Visual programming would be fun if it didn't involve the mouse.

September 25, 2010 4:26 PM

Is there a realtime audio processing environment that is programmer-oriented? Like pure data, but text mode.

I want to play with audio. Recordings and also realtime effects. I'm trying out pure data. It's basically exactly what I'm looking for. But, it has the most obnoxious user interface ever designed by man.

Is there a text-oriented equivalent to pure data? I'm a programmer by trade, and so I find it very easy to abstract process and filtering chains as text files and functions. But, clicking and dragging tiny virtual "wires" around on the screen is really, really painful--literally, as it drives my RSI crazy.

posted by Netzapper to Technology (5 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh! I should mention that my objection to the interface isn't for performance. I can lick that one with a controller, as b1tr0t suggests.

My problem is that building patches with the mouse is so tedious, when I'm comfortable abstracting into code.
posted by Netzapper at 4:31 PM on September 25, 2010

I'll second CSound
posted by jpziller at 5:26 PM on September 25, 2010

I will also vouch for CSound, Supercollider, Chuck, and (to a lesser degree) Max/MSP (as it's a kissing cousin to Pure Data).
posted by tip120 at 7:54 PM on September 25, 2010

Best answer: Another vote in favor of Chuck. I hear the laptop orchestras get a lot of milage out of it, and a couple of my friends are fluent in it. I've also seen pretty neat things done with CSound.

Then again, a kick in the head is more user-friendly than PD/Max, to me, so YMMV.
posted by Alterscape at 12:32 AM on September 26, 2010

Response by poster: I've gone with chuck. It's missing a couple of key features (simple arithmetic nodes, includes).

But, the language itself is damn-near exactly what I'm looking for.

I've already written a ruby front-end to wrap around it that handles includes and makes experimenting with the thing much easier.
posted by Netzapper at 2:18 PM on September 29, 2010