I have written many programs to accomplish a specific task. I haven’t published them before because I thought they’re too specific and I should make them more generic… which isn’t going to happen soon because that’s a lot of work to polish a quick hack into a framework. However, the beauty of open source is that you can quickly hack my quick hack and make it useful in your use case, or clean it up and actually make it a serious thing (or I’ll do it when I retire). Whatever you do, it’s better than my work being wasted because of perfectionism.

faders-midi-osc-router started as x18faders when I wanted to control Behringer XR18 (X18 in rack case) using a MIDI controller. I also wanted the controller’s motorized fader to move on scene load or when mixer setting was changed from another device (tablet with X Air app). It was used during one concert of the band I play in - Maha Fixum (after which I understood that using a digital mixer doesn’t give me enough freedom in making experimental music - i.e. I needed to change source code each time we were repatching our studio signal flow)

This is the first post of the thinking out loud series about the signal processing framework and modular environment I’m developing - SignalDub.

Dubbing the Signals

What’s the functionality I need most when processing audio signals in-the-box (i.e. using a computer)? Dubbing. It has multiple meaning and all those are valid in this context:

• recording
• adding effects in creative way, using them as an instrument (delay and reverb in particular)
• experimenting, using devices not-always-the-way-they-were-designed

I feel that not only music producers and sound engineers, but also visual artists, broadcast engineers… anyone working with multimedia, deserves such system allowing experimentation.

Free as in Freedom

That’s a pretty obvious requirement. You can’t have a hackable system if its core can’t be changed. Also, if the source code is kept secret, the knowledge used to develop it is wasted.

Extreme Modularity and Signal Loops

Most audio software today is modular. You can use whatever DAW you want with your soundcard, insert whatever plugin you want on the track in the DAW. But have you ever tried to insert an EQ on delay’s feedback path? Or distort it?