Ableton Link (The Fancy Sync Thingy)

Ableton Link keeps OnSong's tempo & beat vibin' in lockstep with Ableton Live & other Link-enabled apps & devices on your same Wi-Fi network. Zero pairing nonsense, zero cables: apps just find each other & join the party automatically. ZOMG!

Once you're in a session, everything in OnSong that dances to the beat clock — the metronome, the drum machine, tempo-synced delays, arpeggios — is all countin' the same beat as every other bleepin' person in the room.

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Turnin' That Thang On

Ableton Link lives in Settlin's ▸ MIDI ▸ Ableton Link. The screen's got three whole parts:

• Ableton Link — the switch itself, straight outta Ableton's own panel. It tells you how many apps are partyin' in the session once you're hooked up.
• Sync Mode — how OnSong's tempo vibes with everybody else's. Peep below.
• Status — Connected when there's at least one other homie, Searchin'… while Link is on but lonelier than a drummer without snacks, & Off when the whole thing ain't runnin'.

You can also yeet over to it from the dock: toggle Beat Sync on any panel & the fancy chip that pops up offers Ableton Link… as a shortcut.

Sync Mode

Link itself is all "no bosses here" — there ain't no master, & any participant can totally remix the shared tempo. Sync Mode is OnSong's own vibe about that:

• Both — share the tempo goin' both ways. Change tempo in OnSong? Everyone else feels it. Somebody else nudges? OnSong rolls with it. The default, & true peer-to-peer energy.
• Lead — OnSong's tempo rules the session, & if a peer tries to get spicy, OnSong's like "nah fam, I'm in charge." Use it when OnSong's drivin' the whole band.
• Follow — OnSong keeps its mouth shut & just takes whatever the session's doin'. Use it when someone else owns the tempo & OnSong's just hitchin' a ride.

The mode sticks around even after you disconnect, so a rig set to Follow stays that way next time you load in.

What Gets Weird While You're Connected

• The shared timeline runs the whole clock. A Link session keeps OnSong's beat clock goin' even when nothin' local is actually playin', which is why beat-sync LEDs start pulsatin' the second you connect.
• Tempo changes broadcast everywhere. In Both or Lead, mess with OnSong's tempo — by tappin' it, loadin' a song with its own tempo, or a section's {tempo:} — & the whole session shifts.
• In Follow, the song's tempo gets ignored in favor of whatever the session's doin'. That's literally the whole point of the mode, but heads up: if you open a chart & the metronome's not playin' at the tempo written on it, that's why.

The Fine Print (aka Why It Breaks)

• Every device's gotta be on the same Wi-Fi network, & that network's gotta let devices actually see each other. Guest networks & half the venue networks out there block that on purpose, which is why your session never finds a buddy 99% of the time.
• No internet needed — Link rocks on a local network with zero router uplink whatsoever, which means a sketchy travel router's actually your best friend on stage.
• Link is peer-to-peer, so there's no "host" device you gotta fire up first. Just plug 'em in any order & go.

If Status's stuck on Searchin'… & another Link app's clearly runnin', it's the network bein' a jerk, not the apps. Put both devices on the same access point — or an ad-hoc one you actually control — before you blame literally anything else.