Re: [microsound] matlab and mircrosound

[ben nevile <bbn@xxxxxxxx>]

Apologies in advance to those who find the below technical discussion 
boring.  I am the kind of nerd who finds the technical fascinating and 
the aesthetic pointless!  :)  it takes all kinds, so let's try to enjoy 
the fact that we share a common interest with a diverse group of people.

> has anyone out there ever used matlab for processing, synthesis,
> performance, etc?

I use Matlab on a daily basis.  There is no better environment for 
designing and testing DSP algorithms (in my opinion.)  After designing 
an algorithm in Matlab porting the code into a Max/MSP external is 
relatively straightforward.  Doing things this way saves a lot of time.

> the current version runs on NT and unix, the previous version also 
> runs on
> macs and i hear an os x version is in development.

The OS X version has been out for a while.  It is basically the unix 
version with a few of the components that wouldn't immediately work in 
OS X disabled.  After you jump through all of the required installation 
hoops - a colossal headache, Mathworks is probably the most paranoid 
software company on the planet - it works well.

> Working with matlab and audio is lovely...
> but... like in the old Csound: you don't have real time.

Actually that's not true - there is a signal processing toolkit in 
Matlab that operates in real time.  For musical purposes it's only a 
fraction as flexible or as enjoyable to work with as Max/MSP, but it 
does provide an adequate testing ground for ideas.

> www.octave.org

This is good software too.  Other similar commercial packages are 
Mathematica and Maple, but although it is technically the least 
flexible, for DSP work Matlab is the handiest (in my opinion).

bbn

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