[CM] What motivated the change from CL to Scheme?

[Brandon Hale]

> Ok, that seems like a decent motivation to switch to Scheme, since it 
> is or was used in basic programming courses at universities anyway. 
> But am I wrong to assume that this change created a rather 
> incompatible version, i.e. all existing compositions based on CLOS, 
> and the published papers and books about Common Music became virtually 
> obsolete, and the way to compose with version 3 is significantly 
> different than with version 2? Or do I have a misconception in this 
> respect?
If you need to run anything with Common Music 2, you can still get it to 
work...with incudine <https://incudine.sourceforge.net/>! I can also 
confirm, as someone who learned lisp with cm-incudine, that Taube's book 
"Notes from the Metalevel" works with cm-incudine, thanks to Orm 
Finnendahl's help. I use the cm-incudine system for my own endeavors, 
like this piece <https://youtu.be/i2BiwwZGtaA?si=24nDxuUqoMETOvr0> 
(hopefully it's okay to show a piece, not trying to advertise).

Check out this link: https://github.com/ormf/cm-incudine to learn more. 
Cm-incudine relies heavily on Jack, so using it on Linux works the best, 
but I've gotten it to work on Macos before at work.

I also wrote an installer for it for Arch Linux distros and a docker 
image that can work on any system that docker will run on, without the 
realtime audio support of course:

https://github.com/brandflake11/install-cm-incudine

https://github.com/brandflake11/cm-incudine-docker

Brandon Hale

On 11/9/23 9:49 AM, Rochus Keller wrote:
>
> @ Mike, Bil:
>
> Thank you both very much for your quick response and the interesting 
> information.
>
> > Scheme is a somewhat easier language to learn and use ... I think the motivation was to simplify teaching computer music.
>
> Ok, that seems like a decent motivation to switch to Scheme, since it 
> is or was used in basic programming courses at universities anyway. 
> But am I wrong to assume that this change created a rather 
> incompatible version, i.e. all existing compositions based on CLOS, 
> and the published papers and books about Common Music became virtually 
> obsolete, and the way to compose with version 3 is significantly 
> different than with version 2? Or do I have a misconception in this 
> respect?
>
> > if you are looking to use specifically Common Lisp for computer-based composition
>
> Actually I currently rather try to find out which language is best 
> suited to represent music on a symbolic, compositional (not physical 
> or sound design) level. I'm not sure Common Lisp or Scheme are the 
> best solution, neither Python. SAL is an interesting approach, but 
> essentially Scheme with a kind of Pascal syntax as far as I understand it.
>
> > so I wrote s7, starting with TinyScheme
>
> Can I conclude from this that your change from Lisp to Scheme and 
> finally your own interpreter was an important reason for Common Music 
> to follow?
>
> I had a look at S7 and its implementation which is impressive. Have 
> you also experimented with threaded interpreters? Is the performance 
> of the Scheme code an issue at all in this application domain?
>
> Best
>
> R.K.
>
>
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