Web MIDI API - Please Add a Player!

Please reconsider your position and add MIDI player functionality to the Web MIDI API. Though the 26 Feb draft API mentions the HTML <audio> tag, there seems to be little or no enthusiasm at browser makers to support MIDI via the <audio> tag. Why this is the case is beyond me: Any browser that could play MIDIs natively would have a significant advantage over its competitors.

At any rate, since the browser vendors seem to be ignoring MIDI, why not add a MIDIPlayer object to the API & let Javascript programmers do the job? A player interface could be defined very simply , something like this:

startPlay(url);

stopPlay(url);

setAutoplay(url, loopCount)

setMute(true/false)

setPreload(url, true/false)

setCallBack(seconds, function(url, secondsPlayed, secondsRemaining) {

    // The player would invoke the specified callback function
// every xxx seconds, as specified in the setCallback() argument
// A script could use this callback to update an HTML
    // slider element (<input type="range">)

});

The methods are based on the options for the HTML <audio> tag. 

The current WebMIDI API seems to be geared toward sound engineers. Adding a simple player interface would make make MIDI accessible to the millions of more plebian Web developers. A browser maker that implements the rest of the Web MIDI API should be able to add player functionality without little additional work. 

Please consider this low cost, high payoff functionality!

Dick Adams
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The Cyber Hymnal™       <>< 
http://www.hymntime.com/tch