SoX and user interaction

[Michael Chapman-4]

I could file a feature request for this, but as it strikes so much at "what
is the philosophy of SoX", I put it up for discussion instead. Please note,
also, the first few paragraphs are trivial, and merit a response of "Next
he'll be wanting a GUI" ;-)> After, the introduction, I hope the point
becomes 'more interesting'.

If one had a syntax such as:
        sox -v "p/m" in.wav out.wav
        play -v "p/m" in.wav
so that a user could increase/decrease volume by hitting the "p" and "m" keys
on the keyboard, one would achieve little useful(!). SoX would be closer to
applications that allow user interactivity (?xine/mplayer).

The concept becomes more interesting with
        play in.wav mixer "A/a,B/b,C/c, ...P/.p"
I could change the mixing of four tracks as I listen.

I would say the usage would be impractical, and one would need a _user_
written script that accepts whatever input the user wants
(keyboard/joystick/...) and writes appropriate values to a file (say sox.txt,
in this case 16 tab separated numbers). The syntax would then be simpler
        play in.wav mixer "sox.txt"
SoX looks at (reads) "sox.txt" every few fractions of a second and then
adjusts (if necessary) what it is doing. (To repeat, writing/updating
"sox.txt" is a problem for the user.)

I can see some applications for 'normal' audio. Not least, if the user writes
a second script, he can 'record' the live mixing he is doing and recycle it /
edit it / ....

For ambisonics, it would mean I could sit in my armchair and rotate (yaw,
pitch and roll) the three dimensional soundfield around the room as I listen.
I could put one instrument/vocalist dead centre. I could 'zoom' in on that
one participant. All in realtime.

It would make SoX a (even more!) powerful tool. Most of the functionality is
already there.
But turning a 'Swiss Army Knife" into a robot controlled wood turning lathe
may be leaving the initial idea behind, a bit ?

I could enlarge on the practical issues. Just wanted fellow users' (and
developers') comments on the philosophy issue first.

Michael

 

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