Teaching Sound Synthesis in C=C++ on the Raspberry Pi Henrik von Coler and David Runge Audio Communication Group, TU Berlin
[email protected] [email protected] Abstract added, they are not considered for exploring ap- For a sound synthesis programming class in C/C++, plied sound synthesis algorithms in this class. a Raspberry Pi 3 was used as runtime and develop- In a more application-based context, graphi- ment system. The embedded system was equipped cal programming environments like Pure Data with an Arch Linux ARM, a collection of libraries (Pd), MAX MSP or others would be the first for sound processing and interfacing, as well as with choice. They allow rapid progress and interme- basic examples. All material used in and created diate results. However, they are not the best for the class is freely available in public git reposito- platform to enhance the knowledge of sound ries. After a unit of theory on sound synthesis and Linux system basics, students worked on projects synthesis algorithms on a sample-wise level by in groups. This paper is a progress report, point- nature. ing out benefits and drawbacks after the first run of the seminar. The concept delivered a system with C/C++ delivers a reasonable compromise be- acceptable capabilities and latencies at a low price. tween low level access and the comfort of using Usability and robustness, however, need to be im- available libraries for easy interfacing with hard- proved in future attempts. ware. For using C/C++ in the development of sound synthesis software, a software devel- Keywords opment kit (SDK) or application programming Jack, Raspberry Pi, C/C++ Programming, Educa- interface (API) is needed in order to offer access tion, Sound Synthesis, MIDI, OSC, Arch Linux to the audio hardware.