[PD] Pd + asterisk?

[IOhannes m zmoelnig]

Russell Bryant wrote:
> Hans-Christoph Steiner wrote:
>> Now that I think about it, it would also work to have each call open  
>> an instance of a patch within one constantly running Pd process.   

just to make sure: you are not talking about creating a system that 
would do that for me as "the" way to use asterisk with Pd?

i think all it needs is an object that tells me that there is a new 
incoming connection and how to access it (that would basically just be 
an ID which can then be used to get the actual data; nevermind whether 
it is creating a new [streamin~] object, connecting to a new jack-port 
or just thawing a frozen part of the patch.


>> Then when the call is dropped, that patch instance would close.  For  
>> this to work well, we'd need to add the ability for a patch to close  
>> itself programmatically (currently, when a patch sends menuclose to  
>> itself, Pd crashes :( )

just to re-iterate: i think you are planning on the wrong level. what 
you are planning seems to be a full-featured environment that does all 
kind of thinks for you.
if i understood the problem correctly, we are not there yet; what, imho, 
has to be done first is creating an as simple as possible way to access 
the data from Pd. generative patches are most likely way to highlevel 
for this.
once we have this low-level API, somebody could go and create the 
environment you are currently dreaming of.

somebody else, could go and create an other environment, that fits their 
needs better.


> 
> Yes, that would certainly be the ideal way to do it.  In fact, instead of
> messing around with multiple Pd processes, I would much rather just help solve
> whatever the problem is that causes this not to work.

i agree that multiple Pd instances are not the way to go.


as i have said, i would keep it as simple as possible, and as general as 
possible:
my suggestion for asterisk is to use jack for dealing with the audio lines.
2 ways come into my mind:
- open a new jack-port (in asterisk) for each call ; leave the 
application to handle this
(on the Pd side this is simple; one can redefine the audio-api (e.g. 
jack-ports used) at runtime; one would then need an external (most 
likely already written by kjetil) to do the jack-routing)

- start with a fixed number of jack-ports (maximum number of 
simultaneous calls) in asterisk; pre-connect all jack-ports from 
asterisk to Pd and switch~ on/off patches for each line as they are 
opened/closed. i guess for many projects this super-simple approach will 
be totally sufficient.


both of these ideas seem to be simple to implement and have the biggest 
overall advantage, not just for Pd, but _also_ for Pd, as they are far 
more simple to use than anything that does things automatically.


mfga.sdr
IOhannes