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Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

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Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#61

Post by usrusr »

DonHopkins wrote: post #55
jancsika wrote: post #14

Max is Max/MSP, where: * MSP is an engine for generating/synthesizing/analyzing realtime audio which the user builds as a diagram in a GUI. The backend automatically sorts the diagram into a graph and generates the audio as the user builds the program. So by the end, the programmer has used their ears to measure whether the program can indeed compute audio for the diagram in realtime. (And the corresponding classes f…

Bravo! If you enjoyed that anti-Max performance art trolling, but thought it wasn't spectacularly hyperbolic and sociopathic enough, I recommend looking up some of the classic flames on the nettime mailing list by Netochka Nezvanova aka "NN" aka "=cw4t7abs", "punktprotokol", "0f0003", "maschinenkunst" (preferably spelled "m2zk!n3nkunzt"), "integer", and "antiorp"! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netochka_Nezvanova_(aut…

Oh, it was so futuristic! I was young and easily impressed. It was the last time for me that the present felt like a prelude to the future. A few years later and the progress of time meant little more than a constant dribble of new codepoints getting added to the emoji set.

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#62

Post by peapicker »

AndrewUnmuted wrote: post #50
qmmmur wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> exploiting the tired and inefficient trope of the noodly "patch connections" That's the whole point. pd works the same way and so does vcvrack among more localised tools like Reaktor. > The new versions are made using the JUCE framework, and yet it has no Linux support. WTF? I don't have any love for JUCE but you are naive to think that its as easy as setting a new compile target and pressing go. Max is for profit…

> Max is for profit and they need to target the most salient customers. The problem with this is that... > professional use of Max ... surely, you jest. This software is not stable enough, useful enough, nor performant enough to be used in professional settings, outside of perhaps some of the "multimedia performance" buffoonery of people like Carsten Nicolai. One could not reasonably use Max/MSP for scientific or aca…

Max/MSP is used professionally by Autechre for many albums now as well as live on stage.

I’ve written several devices and never had any problems yet. I’m using a bog standard laptop from 18 months ago.

I also Reactor and ChucK and JUCE directly.

Nice rant tho.

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#63

Post by sunjiroaoul »

tayistay wrote: post #56
AndrewUnmuted wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Max is for profit and they need to target the most salient customers. The problem with this is that... > professional use of Max ... surely, you jest. This software is not stable enough, useful enough, nor performant enough to be used in professional settings, outside of perhaps some of the "multimedia performance" buffoonery of people like Carsten Nicolai. One could not reasonably use Max/MSP for scientific or aca…

Why do you find Pd so much better? FWIW, Radiohead used Max/MSP live IIRC. Aphex Twin has used it. Neither are "multimedia performance buffoonery". Though I love your characterization because I've been subjected to plenty of said buffoonery.

For us plebes, the FOSS makes pd great. Backwards compatibility is nice, resurrecting 10 year old patches has never been a problem for me.

I suspect being successful musicians, cycling74 has an interest in getting their product into your rig. I bet Johnny Greenwood gets custom objects if he calls them up.

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#64

Post by DonHopkins »

usrusr wrote: post #61
DonHopkins wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bravo! If you enjoyed that anti-Max performance art trolling, but thought it wasn't spectacularly hyperbolic and sociopathic enough, I recommend looking up some of the classic flames on the nettime mailing list by Netochka Nezvanova aka "NN" aka "=cw4t7abs", "punktprotokol", "0f0003", "maschinenkunst" (preferably spelled "m2zk!n3nkunzt"), "integer", and "antiorp"! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netochka_Nezvanova_(aut…

Oh, it was so futuristic! I was young and easily impressed. It was the last time for me that the present felt like a prelude to the future. A few years later and the progress of time meant little more than a constant dribble of new codepoints getting added to the emoji set.

But we have face tracking piles of poo now!

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#65

Post by DonHopkins »

jcelerier wrote: post #19
pmoriarty wrote: post #17

I have a real problem with visual languages like Max and PureData (and all the other visual languages I've ever seen). They seem like a good idea, and might be fine for computer-phobic people just starting to be introduced to programming, but whenever one tries to make anything even a little complex in them they inevitably become a mess of spaghetti-code. Languages like these also don't have the almost hundred years…

> Languages like these also don't have the almost hundred years of research and effort in to creating an ecosystem around them like text-based languages do. c'mon, the first dataflow languages date from the 60s, that's barely after the first textual PLs - see eg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQhVQ1UG6aM > There's no way to harness the incredible power of text editors like vim or emacs. have fun showing most art stu…

I hate to be the one to say it, but vim and emacs are basically just programmable card punch machine emulators. Of course Emacs is obviously the best card punch machine emulator, by far, though. ;)

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#66

Post by spacechild1 »

jancsika wrote: post #14

Max is Max/MSP, where: * MSP is an engine for generating/synthesizing/analyzing realtime audio which the user builds as a diagram in a GUI. The backend automatically sorts the diagram into a graph and generates the audio as the user builds the program. So by the end, the programmer has used their ears to measure whether the program can indeed compute audio for the diagram in realtime. (And the corresponding classes f…

How much of your critique of Max/MSP does apply to Pd? ;-)

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#67

Post by qmmmur »

tayistay wrote: post #54
qmmmur wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, this kind of comment really only comes from someone who has never used the language in any kind of depth. Whether or not the object triggers twice depends on type of object as you pointed out, ordering of inputs forgetting whether or not two executions is perhaps intended.

Proving my main point--that the semantics are interesting--by way of nitpick and ad hominem.

Oops! I meant to respond to the parent of _your_ parent, not yours. Apologies!

Re: Max/MSP: A visual programming language for music and multimedia

#68

Post by miillkk »

jancsika wrote: post #14

Max is Max/MSP, where: * MSP is an engine for generating/synthesizing/analyzing realtime audio which the user builds as a diagram in a GUI. The backend automatically sorts the diagram into a graph and generates the audio as the user builds the program. So by the end, the programmer has used their ears to measure whether the program can indeed compute audio for the diagram in realtime. (And the corresponding classes f…

I teach Max at a college level currently. The Rube Goldberg machines you speak of result from over engineering and the weird philosophy Cycling 74 has of always having new versions of Max be backwards compatible.

However after you spend a good amount of time you start to be able to avoid these higher-level over engineered mini libraries and be able to use lower level operators to achieve exactly what you want and nothing more. After you build up your own library of modules all is well.

But I do agree with your point. I've even been creating my own counters lately because even simple things like the counter "object" in Max are so bloated.

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