Pure Data Running On The $25 Raspberry Pi Computer

This is a quick demo, by , of Pure Data running on the $25 Raspberry Pi computer.

Pure Data is a computer programming language for creating music and multimedia. The Raspberry Pi is a new credit card sized computer platform, designed to be an inexpensive, minimal computer.

Technical details from Greenlee below:

Video from my first session with the Raspberry Pi running Pure Data. I’m running Pd 0.44 (test version) with “-nogui -noadc -alsa” flags + a budget USB audio device, and a Novation ReMOTE ZeroSL as the midi device. Raspberry Pi OS is Raspbian “wheezy.” Note, I’m running from the command line, not from inside the X window system (performance with GUI seems more likely to glitch, at least with my first tests). I did not try headphone jack for audio given initial reports were not good (and presently I’m unable to test HDMI audio).

Pd 0.44 here: pure-data.git.sourceforge.net/git/gitweb-index.cgi

I used notes from Miller Puckette sent to the Pd-list (check September 8 & 9, 2012) and some info. fromlog.liminastudio.com/programming/running-puredata-on-the-raspberry-pi to get things going.

DR-OM Pd patch from protoDROM version (Processing+ libPd) available at github.com/s3g/protodrom
blog.makezine.com/2012/09/24/protodrom-prototyping-with-pure-data-and-processing/

DR-OM code for Fluxama iOS app: github.com/fluxama/Drom
DR-OM ready-to-go for iOS: itunes.apple.com/us/app/dr-om/id555409573?mt=8

via Palm Sounds

11 thoughts on “Pure Data Running On The $25 Raspberry Pi Computer

  1. Now this could be very exciting… For a minimal cash investment, you could have an incredible amount if dsp in that little thing. Like the greatest fx pedal of all time

  2. Very interesting, but if you own an iPhone there are plenty of cheap music apps, effects, synths, samplers, drum machines, workstations etc…..

    But this looks fun….

    1. That’s the question that pops right to mind. I think it will be the big task to differentiate what this thing can do (for $25) compared to what can be done with a hand-held iOS box. I also think it would be cool to understand the differences between this an what can be done on an Arduino.

      Forgive me if I sound ignorant. I really don’t know much about these kinds of boxes.

    2. Yes but you would not leave your IOS device in a public space. I think this will be more useful for experimentation, working with special groups, theater, networked audio and for developing audio for public spaces. This is not just about making sounds.

  3. I think the real achievement here is people actually getting Linux to run on this critter. Because without Linux PD wouldn’t have ran at all.

    To be honest I was expecting some deep level hacks to be demonstrated, but ended up surprised that a mere “apt-get install” was used to set this up (apt-get is a very common command on Linux environments to install / remove software).

    As such; IMO the people who setup this Linux distro deserve the credit here.

  4. Hell, if they ported PD over to iOS id be all over that… Doesn’t seem likely though so the Pi is the hope for that at the moment

  5. One my (rev1) Raspi the headphone jack will not work but only produce static with pd (but not with e.g. alsaplay). HDMI-Audio is fine as far as I can tell but I have yet to perform more tests to be reasonably sure.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *