Welcome to the SoniPy Project website!

Purpose

As data sonification is an interdisciplinary activity, it is not surprising that a diverse range of research and production tools is required. Finding, testing and integrating components that can work together is a time-consuming and somewhat frustrating task. The Sonipy Project aims to collect a set of tools by collating public-domain Python modules which are suitable for the purpose and integrating them using a modular framework. In doing so, the Project aims to provide a community resource for individual sonifiers who don't have the time, skill or inclination to independently go through the process of putting together such a coherently-functioning toolset.

ICAD 2007 paper (.pdf, 628k), by David Worrall, Michael Bylstra, Stephen Barrass and Roger Dean, delivered at the International Conference on Auditory Display in Montreal 2007, is a full introductory discussion of the motivations and concepts involved in SoniPy. ICoMCS 2007 paper (.pdf, 456k), by David Worrall, delivered at the International Conference on Music Communication Science in Sydney 2007, is a less technical introduction with more emphasis on musical applications.

Data sonification is segmented into a number of processes, as illustrated by the following diagram. Python modules are collected according to their function in those processes and Menu items on the left link to pages about modules that have been tested.

The SoniPy Project aims to be useful for a diverse range of users, from the adventurous psychologist to the experienced composer: researchers, software developers, industrial user-interface designers, sonifiers. The Project began in 2006 and so some areas of the website are still just sketches and should be read in conjunction with the FORUMs. If you'd like to lend a hand, see below.

How you use this website will be pretty much determined by your previous experience:

• If you're keen to get started and haven't done any Python scripting, select the PYTHON menu on the left.
• To try out some of the numerical tools, select DATA.
• To explore the sound-synthesis possibilities, select SOUND.

Some of pages are more advances than others and we are keen to hear from you about your experiences in putting together a toolset.

The SoniPy project has been established as a public-domain, community-based project so it can evolve as its components evolve to meet the changing needs of the sonification community. It uses only public-domain software and, although it is being initially developed on Macintosh OSX, the aim is to eventually release for all major hardware platforms.

Because the component modules and their libraries are written by a diverse range of unconnected people, there is a diverse degree-of-difficulty in building and/or installing these third-party tools. This degree-of-difficulty exponentiates when a module has dependencies which themselves need to be compiled. For a more detailed exploration of this issue, and our approach to dealing with it, select the DEPENDENCIES menu.

Our approach is to

• recommend modules where the download and installation is simple or automatic, where possible, or
• recommend modules where the build requires as few other dependencies as possible without compromising quality, or
• build or rebuild the modules ourselves and release the build via our sourceforge site. This "repackaging" is our preferred modus operandi but has has copyright implications which need to be worked through with the software's author(s). See the COPYRIGHT menu.

The project needs people with a diverse range of expertise including platform specific module testing and documentation, interface design for undertaking empirical experiments to name but a few. Perhaps you already have a module which would fit into the framework. Suggestions are welcome! Just click through to the FORUM and let us know what you're thinking or contact David via sonipy_at_avatar_dot_com_dot_au.