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Two names do most of the work on this sheet.

• Console — the window you drive from. Unison sidebar → Present → Console.
• Settings — the cog on the console's top bar. Four tabs: Words, Credit, Corners, This machine. This sheet writes it as Settings → Corners.

Setting up

1. Plug into the projector. Set the display to Extended, not mirrored. (macOS: Settings → Displays → Use as → Extended. Windows: Win+P → Extend.) Check: the projector should show an empty desktop, not your Unison window.
2. Open the console. Unison → sidebar → Present → Console.
3. Pick the service from the Set list dropdown, top left.
4. Pick the projector in the screen dropdown, then click Open screen. (Chrome and Edge show that dropdown. Safari and Firefox do not — open the window and drag it across yourself.)
5. Full screen it. Click the output window, press F. If nothing happens, click inside it again and press F once more.
6. Band screen? Click Stage, drag it there, press F.
7. Put a countdown up.

Driving it

Next / back	→ or Space / ←
Blank the screen	B
Church logo up	Logo pill
Find a line	/ then type
Undo a removal	⌘Z
Clicker (Page Up / Page Down)	Works in the output window only — click that window first

Click a slide and it is live. Tick Hold before live at the bottom if you want to stage first, then Enter to send.

Red is live — the panel marked THE ROOM SEES. Green is next.

Click a window once before using its keys. The console and the output each listen only when they are the active window.

Running from Ableton Present Plus

1. Click the MIDI pill. Chrome asks permission once. Every slide then shows the note that fires it — read them off the slides, that chip is the truth.
2. The pill always reads MIDI. The colour is the state: white off · green listening · amber on, but nothing is connected.
3. Route Ableton out. Ableton → a MIDI track → out to the IAC Driver bus (Mac) or loopMIDI (Windows).

How the notes are handed out

• One channel per song, in the order they are sung — song one on channel 1, song two on channel 2, and so on to fifteen.
• One note per slide inside a song, climbing from C3.
• Slides you insert into a song run from E6 upward, separately.
• Blanks, PowerPoints and videos all cue on channel 16.

That division is deliberate: adding a blank or dropping in the pastor's PowerPoint cannot move a single song cue.

Two machines — what you do every time you switch on

Ableton on one Mac, the screen on another. There are two ways to join them. Use whichever your church set up; the person who set it up should tick one here: ☐ Network MIDI   ☐ Stage bridge

Network MIDI

Set up once and it stays set up: a session on each Mac, Who may connect to me → Anyone, Ableton's output routing, Chrome's MIDI permission, and the MIDI pill. None of that needs doing again.

The join is the only thing that doesn't survive switching off. macOS will not reconnect it by itself. So, in this order:

1. Both Macs on, on the same network. Guest wifi usually will not work — most of it stops machines seeing each other.
2. On the Ableton Mac, Audio MIDI Setup → Window → Show MIDI Studio → double-click Network. Find the screen Mac in the Directory, select it, click Connect.
3. Then open Ableton.
4. Then open the Console in Chrome.

Stage bridge

If your church uses the bridge instead, open bridge.html on the Ableton machine and type the same pairing key on both. Shift-click the MIDI pill on the console to see or change that key. This route also works when the console's browser has no MIDI of its own.

Prove it in ten seconds

Sidebar → MIDI check on the screen machine, and play a note. It touches nothing and reports what the browser can actually hear.

• Notes appearing → the chain works. Wrong note number at worst.
• Inputs listed, no notes → the join, or Ableton's routing. Not the console.
• No inputs at all → the session isn't there, or Chrome has lost Local Network permission (System Settings → Privacy & Security → Local Network — a Chrome update can silently drop it).

For a permanent installation: a cheap network switch and two ethernet cables beats wifi every time, and also cures the screen changing half a beat late.

Mid-service

Extra chorus → right-click the slide → Arrangement — repeat or reorder… → add the section again.

Song not in the service → click it in the Song library → Add to running order.

Typo on screen → right-click → Edit this slide's words…. Tonight only; the church's song is safe. The menu shows (edited) afterwards.

A dark beat, or holding pictures at the top → right-click → Insert a slide before this one… / after this one… → leave the words empty → set How many. Each blank takes its own background and its own MIDI note.

Put a picture on a slide → Media → drag the card onto it, or click the card then click the slide. A background runs on until something changes it — Clear background from here stops it.

Car in the way → NOTICES card → pick the template → fill the boxes → On the screen (or Over the words, or To the stage).

Message to the band → type in the STAGE DISPLAY card → Send. The congregation cannot see it.

If something breaks

Symptom	Fix
Arrow keys do nothing	Click the window you mean to drive
Clicker does nothing	Click the output window — the console does not listen to a clicker
Projector shows your console	Display is mirrored — set it to Extended
Console moves, screen doesn't follow	The two are on different builds — reload both, output last
Output ignoring the console	Click the output window, press ⌘R
Blank looks wrong after blanking from the output	Blank from the console instead and the two agree again
MIDI note fires, nothing moves	The console names the note it heard. No message at all = MIDI isn't arriving
"MIDI is arriving — but MIDI is switched off here"	Click the MIDI pill. The switch is remembered per machine and starts off
MIDI pill is amber	On, but nothing is connected. On two machines the session has dropped — reconnect it
"MIDI input lost: …" mid-service	The session dropped. Usually a sleeping wifi card. Reconnect in Audio MIDI Setup
No MIDI pill at all	The church is on Present Essentials. MIDI is Present Plus
New MIDI bus not listed	Reload the console — Chrome only looks at page load
Background is black	That file isn't on this laptop — re-import it in Media
Countdown ended on black	No holding still chosen — Settings → Corners → Church logo / holding still
Notice won't clear	Clear the notice on the NOTICES card
Output window closed	Reopen it — it resumes where it was
Nothing opens when clicked	Allow pop-ups for this site

The words never go down because a background is missing. If the picture fails, the text stays.

Afterwards

Need the list of what you played? Settings → Credit tab → Download what was projected (CSV) — it saves as unison-projected-songs.csv: date, title, service, and your church's licence number if one is saved.

That record lives in this browser. The backup below carries it too — and merges it rather than overwriting, so two machines' history adds up instead of one wiping the other. Even so, export it before anyone clears the laptop.

Back it up — once, after you build the service

Settings → This machine → Back up this console. One zip file, media included.

It carries the whole console: the running order, inserted blanks and their pictures, splits, retyped lines, notice templates, fonts and colours, the MIDI note map, and the projection log.

Keep it somewhere that is not this laptop — a stick in the desk drawer, or the shared drive.

On a new machine: sign in → Console → Settings → This machine → choose the file. It tells you what it will replace before it does anything, then you press Replace what's here. Afterwards it says what it brought.

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