HYDRACTRL 1.2.1

Show your code to the audience: a live code overlay on the Syphon and Spout output, and the nanoPAD2's scene button working in the desktop app.

Added

• Code overlay: your code over the visuals as you type it, the way hydra's own editor shows it, so the audience can follow along. It goes out on the desktop app's Syphon/Spout output, on /output pages and in the breakout window, and the interface shows it too while its UI is hidden.
  • It follows the editor about 15 times a second, cursor and selection included, without costing the visuals a frame, and shows the Setup tab while you edit that.
  • A tag says whether the code on screen is RUNNING or EDITED since it last ran, a mark in the margin shows each line that differs from what runs, and the code flashes when it runs, like it does in the editor.
  • Optionally, a corner shows your scenes and slots: which slots hold a saved sketch, which scenes have any, and which slot is active.
  • It has a blend mode and an opacity of its own. Switch it on and set it up in the system panel, under CODE OVERLAY, or in the desktop app with Output › Show Code on Output.

Changed

• Ctrl/⌘ + `` `` now cycles through three states: the first press hides the UI, the second shows or hides the code overlay, the third brings the UI back. Hiding or showing the UI never changes what the outputs show, and Esc still brings the UI back straight away.
• The desktop app runs on Electron 45 (Chromium 156).

Fixed

• The nanoPAD2's scene button works in the desktop app on macOS. The app ran on Chromium 152 (Electron 44), whose Web MIDI on macOS loses the start and end of SysEx messages, which is how the nanoPAD2 reports its scene.
• Should a scene change on the nanoPAD2 ever go unnoticed, its pads still work: each scene's pads play their own notes, so the first pad you press on another scene switches to that scene and selects its slot.

Downloads

Platform	File
macOS, Apple Silicon (M1 and later)	HYDRACTRL-mac-arm64.dmg
macOS, Intel	HYDRACTRL-mac-x64.dmg
Windows, 64-bit installer	HYDRACTRL-win-x64-setup.exe

The browser version needs no download: hydractrl.d17e.dev/app.

The Windows installer is not code-signed yet: choose More info → Run anyway when SmartScreen warns.

SHA-256 checksums for every file are in SHA256SUMS.txt.

HYDRACTRL 1.2.0

HYDRACTRL Desktop, the standalone app with Syphon and Spout output, and a new home for the project at hydractrl.d17e.dev.

Added

• HYDRACTRL Desktop: a standalone app for macOS (Apple Silicon and Intel) and Windows that runs the full interface and shares your visuals as a Syphon (macOS) or Spout (Windows) source for Resolume, MadMapper, VDMX, TouchDesigner, OBS and anything else that speaks either (#6).
  • Each sketch renders once, on the output, and the interface shows the output's own frames: what you see is exactly what Resolume, MadMapper or OBS receive, letterboxed to the output's shape. While the output is stopped, the interface renders on its own.
  • A sketch with an error never reaches the output. The error shows in the editor and the output keeps playing the last sketch that worked.
  • An Output menu and settings window: resolution presets up to 4K or a custom size, 24 to 120 fps, sender name, preview window, alpha channel, start at launch and optional network access.
  • Output status, frame rate and a start/stop button in the interface's system panel.
  • Drop images and videos on the editor to use them in a sketch. The app copies them into its media folder and adds the line that loads each one, such as s1.initVideo("/media/clip.mp4"). Choose the folder in the settings window; files already in it stay where they are.
  • The macOS app is signed and notarized by Apple, so it opens like any other app.
• A chrome-less /output page that mirrors the interface live over a WebSocket, for OBS browser sources, TouchDesigner's Web Render TOP or a second browser window.
• Desktop builds for every release, attached to the GitHub release and linked from the landing page.
• A landing page at hydractrl.d17e.dev, set like a hydra session: the sketch playing behind it is code you can edit and run, and opens in the app with one click. It has the desktop downloads, a roadmap and a sign-up for an email when a new version is out.
• When you run a sketch with Ctrl/⌘ + Enter or the Run button, its code flashes for a moment in the interface theme's own colour, the way hydra's editor does. Auto-run leaves it alone, and so does a system set to reduce motion.
• The version number in the About panel, the server's startup banner and /api/capabilities.
• The server honours the PORT and HOST environment variables.
• The browser version works on iPads and other tablets. They get the full interface instead of the phone view, without MIDI and the breakout window, which don't work there, and it all works by touch: drag panels by their title bars, resize the editor, the docs and the slots by the grip in their corner, fling the XY pad, and tap anywhere to bring back a hidden interface.
• The browser version installs as an app: Chrome and Edge offer to install it, and phones and tablets can add it to the home screen. It then opens without the browser's toolbars.
• Send feedback from inside the interface: the About panel's Send feedback button, or the speech bubble in the system panel, opens the contact form in a panel. Your HYDRACTRL version, browser or desktop app, OS and browser go along with the message.

Changed

• The browser version moved from the site root to hydractrl.d17e.dev/app. Links shared with the old address still open their sketch.
• Sketch links copied in the desktop app or on a local server point at the browser version, so anyone can open them.
• New starter scenes: Tide, Chained, Pulse and Mint, the sketches behind the landing page, replace the two old ones when you start with no saved scenes. Pulse follows the XY pad. Scenes you already have are left alone.
• A new logo: the hydra's heads each have a character of their own. One keeps its jaws shut and stays in control, one howls with its eyes closed and one rages. The chains wrap round the body and bite into it. The starter scenes that load the logo show the new one.
• New icons, a white hydra on black: the favicon, the home screen icons, the logo in the landing page header and the desktop app, whose icon now has rounded corners like the other apps in the Dock.
• The code editor uses Fira Code, with its ligatures, and the rest of the interface IBM Plex Mono. Both are bundled, so they work offline and in the desktop app.
• Tighter panels: the editor's Sketch and Setup tabs sit in its title bar, and every panel has less padding around its contents.
• Frame rates show as whole numbers, so the system panel keeps its width when the rate wobbles around 60.
• The Light and Pop 90s themes are redesigned, each with its own editor colors: Light is ink on white with a violet accent, Pop 90s has cream panels with black outlines, sunny title bars, hot pink and teal.
• The breakout window's size is a dropdown next to its Open button. It remembers the size you picked, and picking another resizes an open breakout window.
• The slots panel resizes by the grip in its corner, like the editor: the slots stay square and grow with the panel, from 40 to 100 pixels. This replaces the Slot Size slider in the system panel; the size you set there carries over.

Removed

• The old project page at dxviie.github.io/HYDRACTRL. The project lives at hydractrl.d17e.dev now.

Fixed

• Running a sketch that plays a video again no longer leaves the previous run's video playing in the background, one more on every run.
• Sketches that use nanoX and nanoY also render on phones, where there is no XY pad: both start at the centre (0.5).
• On touch screens, the first tap resumes suspended audio for a.fft.
• The docs panel fits the window, so its last functions and its resize corner stay within reach on shorter screens.
• Alt/⌥ + X and Alt/⌥ + I export and import banks on a Mac too, where Option turned them into other characters.

Downloads

Platform	File
macOS, Apple Silicon (M1 and later)	HYDRACTRL-mac-arm64.dmg
macOS, Intel	HYDRACTRL-mac-x64.dmg
Windows, 64-bit installer	HYDRACTRL-win-x64-setup.exe

The browser version needs no download: hydractrl.d17e.dev/app.

The Windows installer is not code-signed yet: choose More info → Run anyway when SmartScreen warns.

SHA-256 checksums for every file are in SHA256SUMS.txt.