[PD] [*] vs [*~]

[David NG McCallum]

On 27/12/06, Tim Blechmann <tim at klingt.org> wrote:

> > Do you mean that it would be difficult to figure out what's a DSP object
> > and what's not, in terms of figuring out what's in the DSP chain?
>
> from the user point of view, i think, it's a good idea, to have a
> specific separation between dsp and messaging, because both work with
> very different concepts.

Maybe I shouldn't be jumping into this discussion so late, with little
programming knowledge, but…

If we're to think about the metaphor of dataflow languages, which is
essentially modelled after electronics and circuits (and I'm thinking
about analogue circuits, although I'm sure a similar argument could be
made for digital), then there should be no difference between
"control" and "audio," because they're the exact same thing.

We might think that separating control and audio makes perfect sense
from a user standpoint---I even think so. But I'm pretty sure that we
only think that way because we've learned to think within the dataflow
paradigm. If this distinction never existed, we wouldn't think twice
about mixing the types, because there wouldn't be any types.

I remember learning the difference between floats and ints. From a
user's standpoint, why bother? I remember resigning myself to "well
that's annoying, but I guess it's necessary." Why does Pd not
distinguish, but Max does?

As far as I understand, the difference between control and audio data
exists purely for computational efficiency, and has no real conceptual
basis. (Maybe I'm asking for a beatdown with that statement…)

D!


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