Byte Beat for OS X

A collection of simple programs that generate 8-bit sound & images.

! ! ! WATCH YOUR EARS ! ! !

Audio produce by this application can damage hearing, and equipment. Always run output signals through compressor/envelope/amp/attenuator/attenuverter!

[ mac ]--+
         |
         $~ Compressor
         |
         +-->[ headphone amp ]--+
                                |
                                $~ Reduce
                                |
                                +-->[ you ]

Installation

Just ensure your on OS X 10.11, and have Xcode installed

git clone https://github.com/emcconville/bytebeatx.git
cd bytebeatx
xcodebuild
sudo cp build/Release/bytebeat /usr/local/bin/bytebeat

If your building on OS X before 10.11, be sure to set MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET

xcodebuild MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET=10.10

See this issue for additional detail.

Basic Usage

The bytebeat utility runs a single "program" to generate either Audio PCM singles, or PNG image representation.

Generate Audio

bytebeat +<frequency> -<label>

Where +<frequency> is the audio single frequency (e.g. 44.1kHz, 11.0kHz, or 8.0kHz). The default value is 8000.0.

bytebeat +44100.0

The -<label> is the name of the "program" to run.

bytebeat -bbc

Generate Image

bytebeat -width <int> -height <int> -image <path/to/image.png>

Both width & height of the image can be defined with -width <int> and -height <int>. PNG image will be saved to the following argument to -image <path>. The -<label> option can switch "programs" to run.

For example

Generated an image representation...

bytebeat -bbb -width 1024 -height 128 -image bbb.png

Then play it...

bytebeat -bbb