Thank you for your excellent reply.
Apologies – I’m new here. I had actually intended it to be one request (MIDI mode setting from footswitch); but ended up with some “commentary” features as well. I’ll try to do better in future. I’ll also do as you suggest and break them down into individual posts in the feature request category.
To give some context: before I got Aeros I was making do with BB and RC-30 and simply learned to get acceptably close with my timing for loop start/stop pushes on the RC-30. Obviously that’s incredibly stressful during live performances – train wrecks can ensue. The purpose of pretty much all my suggestions is to get to the point where I can do what I can do with BB+RC-30 with BB+Aeros, except synced. To be honest, it’s a little bit embarrassing to have spent that much and find Aeros can’t do what an RC-30 can – but I understand it’s all in development and it’s ridiculous to ignore all that Aeros can do instead.
You’ll have to forgive my verbosity; it comes only from enthusiasm for the product.
Freeform mode has no quantisation at all. It would work for one track and part; but then the subsequent tracks are completely unsynced. I think for no-drums (and ideally no-click) songs, what I would like is what’s available (to the exclusion of any other mode) on more basic routers (but with Aeros features available): press start, play a loop, press RPO. That first loop is recorded as a quantised block and implies the tempo.
Of course I understand that it’s created a MIDI loop – but that’s exactly the problem that needs addressing I think. Sometimes a song will require BB (or other drum/beat generator) to be the MIDI master clock – that’s common of course: drum intro; loop recorded quantised to drums. Sometimes a song will require Aeros to be the MIDI master clock: loop recorded sets BPM, drums (or other MIDI clients) are started and synchronise correctly. I don’t think “recable” is a serious solution to the problem of having different songs in a live set.
I don’t think MIDI would have a problem with the master changing – it can be done manually by playing with settings – but the MIDI bus being a loop probably is a problem. I also don’t think it’s unreasonable to have Aeros use both MIDI In and MIDI Out – after all, it’s role is very similar to that of a DAW and a DAW definitely has both connected. The loop issue could be solved fairly easily by simply breaking the virtual “MIDI Thru” that exists inside the Aeros. That would just be a global setting – since cabling could never be a per-song setting.
I have noted that and liked it – I didn’t have anything to add to that so didn’t bother. The only question then is when the Aeros is a clock master or a clock client or neither. It’s down to the user to make sure there is only one clock master on the bus at a time – although it would then be nice to get some symbiotic help from BB firmware too (but of course that’s not for this conversation). My key point is that this needs to be possible in a per-song manner and ideally, therefore, on a footswitch.
Yes, I agree that “users may need to start after transitions” is possible – but it’s only a “may”. If it’s a “may” then it needs a setting – and a per-song setting at that.
Perhaps I’ve used the wrong terminology – but to my mind if those features aren’t a pair then things will go wrong with timing very quickly (dare I suggest that that’s why your developers are struggling so much with auto-quantise, which seems superficially straight-forward?). Auto-quantise sets the size of a loop. That must then be the size of N measures; so combined with a time-signature and possibly beat detection that sets the tempo. That implies the Aeros is then the MIDI master – no other device on the bus has the information needed to work out the tempo after an auto-quantise.
I’m equally confused how you would envisage auto-quantise being anything other than MIDI master – after auto-quantise, what do you imagine would happen to drum machines on the MIDI bus?
That’s excellent – I thought I had tried all settings, but perhaps I’ve missed that. I’ll give it another go. If it is the case, I think I’d argue that that is a song setting not a global setting though.
I’m also pretty patient, so things being coming-in-updates, is okay.
I’m aware of Freeform mode – what I meant was that my feature suggestion of “mode-selection on unused next-part button” could include “freeform” as one of the modes, not the implementation of freeform mode, which of course already exists.
I’m sure you’ll regret saying that 
I like the Aeros very much. It is a huge upgrade from my RC-30 and was quite a leap in money. But I like that it’s still in development and there is potential to influence it with a receptive development team (getting BOSS to fix even their bugs, let alone features is a lost cause). I’m an embedded engineer myself, and a high-end looper has been on my “one day, I’ll make that product myself” list for quite some time. I’m delighted at the possibility that Aeros makes it completely unnecessary for me to do that (given that it’s also insane for me to take on a project of that magnitude alone).
Thank you so much for your time. Don’t feel you have to do a point-by-point response to the above, your time is better spent elsewhere I’m certain. It’s enough for me to know that you’re listening, and hopefully I’m raising some reasonable points.