Chris Anderson @chrisanderson1973@librem.one

Work continued at lunch on a functioning bridge between the audio effects control/client and virtual device. I switched over from a FIFO read/write approach to a basic UDP socket communications link. This is actually better than the serial communications used from the client app to the realworld board.

In any case, the next step is to implement some of the same command decoding in this virtual device, and begin building virtual audio modules.

Building a virtual version of the effects processor's serial port. This will allow me to prototype command sending and interfacing on a Mac, Linux PC, etc. without need for the hardware. Getting these commands to work smoothly is a big deal in the design, so this setup is worth it to put together.

Work tonight was mostly a success. I think the rule on the alien was effect will be to limit it to one side (mono) per instance in the processing chain. This sets things up to look into delivering parameters from the Qt app.

Getting to work on this project, once and for all. The new timeline, including adding a cool feature to create FAUST-based effects.

A bit of work this morning before 6am on the audio effects DSP project. Fixed an indexing issue with the alien wah processing. The plan is to test the fix this evening.

Screenshots from the 7/14/24 effort to build a Kirkstone Yocto image:

AI, ShmAI....I love to code and make things! Looks like some ideas from the day job, concerning coding, is going to leak back into my audio effects project.... QAbstractListModels can work wonders with easily managing a bunch of objects in memory....which is what I need to more easily create stereo effects chains.

I'll have to do a lot of background work on the object management side before revamping the UI, which is part of my current plan.

Reviving the on again / off again 100 Watt guitar amplifier project…. Looked up one of my favorite parts of the design - the power supply. The power supply is extremely critical for getting a nice, loud amplifier.

Getting back into this project.....starting up with simplifying some QT/QML code for creating updates effects parameter packets.....

I'm now well into getting the bill of material ready for a simple 100Watt guitar amplifier.....

100W guitar amp project. It's been a while. This kind of goes back to Electronics II at VT.

Good progress on the embedded side of the audio effects project. I think i have a reasonable design pattern using a C-based method of instantiating DSP modules. I could very easily opt for C++ and that may come up, but we’ll see how this tests out. Lots of new ideas brewing, as well!

More work today, and I was able to actually hear and use the alien wash effect! It is setup for stereo, just as it was with the iPad. I want to expand that functionality, though, and have the two stereo channels take independent parameters. Another add in will be a pedal hook up for one or both sides.

Work continues on this audio effects platform. I implemented an audio effect (alien wah) that first appeared with AnaddrSynth in 2014.

I will be testing it this week.

The WIndows setup scheme is up and running! There are a couple of fine points to resolve, but it works well overall.

That's pretty much it for non-app store releases of binaries / packaging! Linux was easy, but the Mac deployment took a little more effort. I think I can manage the deployments using Amazon Web Services and some scripts. The only issue is that if I ever want to sell anything else through this software, that necessitates using the the Mac App Store.

More work tonight on the audio project: I set up Windows, Mac, and Linux all for reliable builds. Windows is still somewhat of a straggler with an external make project currently required to create a compatible library. It will do, for now. On to creating the release versions of the app, just to have that part of the puzzle solved.

Work on the app's flasher plugin today - starting with the easiest environment - Linux. The whole point is to build this program in a module way from the beginning. (Also - no work on mobile platforms, for now. iOS and Android, both, make using UARTs very difficult and not worth the trouble right off.)

There was work over the last couple of days to set up the Android / Qt build environment. I last worked with this kind of development environment in 2020, and had not attempted the Qt on Android build setup in QtCreator. I finally cracked after a few hours, though, and I am now looking into serial port handling on Android using Qt. Exciting stuff!

Linux firmware updates - about 90% there! A bit of work to, first of all, try out the Linux build of the app, which was fine. The second part was rolling the serial interface library, which was a piece of cake.