Let's get this community rolling

Posted by Stefano on Sun, 22 Jan 2023 21:37:34 GMT.

Sorry for not having updated you in a long time. We actually have quite many news but we've also been incredibly busy lately (and still are).

Let's get started right away!

We have a forum

This blog was started with the main intention of fostering open and sincere discussion on music technology, as outlined in the very first post. Yet it lacked the most basic feature that allows that: a bi-directional communication channel. I thought we would put one in place after a month or so, but finally here it is despite the large delay.

You can access it here. It serves both as a commenting system for blog posts and to start new discussion, etc. Well… you know what a forum is, don't you?

We carefully avoided to lock ourselves into those new shiny platforms you see around these days, as not only we value privacy (for real), but also because we dislike walled gardens.

Brickworks released

Have you heard of Brickworks?

We started this new free/open source project (with a commercial licensing option) about 3 months ago. It provides you with a collection of essential DSP algorithms coded in plain C, polished, and packaged in such a way that they can be used anywhere, from embedded hardware to web pages, including mobile and desktop applications/plugins.

The idea is that we will finally have a common, robust, and relatively wide set of carefully coded music DSP algorithms that everybody can use. For us, this also means that we will be capable of complementing our custom DSP services with standardized algorithms that we can trust, thus lowering prices, speeding up development, and reducing risks. Ain't that nice?

We already had two alpha releases, and the next one should happen rather soon (maybe next week).

If you have any ideas on what features could be added post 1.0.0, we now have a forum thread to discuss that.

Ciaramella expands and development goes public

We have finally implemented "true" conditionals in Ciaramella as anticipated in a previous post — well, we actually have a few bugs to iron out, but it's mostly done.

You can't yet see that yet as the development was carried out outside of the public repo. But we want to change that. We are going to update the repo and continue developing there, or in another public repo if we think that's better for some reason.

Now, as this feature is quite innovative, we're also in the process of writing a paper on the issue and submit it to some journal or conference. At the same time we're wondering where to stop with new features and call the syntax/semantics stable for a first iteration, so that we can also concentrate on the tooling.

In any case, also for Ciaramella we now have a forum thread to collect use cases.

Orastron in the media

I was on WolfTalk #009 lately, giving some (hopefully good) advice on freelancing in the music industry and talking about our recent developments.

Also, yet another local newspaper made me an interview, but I can't find it online, so let's just add that to the records.

New DSP research in the works

As we didn't have enough things to do already, we're collaborating with a couple of well-known researchers on one or two new papers on explicit resolution of certain nonlinear equations and related approximated models of nonliear electronic components. Enough spoiling here.

Reworked internal software infrastructure and administrative processes

Other major changes are invisible to the outside: we have completely rebuilt our internal software infrastructure from scratch and streamlined certain administrative processes that wasted a lot of our time.

We now have our own Wireguard-based VPN, new file sharing systems, backup tools, etc. Unsexy but fundamental stuff.

What next

As said, a new Brickworks release is due soon and we're thinking hard on where and how to push Ciaramella.

Other than that, we want to substantially improve our communication and nurture and grow our community from this point on, as we now have all the basic tools that are needed.

Want to be part of it?