JavaScript desktop programs with NW.js

This is an overview and tutorial of how to create desktop programs for Linux, Mac and Windows using NW.js.

NW.js is a framework for building desktop applications with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. It works by combining a JavaScript app with Node.js and Google’s Chromium browser engine into a single desktop program.

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Volca-Freesound

Volca-Freesound is an online app to load samples on the Korg Volca Sample.

It selects random samples from the freesound.org database. So it’s not a sample manager like Vosyr or Caustic Editor. This app chooses random samples by itself. You can only control the maximum length of the samples and which Volca slots to overwrite, but not much else.

The app is a sort of ‘sample randomizer’. Use it to bring new life to your Volca Sample. Let it create a selection of new and unexpected samples that might inspire you to create new music.

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Euclidean Pattern Generator 1.2

EPG 1.2

Euclidean Pattern Generator 1.2

This is the final version of the Euclidean Pattern Generator as a Java desktop application. I built this version five years ago, but never quite finished it. Now I want to get it out of the way to make a fresh start with a new online Javascript Euclidean patterns app that runs in the browser.

New in this last Java version is MIDI note triggering of patterns. That means individual patterns can be started and stopped by external MIDI Note On and Note Off messages. A drawback of earlier versions was that all patterns always played. There was just one button to start or stop all of them. I wanted to control patterns individually so that I could more easily make some sort of song arrangement.

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Force Touch and Web Audio on the iPhone

3d touch iphone

3D Touch with pressure.js

Since a few weeks I have an iPhone 6S. It has 3D Touch, Apple’s technology to detect pressure on the phone’s screen. It takes some time getting used to. Things unexpectedly happen when you press down on the screen. But it feels naturally very soon. It’s like a third dimension after swiping across the surface of the screen.

The possibilities for audio and music are exciting. Drum rhythms can be tapped in much more expressively. All kinds of sound parameters can be controlled by pressure.

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Generating MIDI with physics

Tinguely sculpture

Tinguely sculpture

This is an idea for an application that generates MIDI notes from moving machine parts. Not real machines however, but software simulations. Cogs, wheels and gears that rhythmically rotate and drive each other and while doing so transmit their rotation, torque and most importantly their collisions as MIDI notes and CC messages.

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