Task 2 completed! Want a copy?

Our goal was the following:

• We want a fully operational GUI-pitch detector combo that is nice enough that we won't be ashamed to distribute it.
• We want to put it in a format where a non-expert can install it on their windows PC with no external help.
• We want to accomplish these things by June 1st 2006.

That goal was completed yesterday. The GUI-(pitch detector) combo is workable. I decided (felt like inspiration) to go with flash cards for this first product. Anyway, a note is displayed. If you can sing the note and maintain it you will be shown a new note, picked at random. Then you sing the new note. Gina and I have tried it with the piano and with our voices and it works. There are a lot of improvements that I want to make over time. But the bottom line is that it works! It's simple and it works.

The second part of the goal, like the first part, is met. It turns out that NetBeans automatically generates a set of JAR files that are easily deployable. I just give Brad a folder and he opens it and clicks on the JAR executable and up comes my program. (The only caveat is that he has to have JRE installed to run it. And I haven't tested to see if the program works for older versions of JRE, I only know it works for the current version.) I had to tweak things a little to make the flash cards deploy with the rest of the program. I'm sure that there are some things I can do to make distribution more effective. But start simple, no?

My jogging buddy, Brad Bushman, is going to a family reunion this weekend. I told him yesterday morning that the first simple version was getting close to completion and he said that his inlaws are music crazy. So he asked me if I could get him a version by today that he could show it off to them over the weekend. He said he would try to get feedback. Tonight I deploy the first copy.

Want a copy? I want to sell the program for $20 a pop. It's not enough to pay anyone full time until a whole bunch start getting sold (meaning thousands per year). But I want it to be a small enough expense that any normal family can buy it and not be affected too much one way or the other. (Sight reading for voice is a rare skill right now. I think that we can make it a lot more common.) Anyway, when you get your free copy I hope you won't think "it's free to me so it has no value." Rather I hope you will think "this little thing is pretty cool! Maybe if Doug did ____ it would be even cooler. I'll have to tell him. You know, I know some people who would really get a kick out of this. I should show them. Maybe they'll buy a copy. At $20 they can't lose." (Right, so I fantasize a lot.)

Anyway, all this is leading up to my offer (which is really a request for help). If you want a copy, tell me. Anyone who requests one by email to me or in a comment to this blog before June 15th (Heather's birthday) will get one sent to them by email. For free, of course. If I don't have your address just post it. You might post it in some kind of simple code like with the first letters of a sequence of words giving the address. That way I think it is unlikely to be found by a spam robot. OK. I had better get back to my physics.

But before I leave can I say that I am amazed? Last week it seemed like I would never make the goal. In the past few days it just came together. Way faster than I was thinking! Now how often does that happen? Yahoo! (TM) :-)

Doug