[HN Gopher] Show HN: Cynthia - Reliably play MIDI music files - ...
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Show HN: Cynthia - Reliably play MIDI music files - MIT / Portable
/ Windows
Easy to use, portable app to play midi music files on all flavours
of Microsoft Windows. Brief Background - Used midi playback way
back in the days of Windows 95 for some fun and entertaining apps,
but as Windows progressed, it seemed their midi support (for Win32
anyway) regressed in both startup speed and reliability. Midi
playback used to be near instant on Windows 95, but on later
versions of Windows this was delayed to about 5-7 seconds. And
reliability became somewhat patchy. This made working with midi a
real headache. Cynthia was built to test and enjoy midi music once
again. It's taken over a year of solid coding, recoding, testing,
re-testing, and a lot more testing, and some hair pulling along the
way, but finally Cynthia works pretty solidly on Windows now. Some
of Cynthia's Key Features: * 25 built-in sample midis on a virtual
disk - play right out-of-the box * Play Modes: Once, Repeat One,
Repeat All, All Once, Random * Play ".mid", ".midi" and ".rmi" midi
files in 0 and 1 formats * Realtime track data indicators, channel
output volume indicators with peak hold, 128 note usage indicators
* Volume Bars to display realtime average volume and bass volume
levels * Use an Xbox Controller to control Cynthia's main functions
* Large list capacity for handling thousands of midi files * Switch
between up to 10 midi playback devices in realtime * Playback
through a single midi device, or multiple simultaneous midi devices
with lag and channel output support * Custom built midi playback
engine for high playback stability * Custom built codebase for low-
level work to GUI level * Also runs on Linux/Mac (including apple
silicon) via Wine * Smart Source Code - compiles in Borland Delphi
3 and Lazarus 2 * MIT License YouTube Video of Cynthia playing a
midi: https://youtu.be/IDEOQUboTvQ GitHub Repo:
https://github.com/blaiz2023/Cynthia
Author : blaiz2025
Score : 77 points
Date : 2025-11-24 13:58 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.blaizenterprises.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.blaizenterprises.com)
| tosti wrote:
| Calling a program portable by virtue of wine being a thing defies
| logic. That said, nice work. Midi instrument input is on my
| wishlist.
| ale42 wrote:
| Maybe it's "portable" in the sense that it's just an executable
| to launch, with no installation needed? I don't think they
| claim it is multi-platform.
| 6581 wrote:
| "* Also runs on Linux/Mac (including apple silicon) via Wine
| *"
| Krssst wrote:
| Their website makes their definition of portable very clear
| in "What makes a portable app special?".
|
| It's quite clear they mean more a (much) stricter variation
| of the "no installation" definition than the "easily
| buildable on other OS" definition. Though they do mention
| execution under translation environments as a requirement.
| jjmarr wrote:
| Wine MIDI doesn't work, so it's a big advantage.
| SergiusHN wrote:
| Portable and cross-platform are not synonymous. Being developed
| with the Wine in mind and being a standalone app are two
| unrelated features.
|
| https://www.blaizenterprises.com/cynthia.html#help--what-mak...
| ksherlock wrote:
| I'd guess approximately nobody does it, but with winelib you
| can do a native compile and link.
| internet2000 wrote:
| Yeah, very nice app, but it's weird to target Windows as the
| primary OS.
| karmakaze wrote:
| There were companies that specialized in 'porting' games to Mac
| using/packaging Wine long ago. It was certainly effective in
| the Intel Mac days and newer CPUs can certainly run software
| that predates that well. Heck browsers can run OSes and games
| in JS/Wasm.
| ale42 wrote:
| In the days of Electron bloatware, it's refreshing to see a
| program that is so light in terms of size. Unfortunately, at
| least on a 4K screen, the interface is a bit laggy and it uses a
| lot of CPU.
| braebo wrote:
| A web app would have been cross platform (including just web),
| had a superior UI (in both speed and UX) -- and with a less
| bloated Electron alternative like Tauri -- better in just about
| every way that matters.
| layer8 wrote:
| I've yet to see a web app that has native-like great UX.
| luc_ wrote:
| Finally, don't have to remember the UMRN for Camptown Races
| anymore.
| baal80spam wrote:
| Type: Desktop App (Standard Edition)
|
| This is (pun intended) music to my ears!
| xcf_seetan wrote:
| It has a freepascal/lazarus project file, so it can be compiled
| for a lot of platforms, i don't about midi drivers on those
| platforms, so midi could not work or need more code.
| mock-possum wrote:
| My first thought was "what's wrong with foobar?"
|
| Then I saw the instrument / note grid, and the keyboard UI - this
| looks fun!
| zahlman wrote:
| Wow, it's been a long time since I saw Pascal code.
| bitwize wrote:
| Feature suggestion: Optional OPL3 simulation, so that CANYON.MID
| can be heard as God intended.
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(page generated 2025-11-24 23:01 UTC)