Question

recently I was thinking about writing some midi related stuff.
I’ve planned to use the sequencer for real-time midi processing, like for example interactive arrangers – given a chord they would produce a real-time sequence of commands, etc.

Since java is my primary language so the choice was obvious to me with it javax.midi package 🙂
But then I thought – Java… garbage collection… real-time stuff… Hm – will it really sound good – no glitches, no delays?
Needless to say, I have no previous experience in writing midi software.

So I would like to know is it possible to really write a midi software in Java, are some general rules of thumb I should be aware of when writing such a thing?

Can you recommend some thirdparty libraries for the task I’ve explained?

Thanks a lot in advance

Answer 1

I have a Java implementation of MIDI up on Google Code; it’s just the bare-bones format to read and write MIDI data, but it might be a good place to start. In my experience little real-time performance hick-ups are pretty unavoidable in Java, but smart implementation can usually keep it to an acceptable level.