GSoC idea: overhaul of processing-sound library

Hello,

one of the suggestions on the GSoC project list is bringing the processing-sound library up to date, with a particular eye on improving support across platforms. Having had a look at forum posts and the repository it seems that most of the unresolved issues of the past few years can be traced back to (non-Java) libraries that are dependencies of the Methcla synthesis engine whose maintenance status is unclear (and which is in either case only very sparsely documented).

I was therefore wondering whether it would be more constructive to do a complete overhaul of the library and replacing Methcla with a native Java sound synthesis engine (to maximise platform compatibility)? The processing-sound API is not that massive so it's definitely a manageable task, and it would go hand in hand with improving and extending the existing documentation and tutorials.

Regarding candidate libraries that are mature/stable, well-maintained and tested across many platforms I was wondering about JSyn, which is a very small download yet has all the synthesis and analysis capabilities required by processing-sound, and much more (javadoc). So while it would be possible to expand the sound library API quite a bit, I guess there's a trade-off there with making it a beginner-friendly library that is not too overwhelming? For more complex (and computationally expensive) stuff more experienced people will probably want to move on to minim or even SuperCollider anyway..

I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts on this idea, and also if anyone would be interested in mentoring.

Best! Kevin

Comments

  • Sounds great. The current sound library is not so good. (Far from good). You can't check if a sound is playing, you can't see how far it is with playing, if play is called on a sound that plays then it stutters etc. I see students fall back to minim all the time, which in my opinion is still way better.

    About the complexity / jSyn / whatever I don't know. I just wanted to tell that I think it would be great if the sound department of processing get's some patching.

  • I'm tagging @reas for his thoughts about the state of the current sound library.

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