Live Nightclub Hacking

rjjm writes "Alex Mclean has written a stormin' article at perl.com on Hacking Perl In Nightclubs. Alex programmes live on stage to perform his music."

Comments

I like perl

[Slashbot Hive-Mind]

'm going to stick my neck out and say I like Perl -- so I think this is good news. However, I've always thought of Perl as a text-processing language, and In My Limited Experience, mobile phones can only fit about ten words on the screen. {on the other hand, this could simply lead to phones with bigger screens.}

There's no denying that you can write really ugly code in Perl, but you can also write beautiul code in Perl. I think some of the people who knock Perl are confusing "undisciplined" with "not anal retentive". Perl was always based around the idea of serving the end rather than the means -- it's about where you're at, rather than how you got there. It does not impose a particular style on the programmer. Thus, for any given task, there could be many, many ways to accomplish it in Perl.

They're all right.

Some will be faster than others, some will use fewer resources than others, some will look prettier then others when viewed as source. But if you don't care enough about those things to mention them in the design spec, then they don't matter.

Now, you can have your fancy object-oriented stuff, but in many ways it's overkill. For instance, if you needed to write a programme involving geometry, you could create an Angle object which would have a value assumed to be in radians and properties for its sine, cosine, tangent and representation in degrees; a Distance object which would have properties for its representation in different measuring units; and assigning a value to any property would affect the object and therefore its other properties. It might be beautiful if you like the OO concept, but it's a bit overkill if you just want to find the missing side of a triangle.

And does a "disposable" programme -- one that you will run only a few times before forgetting it forever -- really need to look pretty anyway?

As for PHP, well, it really isn't much different from Perl -- apart from always needing to put brackets around function parameters, the fact that all variables start with a $ sign whether scalar, array or hash and there is no $_. {I happen to love $_. It goes nicely with the concept of an accumulator. If you never did any assembly language, you probably won't know what I'm talking about, though}. That is hardly surprising, because the original PHP was actually written in Perl to be like a kind of subset of Perl.

Also, one of my little niggles -- and I freely admit that this is just my own opinion -- is the inability to get on with any language that uses the plus sign as the string concatenation operator while letting you freely mix string and numberic variables. {*cough* ruby *cough*} I expect "2" + 2 to equal 4, not 22. Hell, if I have to do something to my variables before I can add them, that just nullified the advantage of having freely-mixable scalar types! It might as well be a strict-typed language and barf on an expression such as "2" + 2!

As for Python - well, it's not my cup of tea {I guess you like either Perl or Python} but other people seem to have written some pretty good stuff in it, so I shan't knock it.

Re:I like perl

[Ignignot]

Yeah um... I'm gunna go ahead and disagree with you on this one.

The true value of any code is its current use combined with its reusability. Yes, it is nice to be able to write some code that does something useful quickly. But that code that can be used again and again is extremely valuable - and is especially valuable when other programmers can also reuse your code. Perl is hard to reuse when you wrote your own program. For someone else to understand it is a nightmare. And yes, I've written software in perl. I've written in assembly, basic, visual basic, C, C++, Pascal, matlab, excel, delphi, and bash. Only assembly rivals perl in incomprehensibility, and that is only when it isn't commented. Perl's lack of structure is an impediment to other people reusing the code. For a one-off program, or something very well defined and documented, Perl is fine. But it sure ain't pretty.

Re:I like perl

[jallen02]

Though, think about the thousands of little Perl scripts that do this and that, each one using some little syntax trick or another. The end result is that to REALLY understand all the scripts out there you have to basically learn all of the dialects of Perl. Its like learning several child languages that are all a part of this twisted parent language. It kills me to have to remember syntax rules like that.

Compare that to almost any python script out there. The syntax is the same, the program can still "do it more than one way", but it does it with a more clear syntax that is easier to follow. I think the idea that there is more than one way to do it is true for just about any programming language. There are the preferred methods, but nothing is stopping you from coding your own library or method of performing this task or that.

Its the same reason LISP is a great academic language but not a commercial success, even though it is so very powerful to those that can wield it. You can basically re-define the meaning of everything you see, and often its encouraged as you are basically writing source code that is the parse tree of the program! (I Know this isn't true for Perl, but it feels the same way, the language can be varied so much maintaining disparate and differeing scripts can be difficult). Data, oh thats all a part of the parse-tree/program. XML? Bah, the Lisp guys invented that with the S-Expression etc. ;)

Now then, you could still use Perl with complete efficiency in a project that standardized on various language constructs, but you WOULD have to standardize or you would be in a maintenance and integration hell :)

I just think its much better to have a powerful and easy to use language that doesn't introduce artificial hurdles like syntax constructs that can easily be more understandable in any other programming language. Anyway, I will stop prattling. I know that people who like Perl will stay using Perl because they did bother to learn all of the Arcane syntax and now they feel they should inflict their sick and twisted knowledge on the rest of the world ;););) (Just kidding).

Jeremy

Re:I like perl

[maximilln]

It might as well be a strict-typed language and barf on an expression such as "2" + 2!

That's my personal preference. I don't want the language that I use to try and make assumptions about what to do with the combination of different types of variables. As a programmer I feel that it enforces a valid and advantageous logic of purism when the language requires that the programmer be constantly aware of delineations between variable types. This mindset encourages the programmer to constantly think about what data is passed using the variables. I feel that, if this were strictly enforced, it would lead to fewer buffer overflows. Programmers in general would be mindful that the data in the buffer might not be what they expect.

Certainly this approach may require routines to translate variables from one type to another and back. Graphical toolkits evolved and so would variable transformations.

Re:I like perl

[The Unabageler]

the ability to read different programming languages is the same as being able to read different human languages. It's a matter of differing grammar, syntax and character notations. Not everyone can grasp chinese or russian or hebrew, but does that make them valueless languages? I didn't think so. You'll especially run into problems if you try and read/write chinese as if it were english, or perl as if it were C.

Re:I like perl

[maximilln]

The amount of bookkeeping the type systems of Pascal, C, Java, and C++ force on the programmer is significant

I don't see that as a bad thing. Writing routines to draw boxes, circles, requesters, dialogs, or windows is a significant load on programmers. Eventually programmers created libraries such as the svgalibs and evolved towards X11. X11 inherited additional functionality through interfaces such as GTK, Qt, GDK, KDE libs, or whatever Windows uses. The area isn't really my forte but it shows that if a large and cumbersome task is needed again and again the programmers will write libraries to handle the necessary manipulations.

With languages that attempt to intuitively guess at manipulating variables of different types there's no need to work on refining a system to generate numerical values from strings or to think of strings as numerical values (ML). If that very basic division is a constant reminder to the programmer that a "420" isn't really a 420, combined with the considerations of what it's going to take to turn that set of ASCII values into the proper number, some of it may carryover the next time someone else's library is #included.

If you're concerned about programmer productivity, efficacy, and correctness

Heh. :-) That's a bean-counter issue, not a programming issue. We all know that the managers want more code, faster, with fewer noticeable bugs, and they want it last quarter. I feel this is why the proprietary code industry constantly reinvents itself with new featureware. The latest programming language can just as easily be a product of the push for featureware or the latest end-around flanking maneuver to hedge in the market with IP. Strictly speaking it can't compete in quality with the code produced by enthusiasts who don't have deadlines and don't have a corporate agenda that needs them to use the latest macro library in order to use features which will justify a patent or IP lawsuit.

A language that forces you to think about the storage size and layout of every variable is certainly strict, but is that really the kind of strictness that prevents errors

It's certainly not the only mode of thought that prevents errors. You and I both know that good programming is like good health--there's no single magic secret. If the programmer develops the intricate mode of thought it will aid their programming just as a routine of gentle exercise aids health. You just need to remember to do it often enough for it to eventually become an embedded mode. In today's world being pedantic about variables isn't stressed because enough languages make the correct assumptions (and because managers don't like to have their superiority challenged). I feel that the overall model created explains why security isn't a strong point in proprietary code. The reason is both economical and philosophical.

That may be true, but all things are not equal

You're right. I don't program for a living so I can afford to preach from the philosophical armchair of ideality. :-) I've found that if I talk about the ideal points of my own industry (pharmaceutical R&D) the people above me on the corporate ladder turn quite rude.

Re:I like perl

[Camel Pilot]

Well good example, but look at this way - is harder to understand

@lst = sort { $a $b } @unsorted_lst;

Or the 30 or so lines of code it would take to do the equivalent sort in C?

Re:I like perl

[rjstanford]

That was the one I started with - changing the routine to sort on the last token was more complex according to the examples I was looking at. And yes, they were worse than similar samples in C. Compare that to looking at examples for custom sort comparators in, say, Java, and I think that you'll see the difference.

hmm

[TedCheshireAcad]

I usually go to nightclubs to dance and meet women, but I guess this is the Slashdot Way.

Re:hmm

[PorscheDriver]

I go to nightclubs to to dance and get rejected by women, but I guess this is the Slashdot way.

Why not?

[arose]

What else would a geek do in a nightclub?

Hmmmm..

[maggeth]

I've found the experiences of dancing and programming to have a great deal in common.

Why not just say, "I hate dancing, but want to get laid eventually, and just hang around nightclubs hoping that some chick is drunk enough to not notice?"

Well, TFA is interesting if you're into music composition in any case. :D

Re:Hmmmm..

[Slashbot Hive-Mind]

We are confused. What is this 'chick' you speak off?

The Slashbot Collective Hivemind

white boy

[smaksly]

play that funky
@P=split//,".URRUU\c8R";@d=split//,"\nrekca h xinU / lreP rehtona tsuJ";sub p{
@p{"r$p","u$p"}=(P,P);pipe"r$p","u$p";++$p;($q *=2) +=$f=!fork;map{$P=$P[$f^ord
($p{$_})&6];$p{$_}=/ ^$P/ix?$P:close$_}keys%p}p;p;p;p;p;map{$p{$_}=~/^[ P.]/&&
close$_}%p;wait until$?;map{/^r/&&}%p;$_=$d[$q];sleep rand(2)if/\S/;print

till you die

Re:white boy

[Walterk]

syntax error at - line 4, near "&&}"
Execution of white boy aborted due to compilation errors.

Re:white boy

[simcop2387]

slashdot mangled this perl script, and the geek that i am, figured i'd make some music and fix it:)

@P=split//,".URRUU\c8R";@d=split//,"\nrekcah xinU / lreP rehtona tsuJ";sub p{
@p{"r$p","u$p"}=(P,P);pipe"r$p","u$p";++$p;($q *=2) +=$f=!fork;map{$P=$P[$f^ord
($p{$_})&6];$p{$_}=/ ^$P/ix?$P:close$_}keys%p}p;p;p;p;p;map{$p{$_}=~/^[ P.]/&&
close$_}%p;wait until$?;map{/^r/&&<$_>}%p;$_=$d[$q]; sleep rand(2)if/\S/;print

You blew it man

[not_a_product_id]

geek gets into a night club with real live women and what does he do? He programs perl. jeez

Re:You blew it man

[Alsee]

Good joke, but on the seirous side this guy *is* up on stage in front of throngs of dancing women. Hot stimulated women, in a room saturated with pheromones to boot. In a sense the DJ is Alpha Male of the club. Alpha Male, ding ding ding!

I'm a geek's geek. I was head of my highschool chess team. I was embarassingly old when I had my first date. I nearly max out the introvert scale on personality tests. But let me tell you from experience, when you wind up in Alpha Male position of a social event none of that matters. The women start approching you. Even a geek can walk out with two women - and wishing to god he had four hands.

:: memory interlude with goofy smile and dreamy sigh ::

Enjoy the laugh, but this guy is a geek hero. Most /.'rs would give their right neocortex to be him at the end of the night.

-

Alex performs live on stage to program his music ?

[Gopal.V]

> Alex programmes live on stage to perform his music

Did he actually mean , "Alex performs live on stage to program his music" or did he mean the other way around ?

Music and programming

[ryg0r]

IAAMP (am a music producer) and I find that if you want to perform really well at a nite club to get the crowd rocking, you give them what they want - its as simple as that. Supply and demand.

Think of the dance floor as a high maintenance lover. When you bring on the goods, you'll be rewarded well.

Now back to the subject. I can understand that you can use perl to create some interesting musical results. But instead of music being written by a persons creativity, its now a result of a script.

I dunno, I'm undecided on the issue, but it seems like a cop-out, rather than an advancement in the way the musicians write/create tunes.

The best way to perform for your lover is with V1@GrA - used by DJ's all around the globe.

Re:Music and programming

[dave420]

I'm not having a go here, but by your logic the only real musicians are those who make music using only their own bodies: to you, Jimi Hendrix was only a singer - his guitar skill was meaningless as it was the guitar that made the noise, not Jimi. Miles Davis was a talentless hack and The Beatles were a mediocre a capella band ;)

True, the guy is coding the software that makes the music, but if he didn't code it exactly the way he did, the music would be substantially different. The same way a musician has to play the guitar exactly the way they did making the song to faithfully reproduce it.

I think it's far from a cop-out, but a progression of how we use technology to make music. First, it was musical machines, now it's musical computers. The two constants - people and music.

Re:Music and programming

[vidarh]

It is now the result of a script that is the result of a persons creativity. What difference does it make? What matters is the result, and the result will still depend on the composers ability to manipulate the music, whether that is done by playing directly on an instrument or modifying a program to change the way the program plays the instruments.

Besides composition has always been highly rule based, and even classics like Mozart toyed with generative music. There's a lot of music out there that is clearly composed in ways that closely resemble many of the methods used by generative music systems today. Beethovens "Ecossaisen" for instance closely follow the structure of a Cantor fractal. Composing music IS about combining patterns much more than about combining individual notes.

This page is a good overview of the fractal nature of composition.

I'd agree with you that using a computer for generating the music for a live performance would be a cop out if the computer was programmed with the full score from the start, instead of being used as an instrument that allows automation of repetitive elements.

Personally I see very little value in live performances of the actual music if the music is intended to just follow a score - what makes a live performance interesting to me is what goes into the presentation and/or any improvisation, not that someone demonstrates that they are capable of recreating the same tunes over and over in realtime.

Re:hmm... Perl in a **nightclub**

[hype7]

perl in a nightclub?

I do not think that word means what you think it means...

-- james

more like

[schmu_20mol]

#!/usr/bin/perl print "YMCA\n";

Obligatory Swordfish Reference

[Anonymous Coward]

What better place than a nightclub to crack 1024 bit encryption at gunpoint while having a 60-second sexual relation (depending on the defintion of "is" and "sex") with a beautiful woman.

Just goes to show

[wackysootroom]

You can take the geek out of the nightclub, but you can't take the nightclub out of the geek.

Re:Just goes to show

[duggy_92127]

I prefer: You can lead a geek to a nightclub, but you can't make him get a life.

Doug

Drinkin' and Codin'

[subrosas]

Not sure about hacking Perl in nightclubs, but I did drink a fifth of gin while trying to debug a friend's Perl script.
Kind of like a Dantean descent into hell it was...

I Do Both, But Not Simultaneously

[Greenisus]

I am a software developer by day, and DJ at a night club by night. The idea of programming live is really cool to me, but when I'm DJing with my computer, I'm scared to run anything other than the DJ software, because I can't have ANY lag. I do, however, write software at home to help my DJ gigs.

Re:I Do Both, But Not Simultaneously

[Greenisus]

I occasionally use DJ-1800, which emulates multple CD players (I just got it, still testing the demo version before I buy it. The only extra feature I want is a brake, which MegaSeg has). There's also PCDJ, but I'm a Mac guy, so I don't mess with it much. I've even used iTunes and GarageBand. I also use "real" DJ gear, like turntables and CD players, but I'm an outcast (not to be confused with OutKast) among DJs I know because I actually prefer to use the computer.

Perl's a Singer

[mo^]

She Stands up when she plays the Piano... In a night club...

Yah, Perl, night club.... Elkie did it first!

There are better languages for this, like ChucK

[Trepidity]

ChucK is a "concurrent, on-the-fly audio programming language", designed from the ground up precisely for this application: live programming of generative music.

Unbelievable

[Lovedumplingx]

What no one has touched on is that coding, hard in and of itself, and writing music on the fly, also very hard, and doing it live leaves no margin of error.
What if he makes a keystroke error? Wouldn't that have the possibility of destroying his whole set?
This is just too incredible for words.

Re:Unbelievable

[yaxu]

If I may comment as the author of the article... It's not that dangerous, to be honest. I make a change, then press ctrl-x, which re-interprets the code into a dummy 'package.' If that doesn't cause compile-time errors, then it interprets the code into the live 'package.' So all I have to worry about is run-time errors, which are pretty rare. As I'm generally running a lot of scripts at the same time, it doesn't matter if one of them drops out or goes mental. In fact, it usually sounds good. I just have to fix it, then break it again, then fix it again to make it sound intentional!

Patterns

[UncleBiggims]

A good friend of mine often compares programming to music. He studied jazz improvistion at the college level and is now a programmer... so I feel like he has a good insight into this sort of thing. One quote that really made sense to me was, "Traditional jazz improvisation is all about trying to fit creative and spontaneous music composition on top of somewhat predictable chord progressions."

This is what many programmers try to do... develop creative solutions using predictable software design patterns. I guess Alex Mclean has found a way to be creative AND spontaneous with his coding.

Re:Patterns

[CmdrGravy]

"Can you write a Perl script to generate music that captures the feeling of fear? Or lust? Or trepidation? Or loneliness?"

I would imagine you have an equal chance of doing that coding it in Perl as you would have writing a score for an Orchestra or plucking the strings of an electric guitar. All those are methods of making music but in the end it's only the music which counts.

"Structured" Perl

[notthepainter]

I was hired to write a program to parse and modify some Postscript files. Perl was the obvious choice. So I learned Perl for the job, wrote the script, etc...

As you may know, Perl can be very unreadable and I don't write unreadable code. It was all broken down into functions etc.., all fully commented. Probably slow, but we didn't care, it was maintainable.

So years pass, a friend is learning Perl so I show it to her. Her first comment was, "That doesn't look like the Perl the guys write at work!"

Well, I thought it was funny...

Re:I swear to God...

[Ignignot]

Since you sir, have made the first hack the planet joke, you are now contractually obligated to fulfill your promise because:

1)You have met and are currently co-located with yourself.

You are the first person to make a "Hack the Planet" joke.

Therefore, it is your duty and task to kick your ass forthwith.

Yours truly,
Ignignot

Re:Alex performs live on stage to program his musi

[zimpenfish]

He writes code, live on stage, within an existing framework which interprets the code as he types it and that makes the music.

So he performs his music by programming it live on stage. If that helps.

Note...

[electric_mind]

...that the article is all about the modules you can use to generate sounds from Perl (which isn't clear if you don't read it - the Nightclub + Perl Programming idea is way overemphazised in the original post...)

Alex Giving a Talk in London a Week Today

[twoshortplanks]

Alex will be giving the London Perl Mongers a talk (and live demo) on his work in the evening of Thursday 9th September in central London. It's our normal technical meeting and alongside Alex, we'll be featuring talks by Simon Cozens (the current perl.com editor), Tom Husins, and I'll be talking about Perl Testing project.

I'm just working thought the details of the venue now and I'll post a follow up to this thread once I've sorted them out. As always, we're pleased to welcome new faces. Oh, and if anyone wants, they can pop along to the pub for our monthly social tonight.

Slashdot, your local friendly pub invite list.

Re:Perl

[Anonymous Coward]

Incorrect.

cogsci.princeton.edu -
Program - a sequence of instructions that a computer can interpret and execute;

The text file itself is only a script. The script + interpreter is a full program (also worth nothing that several people have whipped up programs that allows you to compile Perl scripts in to native binaries)

Perl code is hard to re-use, huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Guess I'm a genius for using modules from CPAN, and I didn't even know it.

Waitaminnit...

[nanojath]

Alex programmes live on stage

Programmes? Programmes? By god I smell a limey in our midst! Get 'im!

Re:Alex performs live on stage to program his musi

[AGMW]

He writes code, live on stage, within an existing framework which interprets the code as he types it and that makes the music.

So he presses keys in various combinations and the program interprets this as notes or chords, the combined whole being called music (depending on how drunk/musical you are)?
Hmmmm. Isn't that rather what a piano does?

Me too

[TheCrunch]

I've been doing this for ages. I tried Techno but my code usually generates Blues.

Well.. bluescreens.

sorry.

Re:Alex performs live on stage to program his musi

[andrew_0812]

No, if you would bother to RTFA, you would see that he is has written a multi-threadded text editor for writing perl. One thread is the editor, the other thread runs the code constantly. He writes perl code to generate musical patters. He has a system set up so that he can have multiple programmers working at the same time and it will all be in sync, you can even change the temp and all programs will sync up.

I don't know about programming on stage, but the concept of synthesizing music in perl is quite interesting.

Use CSOUND

[adam872]

Real men use CSOUND for "programmed music" :)

Seriously, csound is designed as a programming language for music and is phenominally powerful and can be used in real time. If I were hacking code for music onstage, that is what I would use. Having said that, I'd rather use my guitar or synth(s) as they are the ultimate in "live composition" instruments...

Lost me at the first sentence

[DonkPunch]

"I've found the experiences of dancing and programming to have a great deal in common."

Then either your dancing or your programming needs some serious help.

INAPH and have don't have MIDI

[Kalak]

INAPH, but I'm curious to experience the music. Since I live in BFE, I'm not likely to go to any perl hacking nightclubs (plus, married with 2 kinds, who am I kidding, I'm not going to any nightclubs).

I want to hear the music!

Talking about audio w/o at least a sample is like talking code w/o a Hello World at least. So some perl hacker out there want to take his code snippets and to the right thing and put a MIDI file up somewhere for us to listen to? mp3?

Don't make me get curious enough to dive into Perl for fun. I do too much coding at work, and I don't want to be a coder at home.

Alex has been doing this for years

[babbage]

Alex McLean and Ade Ward have been performing live Perl music under the name Slub for several years now. Quoting from Alex's website:

Behind the scenes, slub is a fairly idealistic project. We make music using entirely self-written software. Every aspect of slub composition and synthesis comes from our fingers. Many interoperating pieces of software work together to generate the music live, using a handmade client/server protocol. The software sampler/synth is written in C (by Ade), the server and synch code is in Perl (by me) and a whole slew of composition scripts and apps are written in Perl and RealBasic. The whole system is distributed across Ade's powerbook and my debian Linux laptop (we stopped short of writing our own operating system).

Poke around and you can probably find MP3s of their music -- it's interesting stuff.

In addition, the two of them have written some papers & software on the programmatic generation of art, whether that be music, graphic arts, software itself, etc:

• Live Algorithm Programming and a Temporary Organisation for its Promotion - A. McLean, A. Ward, et al
• /usr/bin/bash as a performative tool - A. McLean (scroll down a bit)
• Hacking Sound in Context - A. McLean
• How I Drew One Of My Pictures - A. Ward
• The Authorship of Generative Art - A. Ward
• Autoshop, a "Photoshop Parody" - A. Ward
• Auto-Illustrator, an "Illustrator Parody" - A. Ward

Much more of Ade's software is available from Signwave.co.uk.

Re:hmm... Perl in a **nightclub**

[tonywong]

Just an FYI,

Nightclub in North America == discotheque

Nightclub in Europe == Nudie bar

Found out the 'hard' way in Austria.

Error in article

[djfray]

The article says that all modern musicians make their music on the computer. Certainly, this is true to a certain degree for electronic musicians(techno and the like), though I dabble in this and I often find myself sitting at my Grand Piano when working on a riff. Computers play a large part in recording of modern music, but I think you'll find that physical instruments still play an enormous role in it.