THE MIDI PROTOCOL

one top bit separates status from data, seven commands per channel, and how much time a serial wire actually takes

Built as a memo rather than a table: the thing worth hanging it up for reads across the room, with the full reference in smaller type below it.

Three sizes in one archive — from a sheet on the fridge to a poster on the wall.

Formats: A4 · A3 · A2
What you get: Print-ready PDFs, one per size, with every letterform converted to outlines — nothing to install, nothing to shift.
Subject: code · everyone · reference · music room

Above, a MIDI byte at true scale, split in half by its top bit. Below, the seven commands it names, and the time the wire actually spends on a chord.

A MIDI CHORD NEVER ARRIVES AT ONCE

An eight-note chord sent over one MIDI cable spreads across 6.72 ms without running status and 4.48 ms with it — not a glitch, just the time a serial link spends sending bytes one at a time.

That is why dense-chord keyboards and sequencers often split voices across several MIDI cables or move to USB-MIDI, where one byte does not wait in line behind another.

On the sheet

Above, a MIDI byte at true scale, split in half by its top bit. Below, the seven commands it names, and the time the wire actually spends on a chord.
Colour carries meaning, but meaning never rests on colour alone — the sheet reads in black and white.
Nothing about how it was made: the sheet carries only what the reader needs.

Printing

Three sizes in the archive: A4 — 210×297 mm, A3 — 297×420 mm, A2 — 420×594 mm.
All text is converted to outlines. No fonts to install, and nothing shifts on another machine.
White background and sparing fills — it prints on a home printer without draining the cartridge.
Margins of at least 10 mm: a home printer cannot print to the edge.
No stroke thinner than 0.3 mm, so nothing disappears in print.

Why the numbers can be trusted. Every countable number here is computed from data rather than typed in, and the sheet must pass 10 independent checks before it is allowed to build — how many items there are, the order they come in, and the claim in the highlighted box itself. If one fails, there is no file.

THE MIDI PROTOCOL

A MIDI CHORD NEVER ARRIVES AT ONCE

On the sheet

Printing

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