Stefan Goodchild

Novation Launchpad Life (in Processing)

Using RWMidi library I quickly converted the Game of Life example that comes with Processing to work with the Novation Launchpad.

import rwmidi.*;

MidiInput input;
MidiOutput output;

int sx, sy;
float density = 0.5;
int[][][] world;
int note;

void setup()
{
  size(8, 8, P2D);
  frameRate(5);
  sx = width;
  sy = height;
  world = new int[sx][sy][2]; 

  input = RWMidi.getInputDevices()[2].createInput(this);
  output = RWMidi.getOutputDevices()[2].createOutput();

  // Set random cells to 'on'
  for (int i = 0; i < sx * sy * density; i++) {
    world[(int)random(sx)][(int)random(sy)][1] = 1;
  }
} 

void draw()
{
  background(0); 

  // Drawing and update cycle
  for (int x = 0; x < sx; x=x+1) {
    for (int y = 0; y < sy; y=y+1) {
      note = y * 16 + x;
      //if (world[x][y][1] == 1)
      if ((world[x][y][1] == 1) || (world[x][y][1] == 0 &amp;&amp; world[x][y][0] == 1))
      {
        world[x][y][0] = 1;
        set(x, y, #FFFFFF);
        output.sendNoteOn(0, note, 127);
      } else {
        output.sendNoteOn(0, note, 0);
      }
      if (world[x][y][1] == -1)
      {
        world[x][y][0] = 0;
      }
      world[x][y][1] = 0;
    }
  }
  // Birth and death cycle
  for (int x = 0; x < sx; x=x+1) {
    for (int y = 0; y < sy; y=y+1) {
      int count = neighbors(x, y);
      if (count == 3 &amp;&amp; world[x][y][0] == 0)
      {
        world[x][y][1] = 1;
      }
      if ((count < 2 || count > 3) &amp;&amp; world[x][y][0] == 1)
     {
        world[x][y][1] = -1;
      }
    }
  }
} 

void noteOnReceived(Note note) {
  println("note on " + note.getPitch() + ":"  + note.getVelocity());
  if (note.getVelocity() > 0) {
    int nx = note.getPitch() % 16;
    int ny = (note.getPitch() - nx) / 16;
    output.sendNoteOn(0, note.getPitch(), 100);
    println(nx);
    println(ny);
    world[nx][ny][1] = 1;
  }
}

// Count the number of adjacent cells 'on'
int neighbors(int x, int y)
{
  return world[(x + 1) % sx][y][0] +
         world[x][(y + 1) % sy][0] +
         world[(x + sx - 1) % sx][y][0] +
         world[x][(y + sy - 1) % sy][0] +
         world[(x + 1) % sx][(y + 1) % sy][0] +
         world[(x + sx - 1) % sx][(y + 1) % sy][0] +
         world[(x + sx - 1) % sx][(y + sy - 1) % sy][0] +
         world[(x + 1) % sx][(y + sy - 1) % sy][0];
}

Novation Launchpad – Note number to XY Coordinates and back again.

First thing I did with my new Launchpad? Nope, I didn’t hook it up to Live and jam. I hooked it up, fired up Processing and worked out how to light up the pads and recieve the notes so I could hack it to do anything I wanted to.

One thing I noticed straight off the bat is the note numbers are not incremental. Each row starts 16 higher than the last - I assume to allow for the same firmware to work in a 16 x 16 layout model - and there is a very simple way that reminds me of the technique of bitshifting I used back in the bad old days of DVD authoring to convert from one to the other.

// To go from XY to the note number
noteNumber = y * 16 + x;

// To go from the note number to the XY
x = noteNumber % 16;
y = (noteNumber - x) / 16;

Hopefully that will save someone ten minutes of head scratching.

Limited Run Edgard Varèse T-Shirt by Stefan Goodchild

The third in the series of T-Shirts for Analog Industries. This time it’s Edgard Verése on the podium. If you want to find out more about this gentleman there’s a wikipedia page of course.

It’ll be on order for four days, then we’ll make ‘em and ship ‘em. After that, who knows so keep an eye out at Analog Industries for the pre-sale.

Rails on MediaTemple DV

Followed the great step-by-step from here.

But there’s one bit missing to get it working if you’re getting the 403 errors.

You need to run the following command to tell Plesk to use your spanking new vhost.conf

/usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/websrvmng -u --vhost-name=<domain>

SpecializeIn

SpecializeIn - Design / Front End Development (Ruby On Rails, SASS, HAML)

Design and front end development for SpecializeIn.com, the project I am product managing at Jiva