2.19.4-pre

Installation:

Please check the wiki for detailed installation instructions. As usual, Mac, Windows, and Linux (Ubuntu 22.04 LTS) packages can be downloaded below. Many more Linux packages for a variety of popular Linux distributions can be found in the JGU repositories on the Open Build Service. OBS Download

If you're new to Purr Data, please check our Meet the Cat tutorial for a quick introduction.

Changes:

• Fixed some compilation issues due to the recent gcc updates, as well as a lot of bugs and regressions, too many to list them all here (check the commit log for details).

• Updated nw.js to 0.55.0 on Linux, Mac and Windows. This was long overdue, but was riddled by a lot of regressions we had to fix along the way. The 0.55.0 version we use now, for various reasons, seems to work best across all major platforms. However, if you want to use a different version, that's now easily possible with the new patch-nwjs.sh shell script, please check the installation instructions in the wiki for details.

• Updated pd-lua to 0.12.16 which has many bugfixes and improvements, and added the JS API to make Tim Schoen's new pd-lua graphics routines work in purr-data.

• Added a listbox gui object which works pretty much like vanilla's, providing better patch compatibility with vanilla Pd.

• Updated the expr family of objects to version 0.58 from vanilla Pd. This is the latest version with additional acoustic and string functions, and many bugfixes.

• Added Refresh buttons to the Audio and MIDI preferences, so at long last Purr Data can now update the device lists after adding or removing devices without having to re-launch the program.

• Made visual formatting of comments work. This has been broken forever, but at long last you can now use explicit line breaks in comments and have them rendered correctly. Note that this only works with Purr Data right now, so it is best to avoid visual formatting if you want your patches to look right in vanilla Pd.

• Improved help browser, with subdirectory links in the directory view and some bugfixes. Also added the "Meet the Cat" tutorial in pdf format to the help menu and the about dialog, so that it can be read off-line.

• Improved Windows installer (pilfered from pd-l2ork, thanks Ico!), also added unattended installs and better error handling.

• Added Ayush Anand's submission for GSoC 2024. This sports a lot of usability improvements for Gabriela Bittencourt's auto-completion feature: scrollbar, text highlighting, tooltips, and fuzzy matching in the auto-completion menu, along with a bunch of new options in the GUI preferences. It also adds a new Feedback form to the preferences dialog which you can use to submit a ticket on purr-data's bug tracker here on GitHub.

• Added Sushant Sudan's game collection he created for GSoC 2024, featuring three games so far ('Comet Blast', 'Musical Land', and 'Sky Force'), more are to follow. You can find these under "Games" in the help browser. They are both fun to play and educational, as they show you how to program Arcade-style games with sound and (Gem) graphics.

Known problems:

• Mac crash-on-exit bug, can be worked around as described in the bug report.

• Linux dark-mode bug, can be worked around by upgrading nw.js with the patch-nwjs.sh shell script.

Quick look:

Here's a short screencast demonstrating some of the new features.