[Sc-devel] Embedding Specs in SynthDefs

[felix]

On 7/30/07, Scott Wilson <sdwilson at wesleyan.edu> wrote:
> I still think it would be useful to have the scsyndef file and
> Instrument stored together in one convenient package though, at least
> optionally. Maybe when an Instrument is written to disk it could
> optionally have the scsyndef written at the same time, both into a
> subfolder of the Instrument dir.

Instruments are not written to disk.  they are source code.

it is exactly the same as with SynthDef("name",{ })

the advantage is that you can save your Instruments to a directory and
thus always know where to find the source code file.  you could check
file mtimes and recompile any whose instrument files have changed.

you could make a utility that did just that and kept your compiled
synth defs folder up to date.



>
> It's funny how we circle around ideas and assumptions that persist
> from earlier in the development of SC, sometimes pulling away,
> sometimes coming back. From the early days of SC3 it seemed to me
> that the idea of having defs pre-compiled was encouraged. It's been
> interesting to see how the assumption that one is doing that has
> caused some issues. I've sometimes wonder if it makes sense, even
> though I benefit from it. (I have some pieces which use thousands of
> pre-compiled defs. Waiting for them to load is bad enough, I would
> hate to wait for them to be re-compiled...)

computers are very fast these days.

I always honor the maxim that "Programmer time is more important than
Computer time".