1. 1 Practice Paragraph 1.

1 - First steps with Max/MSP

keep in mind that sounds audible to humans fall in the range between
20 and around 20,000 Hz.

• Waveform is a fu ndamental element of t imbre, wh ich we defi ne as the

overall quality of a sound. Timbre enables us to perceive, for example, the
diffe rence between the middle C played on a gu itar and the same note
played on a saxophone . We have seen and heard the t imbre of the sine
wave produced by cycle-.

FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

In this section, we wi ll try to give answers to some of the more common prob-
lems that are encountered by new users of Max/MSP. You should probab ly read
these carefully even if you have not experienced a prob lem, since they contain
informat ion that you wi ll use in the fol low ing sectio ns of the book .

Question: I created an object called " cycle-440", as instructed in th is section,

but the object has no inlets or out lets. What went wrong?

Answer: Be sure that you typed a space between "cycle-" and " 440", because
the first is the name of the object, wh ile the second is an argument, which in th is
case represents the freque ncy of the sound. If t he two words are run together,
Max w ill search for a non-existent object named "cycle-440", and when noth-
ing is found, Max w ill have no inlet or out let information with which to work.

Q: Very good . Why, then, didn' t Max give me an error message?

A: There is an error message, wh ich can be found in the Max Window , wh ich
is a w indow that the program uses to communicate with you. If you cannot see
th is w indow, press <Command-m/Contro l-m> to bring it up. In the w indow,
you wi II probab ly f ind a message such as "cycle-440: No such object". If you
doub le-click on the error message, the object t hat caused it (in this case, the
bog us "cycle-440" object) wi ll be high lighted in the Patcher W indow.

Q: I inserted a space between "cycle- " and "440 ", but th e object has no inlets
or out lets j ust the same!

A: There is a more subtle error that often turns up for some new users when
using objects that have a t ilde (' -') at the end of their name. If you have a
keyboard on wh ich th ere is no ti lde key, and so you need to press a comb ina-
tio n of keys in order to produce the character (for example, <Alt- 5> on some
Macs), you may have cont inued pressing one of the mod if ier keys w hen typing
th e space (fo r example, <A lt-Space> o n th e Mac). The resulting comb ination is
not recognized by Max, and Max is not able to separate the object name fr om
its argument. Delete the space and re-insert it, avoiding pressing modifier keys
at the same t ime.

Q: There is no sound.
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