This is true, Richard, and yet Csound allows one to build custom applications in Python or Java or whatever that allow you move sliders or turn knobs to make things happen. I've been dabbling with stuff like that myself, like my Drone piece. I think there is a lot of scope for work like this. I think more of the Csound examples should be of this tweakable ilk.

Regards,
Mike

-----Original Message-----
>From: Richard Dobson 
>Sent: Jun 2, 2008 5:46 AM
>To: csound@lists.bath.ac.uk
>Subject: [Csnd] Re: Re: Newbie (sort of) Questions
>
>Jim Aikin wrote:
>..
>>> The advantage of Python is in using Python scripts as a concise form of 
>>> music notation. You use Python to generate the score, and feed notes to 
>>> Csound. There is a further advantage in that Python enables the use of 
>>> fractals, mathematical music theory, and so forth to generate scores, or 
>>> transform scores, in ways that are not necessarily easy to imagine.
>> 
>> Ah, but my job as a journalist is _precisely_ to make them easy to imagine!
>> That's why I'm hoping for some specific information on this point.
>> 
>
>
>Probably your target readership thinks not in abstract processes but in 
>concrete tasks (or artifacts). So, they don't think in terms of 
>"generating scores" (much less transforming them) but in running 
>arpeggiators, or laying down pads (textures) and grooves. So one might 
>say that, instead of running your fingers randomly over the keyboard for 
>10 mins to create a random texture, you write a little script and get 
>the computer to do it for you.
>
>Many people think neither numerically nor algorithmically. They adjust a 
>slider or knob until it "sounds right". If they see numbers, that is an 
>emergent feature to which they may pay no attention. Rarely do they want 
>to start literally from scratch, they want to modify presets where most 
>of the work has already been done. This is not meant to be any sort of 
>put-down - I do it myself, if it means I get a  desired result quicker. 
>The challenge of Csound is that it still favours those who are prepared 
>to start from scratch (and who do think numerically and 
>algorithmically), over those who want a vast arsenal of presets to 
>tweak. Bottom-up v top-down, therefore.
>
>Richard Dobson
>
>
>
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