Where are n and notes documented?

Questions and Answers
1

Firstly, I really enjoy the documentation. But, I can't seem to find n or notes documented anywhere?

2

Good question. I was wondering myself, and now I wanted to get to the bottom of this.

".. the documentation" - there are several. As far as the Haskell part of tidal is concerned, use :type and :doc in ghci. It gives good hints:

$ ghci -package tidal

ghci> import Sound.Tidal.Context 

ghci> :doc n
n :: Pattern Note -> ControlPattern
  	-- Identifier defined in ‘Sound.Tidal.Params’
-- | The note or sample number to choose for a synth or sampleset

ghci> :doc note
note :: Pattern Note -> ControlPattern
  	-- Identifier defined in ‘Sound.Tidal.Params’
-- | The note or pitch to play a sound or synth with

Experimentation confirms:

for a sample set, n sets sample number, note sets pitch (try change each of them in the following)

d1 $ s "casio" # n 0 # note (-12)

for a synth, both n and note set pitch, and note takes precedence in case both are there.

d1 $ s "superpiano" # n 42 # note (-12)

It's ultimately up to superdirt how to interpret keys and values in ControlMap constructed by tidal. See, for example, separate out ~n and ~note parameters for samples, optionally for synths by telephon · Pull Request #79 · musikinformatik/SuperDirt · GitHub
("Other synths may use n and note separately if so defined")

2 Likes
3

And don't forget Hoogle, where you can search by substrings, by signature, etc.

https://hoogle.haskell.org/?hoogle=n&scope=package%3Atidal

1 Like
4

Yes. - Search by signature does work in ghci (see 6.2.18. Typed Holes — Glasgow Haskell Compiler 9.8.1 User's Guide)

ghci> _ :: Pattern [a] -> Pattern  a

<interactive>:2:1: error: [GHC-88464]
    • Found hole: _ :: Pattern [a1] -> Pattern a1
      Where: ‘a1’ is a rigid type variable bound by
               an expression type signature:
                 forall a1. Pattern [a1] -> Pattern a1
               at <interactive>:2:6-30
    • In the expression: _ :: Pattern [a] -> Pattern a
      In an equation for ‘it’: it = _ :: Pattern [a] -> Pattern a
    • Relevant bindings include
        it :: Pattern [a] -> Pattern a (bound at <interactive>:2:1)
      Valid hole fits include
        uncollect :: forall a. Pattern [a] -> Pattern a
          with uncollect @a1
          (imported from ‘Sound.Tidal.Context’
           (and originally defined in ‘Sound.Tidal.Pattern’))
        flatpat :: forall a. Pattern [a] -> Pattern a
          with flatpat @a1
          (imported from ‘Sound.Tidal.Context’
           (and originally defined in ‘Sound.Tidal.UI’))

(NB: in languages without static types, people pray to LLMs to complete their code ...)

5

That too! (Typed) holes are great.

6

Thanks! Did not think about using ghci for that. Neat.

7

Although my ghci is not so clever as yours:

~ $ ghci
GHCi, version 9.8.2: https://www.haskell.org/ghc/  :? for help
ghci> import Sound.Tidal.Context 
ghci> :doc note
Can't find any documentation for Sound.Tidal.Params.
Try re-compiling with '-haddock'.
ghci>

Might need to re-compile?

8

ah, thanks for reminding me, I forgot that I have this default setting in $HOME/.cabal/config :

program-default-options
  ghc-options: -haddock

Everybody should have this. Can't live without!

The manual 5.1. Using GHC — Glasgow Haskell Compiler 9.8.1 User's Guide is vastly under-selling this. "parse Haddock comments and include them in the interface file" is technically correct, but does not mention the reasion: to make them available for the :doc command in ghci. The command is here 3. Using GHCi — Glasgow Haskell Compiler 9.8.1 User's Guide but does not mention interface files.

If you didn't have the flag set, perhaps you can do cabal install --reinstall --lib --ghc-options=-haddock tidal but I'm not sure. When in doubt - remove the package, or remove $HOME/.cabal/store just to be sure ... and recompile the world.

9

Setting the flag in the config alone didn't change much, but cabal install --reinstall .. did the trick!

Thanks!