scholarly adjective needed to describe Max

brendan mccloskey's icon

Hi

Could someone please suggest a comprehensive term describing Max, emphasizing the modular, customizable and free-form nature of the tool? Open-source is very evocative but clearly incorrect.

Any suggestions?

Submission date is on the horizon and moving REALLY fast ;)
Thanks

spectro's icon

Back in the day, C74 (or maybe it was even Opcode Systems!) described Max as something like the following: "A graphical* programming environment for building interactive, real-time music and multimedia applications"

* I actually lifted that entire line from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_programming_language and changed visual to graphical...

brendan mccloskey's icon

Hi spectro
thanks, I was hoping to translate the rather wordy definition into something more succinct - perhaps such an adjective doesn't exist in the DAW world; but something like "modular interaction-programming" or "blahdy blah blah".

What would YOU call Max?

Cheers

Helmuth's icon

I give it a try out of m experience with Max:

Max, a modular based programming environment for artists (musicians, composers, visual artists, performers etc.) enhancing time based multi/trans/interactive-media.
Ok this is a phrase not a term ;>)
So, if you are looking for a term, it could be "modular-based"

(Max is maybe more flexible then "modular programming" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular_programming, so I suggest "modular-based". But maybe Cyclists ;>) would know better.
my humble 50 cents
best,
Helmuth

Charles Baker's icon

I have heard "Data driven" to distinguish Max's unique real-time call stack from std procedural or functional languages "object-oriented" or otherwise.. Throw in " visual" (to point out the code is derived/executed orig from a visual representation) and "modular" (for obvious reasons) and you get
" A Visually programmed data-driven modular language". (",created in C language for multi-media art programming.")
k, just my thoughts.

Beep's icon

graphical dataflow

brendan mccloskey's icon

A graphical modular programming language for physical computing?

Thanks gents.

Brendan

Wetterberg's icon

I like the word "open-ended" about Max, even though "modular" somewhat covers it, too.

stringtapper's icon

I would leave off "for physical computing" since it's clearly not all that can be done with Max. I like "graphical programming language" or even with "modular" added in; it seems a sufficiently general term. Puckette calls anything under the general "Max" family a "computer environment for realizing live electronic music." http://crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/Publications/dartmouth-reprint.dir/

Charles Baker's icon

just to say, from a scholarly point of view, i think the "dataflow" term (the accepted term, danke, BarryF) would be a critical component of an academic aka "computer science" description of the language. This is not a normal compiled/interpreted/"comp-terpreted"/language in some ways...especially in that no one (much) programs directly in it's text based linga franca....which also argues for the terms "graphical" or "visual".
j2k

broc's icon

The basic terms for describing Max are

- dataflow language
- real time processing
- graphical programming
- interactive editing

Note that the same applies to other programming environments like Reaktor or Bidule.
But the main difference of Max is "extensibility" (may also be called "open-ended").

Roman Thilenius's icon

first analog programming language ever.

brendan mccloskey's icon

Hi
reviewing this thread, I should clarify my original request: I am looking for a phrase or terms which would succinctly and precisely describe what Max is and what it does, for the general reader; someone who, as Tokyo Rose rightly points out, is perhaps broadly familiar with digital interactivity, but less familiar with Max, PD, Csound, Supercollider, Qlab, Pixivisor et al.

We (they) will disagree on specific adjectives until the moon is a grain of rice, but I like: modular, open-ended, media, graphical and interactive. And Roman's 2c too ;)

Many thanks everyone

Brendan