The Magic Jigsaw: the process of designing an open source/hardware music tracker
Room A | Wed 22 Jan 1:30 p.m.–2:15 p.m.
Presented by
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Maksim Lin
https://www.manichord.com
Maksim is a freelance developer who over the years has worked on everything from phone exchanges to large corporate websites to mobile webapps and Android app development. Previously senior developer at the National Gallery of Victoria, he now specialises in Flutter development and most recently had co-founded Xiphonics where he is working on an open source/hardware music tracker. He is also involved in the Flutter community as a Flutter/Dart Google Developer Expert and co-organiser of the GDG Melbourne and Flutter Melbourne user groups.
Maksim Lin
https://www.manichord.com
Abstract
What does it take to make a complete open source and open hardware embedded music making instrument? Well a lot more than you might think or that I initially realised!
Following on from my workshop at last years conference where I showed off the initial prototype of the picoTracker project, an old school hardware music tracker built using the RPI RP2040 microcontroller, this talk will take attendees on the journey I and my partner in the project took over the last year to create the latest version of the picoTracker as a polished, feature rich product ready for musician end users as well as hobbyists and diy makers.
Along the way, we’ll cover the ins and outs of hardware and electronic design, using open source tools for both circuits and 3d printed parts and how they are so tightly integrated with the software development process for the firmware. We’ll talk about lessons learnt along the way and also look at all the other things that go into making a project such as sour user documentation, testing and certification processes, community contributions and how we went about managing all this, using open source software in many areas to get the job done.
Attendees don’t need any experience in hardware or software development but will come away with a high level of understanding of the various facets of what is required to do an open source/hardware development project.
What does it take to make a complete open source and open hardware embedded music making instrument? Well a lot more than you might think or that I initially realised! Following on from my workshop at last years conference where I showed off the initial prototype of the picoTracker project, an old school hardware music tracker built using the RPI RP2040 microcontroller, this talk will take attendees on the journey I and my partner in the project took over the last year to create the latest version of the picoTracker as a polished, feature rich product ready for musician end users as well as hobbyists and diy makers. Along the way, we’ll cover the ins and outs of hardware and electronic design, using open source tools for both circuits and 3d printed parts and how they are so tightly integrated with the software development process for the firmware. We’ll talk about lessons learnt along the way and also look at all the other things that go into making a project such as sour user documentation, testing and certification processes, community contributions and how we went about managing all this, using open source software in many areas to get the job done. Attendees don’t need any experience in hardware or software development but will come away with a high level of understanding of the various facets of what is required to do an open source/hardware development project.