Sweep: Audio Editing, Scrubbing and Latency Visualisation

Conrad Parker


Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Motivation
3. Implementation
3.1. Visualisation
3.2. Scrubbing
3.3. Monitoring playback latency
4. Conclusion

1. Introduction

Sweep is an open source editor for digital audio. The project started in 2000, initially based on the waveform editing widget from Soundtracker. The motivation then was that the task of editing sound would be made more accessible to average users by mimicking the familiar desktop image editing interface of the GIMP. In early 2002 the support of an animation studio prompted an overhaul of the user interface and the tackling of harder problems related to application latency. This paper discusses that work, including the motivation for major usability improvements and new directions, including Sweep's use for live performance.