pageturner

A program to automatically play an accompaniment and turn pages of sheet music while you play, or otherwise trigger pre-programmed events in reaction to sound.

NEWS

2010, June 20th Version 6 is out!

New features:

I decided to include a compiled (x86) executable in the archive. I am not sure to what extent it works on other systems with different library versions, etc. If pageturner doesn't start correctly try compiling it from source (see INSTALL) and/or post a support request on Sourceforge.
Options to select capture and playback audio devices. I added this after noticing the default device isn't the one with best audio quality on my system.
Support for a configuration file, that can contain any pageturner option. For instance you can set your favourite audio device in there.
New shift option, for instance to tell pageturner to turn the pages one second earlier or later than usual, or to correct latency issues (one day there may be automated latency correction but in the meantime you'll have to use this).

Bugs and crashes:

Using both -patternin and -patternout wouldn't transfer the labels correctly from a pattern to the other.
I ran several use cases with valgrind and fixed all warnings originating from pageturner, fixing potential (and some very real) crashes.
Control-C now doesn't exit right away, removing the risk of interrupting some critical operation. (I've never witnessed that being a problem but let's play safe).

Minor improvements:

The -showspec option is now more efficient.
Reduced risk of underruns (aka that annoying skipping sound). (Next step: get rid of that constant "clicking"...)

2010, April 25th Version 5 is out!

In addition to turning the pages while you play, pageturner can now play other parts of the music, keeping with any tempo changes!
More efficient pattern files take 50% less space (conversion tool included)
Pageturner is now based on portaudio so in theory should work on other systems such as windows or OSX with little or no changes to the source (any candidates for doing the port?)

Warning, there are some issues in portaudio that may prevent pageturner from working. Please read the release notes for details. If this version doesn't work for you you may want to try/stay at version 4 until the bugs get ironed out.

2010, March 7th Version 4 is out!

Fixed bad compilation flags in the Makefile. The program is now about twice faster.
Support for "pattern libraries": You no longer have to tell pageturner which piece you are going to play. It waits until it recognises which one it is, and then shows the corresponding sheet music (or whatever action you told it to do).

Warning, it is not designed for very large libraries, but around ten or twenty files it works very well. If you have lots of pieces and a fast computer, try increasing the CUTPOINT value.

2010, January 13rd Picture gallery

Have a look at the picture gallery for the pretty graphs advertised below, illustrating various program features...

2010, January 10th Version 3 is out!

Massive performance improvement (about three times faster),
Massively enhanced matching algorithm (no, seriously :) ).
That skipping/repeating part feature of version 2 wasn't working (silly mistake in the code) but now it is.
Added options to generate a graphical view of the algorithm's behaviour in a particular run. It's mainly used for debugging, to understand why the algorithm behaved a particular way, but you may still enjoy the pretty graphs it generates.
Instant startup by thanks to gradual loading of pattern files.

Warning, pattern files created from the previous version don't work with this one. I'll write a conversion tool if anyone asks.

2009, December 30th Version 2 is out!

There's now a single binary instead of a collection of programs. You can now record audio to a file while the program compares with an earlier recording to turn the pages. You can manually turn the pages to restart from anywhere in the piece, or to skip a large part — pageturner will scan the page you selected to find from where you are restarting.

DEMONSTRATION

You can see me playing the beginning of Franz Schubert's Sonata in B♭ (D960). The second page was getting dangerously damaged (as you can see from the scanned copy on the laptop screen) because both hands are rather occupied at the time it should be turned. That prompted me to write this program.

Also have a look at the picture gallery for pretty graphs illustrating various program features...

FINE PRINT

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

Let me stress this again. It works for me while I play the piano but using it in any sort of live performance would be sheer insanity.

DOWNLOAD

Please refer to the Installation & Usage page for installation and (wait for it) usage instructions.

CONTACT

I'd be interested to know of any creative use/enhancement you've done with this program. You can reach me at

tendays,
squiggly-sign, users.sourceforge.net

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to the people at the PortAudio mailing list for helping me sorting out issues with PortAudio.