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Re: [microsound] [ot] development environment




On Jan 27, 2005, at 10:08 AM, john saylor wrote:

supercollider and puredata seem to be the best two choices.  which
should i learn first?

pd

cross platform
active development
'cousin' of max
can do as much as you have brain to make it
open source

you'll need to work to get it to do what you want- but it can do pretty
much anything you'll want it to.

I agree with this 100%. Supercollider is more flexible only in the sense that signal objects can be manipulated more dynamically while audio processing is occurring, although often you can get the same thing done in Pd/Max via pre-scripting, matrix~ objects, etc. Otherwise, dataflow languages like Pd are hugely powerful for building nearly any type of application. Anyone who tells you that SC is more powerful because it is a "real" or "textual" language is not familiar with the true nature of dataflow programming. It is a very powerful and non-domain-specific paradigm.


That said, not everyone's brain is compatible with it. Some people find SC easier than Pd, although I'd say most of the time people find Pd easier (if for no other reason than that there is less initial shock).

Supercollider doesn't run on Windows anyway, so unless you're willing to switch to Linux or BSD (which you should of course, if for no other reason than to avoid people telling you to switch), you have to go with Pd. That said, it kicks ass. I prefer Max due to the tons of excellent documentation, easy standalone building, wider array of externals (although Pd is catching up for sure), and Jitter (although gridflow is also becoming very viable as far as I can tell). Of course you can always learn Pd and move to Max later if you want. I installed Pd for the first time a few weeks back, and I was able to begin working immediately. The only real differences are how ordering ambiguities are resolved (I prefer the Max method) how abstraction instantiation is dealt with in regards to arguments (I prefer the Pd method), and if you can edit abstractions or not (you can in Pd, and you can't in Max, but saving an editing abstraction in Pd is functionally equivalent to editing the original in Max anyway). There are of course many features that they do not share, but as far as the core concepts go, that's about it (as far as I can tell). Someone correct me if I'm missing some mid-level differences, which I likely am as I'm not Pd expert.

In summary, Pd will be your new god, and dataflow programming will be your new religion. Convert immediately.

- John


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