Conference napalm::commusic_v1

    So, this is like, "dehumanization"?  Maybe they will be introducing an
    Ethernet hookup to an R8?
    
    Steve

Thanks for posting this, Len.  I'll have a look at the article when
the ZKO library re-opens.

Any commusic'ers want to try out their own musical analysis of 
system performance?  I've got a D5 hooked up to a VAXstation II 
on the net for output, though you could of course bring your
own MIDI synthesizer of choice to Spit Brook.  Our MIDI software 
currently works with VAX/VMS but should work for RISC/Ultrix 
as well pretty soon.

My cost center manager had just suggested system management as an
area that he wanted us to look at for multi-sensory I/O...

    You could make some contradiction here.  By indicating more activity on
    the system you could have more active music, but that would be faster
    than low activity music and so implies that the system will respond
    faster, but it won't, it will respond more slowly.
    The problem is, music is SIMD and we're talking about SISD machines.
    Or mabye music is MIMD since it can be asynchronous between lines.
    Just put an inductive pickup (like a phone pickup) on an exposed part
    of the electrical (not optical) ethernet; maybe you'll hear something.
    I know it's 10Mb/s but something in the audio range might come out of
    the complex waveform.
    Tom

    I did this back in 1971, when I was 7.  I was working as a programmer
    slash operator on an IBM 360 mod 20 disk system, and occasionally I'd
    set an AM radio next to the CPU, and set the dial to 'no' station - 
    I'd get to listen to the CPU whistling away.  I could actually hear
    different code paths running (batch machine doncha know).  RE percussion
    - I wrote a program that accepted card input to determine percussion 
    pattern on the line printer- a '1' said 'print a row of XXXXXXXXXs', a 
    '0' said print a blank row, etc.
    
    karl

    The I/O bus on PDP-7s ran right behind the front panel (to get to the
    paper tape reader) and the reader itself served as a convenient shelf
    to set a small transistor AM radio on.  It was standard practice to
    issue i/o commands at the appropriate rate to "play" the radio.
    
    Jeez, Karl, in 1971 I was 24; you young whippersnappers are just too
    much to take.  But I think I did this in 1969, when I was 22.
    
    len.
    

I recall reading about a MAC mail program that used sounds to indicate
the size of incoming mail messages - low thump means large and high thwip
means small.  

I think you could stretch this concept with music to use a 
short piccolo riff for small message/activity etc. and a Beethoven 
orchestral signature to mean large message/activity etc. An urgent 
message could arrive with the appropriate movie background suspense 
riff, a thrashing system could be atonal contemporary ;-). 

A violin section could show the heirarchy of activity. Lots of batch 
jobs could be heard with bass violins and cellos, lots of interactive
I/O could be violins and on and on. A balanced system would produce nice
full orchestral string sounds...

Dave

    re .7  - Dave, see Michael (BAVIKI::) Good's CLT::PRESENCE conference
    for a long discussion of (seriously) EARCONS.  That conference is
    members only but just ask Michael for access.
    
    He's got the COOLEST job in Digital.
    
    karl