[PD-dev] libpd partly working with pd instances

Miller Puckette msp at ucsd.edu
Mon May 12 16:12:22 CEST 2014


I think the global shared symbol space will cause some confusion (patches
will have to protect their sends and receives, etc., by fabricating local
names using '$' characters.  

Also, it won't be possible to run several Pds concurrently on several
threads - in a threaded environment, each Pd instance will have to lock
all others out while it runs.  (There might be a fix for that by replacing
all static variables in Pd by thread-local ones, but this is untested and
I'd hate to do it unless there's a real need for it, since it would involve
systematically changing 100s of variable definitions in Pd.)

I'm not sure about timing - that depends partly on the libpd release process 
that I'm not involved in.

cheers
Miller
On Mon, May 12, 2014 at 09:45:25AM -0400, Rob Bairos wrote:
> Hi Miller.
> Thats very exciting news!
> Can you give a brief synopsis of what you think the biggest remaining
> limitations are and a rough  timeline as to when a stable multi-instance
> pdlib would be available for general use?
> 
> Thanks again!
> Rob Bairos.
> 
> 
> 
> On Sun, May 11, 2014 at 3:00 AM, Miller Puckette <msp at ucsd.edu> wrote:
> 
> > To Pd developers...
> >
> > I've adapted Pd to nternally use a "pdinstance" structure to allow
> > multiple schedulers (including DSP chains) to run in one address space.
> > With slight modification (see below) libpd can use this to run separate
> > patches asynchronously.
> >
> > I tried to "instance-ize" all Pd symbols to keep them private but ran into
> > seemingly insoluble problems, so am leaving all symbols global for now.
> > (So patches used in pdlib, if they want to be usable in a multiple-instance
> > scenaro, should protect all send/receive/table/delay/etc named objects with
> > a $[0-9] somewhere.
> >
> > I didn't look hard, but I thnk pdlib now will need a way to send $
> > arguments
> > to patches via libpd_openfile() somehow.  Also, libpd_init_audio() will
> > want to
> > make number of channels per-instance, etc.  I've put some relevant comments
> > in the test program I'll include below (and sorry for the length of this
> > mail!)
> >
> > Here's how I modified libpd_wrapper/z_libpd.c:
> >
> > 55d54
> > <   sys_time = 0;
> > 110c109
> > <   sched_tick(sys_time + sys_time_per_dsp_tick);
> > ---
> > >   sched_tick();
> > 130c129
> > <     sched_tick(sys_time + sys_time_per_dsp_tick); \
> > ---
> > >     sched_tick(); \
> >
> > ----------------------
> > and here (sorry again) is the test program, "pdtest2.c" adapted from
> > libpd-master/samples/c_samples/c/pdtest.c :
> > ---------------------
> >
> > #include <stdio.h>
> > #include "z_libpd.h"
> > #include "m_imp.h"
> > #define TIMEUNITPERMSEC (32. * 441.)
> >
> > void pdprint(const char *s) {
> >   printf("%s", s);
> > }
> >
> > void pdnoteon(int ch, int pitch, int vel) {
> >   printf("noteon: %d %d %d\n", ch, pitch, vel);
> > }
> >
> > int main(int argc, char **argv) {
> >   t_pdinstance *pd1 = pdinstance_new(), *pd2 = pdinstance_new();
> >   if (argc < 3) {
> >     fprintf(stderr, "usage: %s file folder\n", argv[0]);
> >     return -1;
> >   }
> >
> >   int srate = 44100;
> >     // maybe these two calls should be available per-instnace somehow:
> >   libpd_set_printhook(pdprint);
> >   libpd_set_noteonhook(pdnoteon);
> >     /* set a "current" instance before libpd_init() or else Pd will make
> >     an unnecessary third "default" instance. */
> >   pd_setinstance(pd1);
> >   libpd_init();
> >     /* ... here we'd sure like to be able to have number of channels be
> >     per-nstance.  The sample rate is still global within Pd but we might
> >     also consider relaxing that restrction. */
> >   libpd_init_audio(1, 2, srate);
> >
> >   float inbuf[64], outbuf[128];  // one input channel, two output channels
> >                                  // block size 64, one tick per buffer
> >
> >   pd_setinstance(pd1);  // talk to first pd instance
> >
> >   // compute audio    [; pd dsp 1(
> >   libpd_start_message(1); // one entry in list
> >   libpd_add_float(1.0f);
> >   libpd_finish_message("pd", "dsp");
> >
> >   // open patch       [; pd open file folder(
> >   libpd_openfile(argv[1], argv[2]);
> >
> >   pd_setinstance(pd2);
> >
> >   // compute audio    [; pd dsp 1(
> >   libpd_start_message(1); // one entry in list
> >   libpd_add_float(1.0f);
> >   libpd_finish_message("pd", "dsp");
> >
> >   // open patch       [; pd open file folder(
> >   libpd_openfile(argv[1], argv[2]);
> >
> >     /* the follownig two messages can be sent without setting the pd
> > nstance
> >     and anyhow the symbols are global so they may affect multiple
> > instances.
> >     However, if the messages change anyhing in the pd instacne structure
> >     (DSP state; current time; list of all canvases n our instance) those
> >     changes will apply to the current Pd nstance, so the earlier messages,
> >     for instance, were sensitive to which was the current one.
> >
> >     Note also that I'm using the fact taht $0 is set to 1003, 1004, ...
> >     as patches are opened -it would be better to opent the patches with
> >     settable $1, etc parameters to libpd_openfile().  */
> >
> >   // [; pd frequency 1 (
> >   libpd_start_message(1); // one entry in list
> >   libpd_add_float(1.0f);
> >   libpd_finish_message("1003-frequency", "float");
> >
> >   // [; pd frequency 1 (
> >   libpd_start_message(1); // one entry in list
> >   libpd_add_float(2.0f);
> >   libpd_finish_message("1004-frequency", "float");
> >
> >   // now run pd for ten seconds (logical time)
> >   int i, j;
> >   for (i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
> >     // fill inbuf here
> >     pd_setinstance(pd1);
> >     libpd_process_float(1, inbuf, outbuf);
> >     if (i < 2)
> >     {
> >         for (j = 0; j < 8; j++)
> >             printf("%f ", outbuf[j]);
> >         printf("\n");
> >     }
> >     pd_setinstance(pd2);
> >     libpd_process_float(1, inbuf, outbuf);
> >     if (i < 2)
> >     {
> >         for (j = 0; j < 8; j++)
> >             printf("%f ", outbuf[j]);
> >         printf("\n");
> >     }
> >   }
> >
> >   return 0;
> > }
> >
> > ----------------------
> > I replaced "test.c" as follows:
> > ---------------------
> >
> > #N canvas 406 290 450 300 10;
> > #X obj 97 64 loadbang;
> > #X obj 97 131 print;
> > #X obj 186 106 dac~;
> > #X obj 97 107 f 0;
> > #X obj 128 107 + 1;
> > #X obj 97 86 metro 2;
> > #X obj 185 41 r \$0-frequency;
> > #X obj 188 73 osc~;
> > #X obj 248 127 print \$0-frequency;
> > #X obj 248 97 loadbang;
> > #X connect 0 0 5 0;
> > #X connect 3 0 1 0;
> > #X connect 3 0 4 0;
> > #X connect 4 0 3 1;
> > #X connect 5 0 3 0;
> > #X connect 6 0 7 0;
> > #X connect 6 0 8 0;
> > #X connect 7 0 2 0;
> > #X connect 7 0 2 1;
> > #X connect 9 0 8 0;
> >
> > ----------------------------
> > and got this output:
> >
> > print: 0
> > 1003-frequency: bang
> > print: 0
> > 1004-frequency: bang
> > 1003-frequency: 1
> > 1004-frequency: 2
> > 1.000000 1.000000 0.999999 0.999999 0.999998 0.999998 0.999997 0.999997
> > 1.000000 1.000000 0.999998 0.999998 0.999996 0.999996 0.999995 0.999995
> > print: 1
> > 0.999944 0.999944 0.999943 0.999943 0.999942 0.999942 0.999941 0.999941
> > print: 1
> > 0.999815 0.999815 0.999810 0.999810 0.999804 0.999804 0.999799 0.999799
> > print: 2
> > print: 2
> >
> > ... Looks like there are 2 schedulers adn DSP chains running :)
> >
> > Miller
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Pd-dev mailing list
> > Pd-dev at iem.at
> > http://lists.puredata.info/listinfo/pd-dev
> >



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