Re: [sc-dev] Re: calling the stream upon EventStreamPlayer-stop

[ronald kuivila <rkuivila@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> - patterns are not good at resource management. Any pattern that
> relies on external resources (or, to an extent, any resource defined
> outside the pattern constructor that needs to be maintained across
> events)
> is risky in performance because you might create or destroy
> the resources at the wrong time.
> Monophonic or effect synths qualify
> as "resource[s] defined outside the pattern constructor" because they
> exist only in the context of the embedInStream method.

The only difference between Pmono and Pfx and normal note generation
is that the note off is not scheduled at the moment the note sounds,  
but blocked until
the stream that created the note terminates.

I could use your argument  to insist that note events
should not rely on scheduling a separate "gate" message but should  
instead
send  "sustain" as an argument to synth(s) it creates. (After all,  
the clock could be
stopped.) But then the duration of the note event will not be  
affected by tempo
changes of the clock.

My way of thinking of this is that Patterns are "scores",  
eventstreams are "performances"
Early termination of a stream (whether by user intervention or a time  
control pattern) is
a "performance" decision.

BTW: creating a separate clock to play an eventstream  can give some  
access to the state of the EventStream.
It is  guaranteed that the clock talks to the root of the tree of  
streams created by the tree of
patterns, so you do not have to worry about unknown modifications.  
(PatternConductor does this so
it can flush pending note offs when the eventstream is stopped. Of  
course, this is not actually modifying
the stream in any way.)

This may seem a disjointed response.  My basic point is that Pmono  
and Pfx  are not creating any special
resources, they are just scheduling a gate message that was computed  
when the event was generated.


RJK






> My solution in my chucklib framework is to create a container for an
> event pattern and event stream. The stream remains immutable, but it
> can refer to environment variables that the user can access and
> change. The container also handles resource management (there are user
> hooks to release resources on stop and free). It's a heavier structure
> (too heavy to be a general solution for the class library) but it
> opens up a lot of possibilities that are otherwise impossible or
> prohibitively inconvenient.
>
> So I wonder if there's a way to decouple resource management in Pmono
> and Pfx? It may not be possible, but I've obtained massive benefits by
> using patterns and streams for what they're good at it and creating
> other structures for the things they don't do so well.
>
> hjh
>
> --
> James Harkins /// dewdrop world
> jamshark70@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> http://www.dewdrop-world.net
>
> "Come said the Muse,
> Sing me a song no poet has yet chanted,
> Sing me the universal."  -- Whitman
>
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