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Posted by pantelisk 1 day ago

Show HN: Audiomass – a free, open-source multitrack audio editor for the web(audiomass.co)
467 points | 103 commentspage 2
Abhi0501 3 hours ago|
Really cool project! Been looking for a browser-based audio editor. How does it handle large file sizes?
pantelisk 2 hours ago|
I just tried it with a 2 hour podcast file, since more people asked about long files. It is performs great on chrome on my pretty powerful macbook. Some operations are a little slow and zooming in to max level starts to be slow, default things like cut/paste, apply fade effect and volume controls to areas of the file feel ok.
andrew_kwak 12 hours ago||
Tried it out for a bit. Really smooth for a web app, especially with multitrack editing. Do you know if it can handle MIDI files too, or just audio?
TheCipster 7 hours ago||
Very cool! Congrats OP. How would you compare it to OpenDAW?

https://opendaw.org

pantelisk 11 hours ago||
Hey HN. Thanks again for featuring this project :) this is my favorite community on the internet and my go to site to visit, almost by reflex, when I have idle time, so it feels me with joy to have made something well received here.

I 'll be heading off soon, so decided to write some features included in this release that might not be apparent right away (still working on improving the UX).

- Drag n drop multiple audio files into multitrack = multiple channels automatically created

- Double click on a waveform box in multitrack, opens it in the original audio editor (for more precise editing)

- Copying (command+c, or shift+c) works between multitrack and regular editor. So for example, you can open a file in original editor tweak it, and then copy all or part of it and paste it in multitrack in a specific channel.

- Most effects have already pre-made presets to make them easier to use

- You can make your own effect presets by clicking the 3 dots after having made a modification in an effect (stored in localstorage)

- Zero crossing selection is under "Edit"

- There is a tempo tools section in View. You can automatically detect tempo of a track, tap to guess a tempo and play with metronome

- There is also an id3 tag viewer (for mp3 files) there as well

- You can right click or press M to add markers (makes it easier to highlight sections of a track, especially when working with longer audio tracks)

- Seamless Loop tool (under Edit): crossfade preview, silence trim, repeat loop, open loop in a new editor tab.

- Offline/PWA support: Help > store offline version, will open a new page that will trigger a service worker that will make the site work offline as well.

- Session export as .amss file for multitrack. If you aren't done working on a session you can export all of its audiofiles and configuration in an LZMA compressed container file (will still be pretty big though). For single audio mode, mp3/wav/flac export is available.

- Pressing X in multitrack when 2 waveform boxes overlap, makes them crossfade smoothly (denoted by an "XF" label at the top right - undocumented behavior but can be quite useful, will keep improving it)

- You can open the menu by pressing the ~ key and then navigate it with arrow keys (left/right for sections, bottom up for selections, enter to trigger an action and esc to close) for a tiny bump in speed of getting things done. Similarly the time controls are clickable and open a mini menu where a time can be specified to jump quickly to it (arrow keys to go between minutes/s/ms)

And finally my favorite feature of them all (though not a new one per se),

- In "View" select "Frequency analyzer" or "Multitrack mixer" and then press the dock button. Audiomass supports the ability to extract elements of it into new pop up windows. So you could have parts of the application on a different monitor keeping the main app in the main tab. It's a very old trick, but I find it kinda cool :)

Thanks again and hope you enjoyed the sample music! (edit: formatting)

Intermernet 9 hours ago||
This is awesome. Congratulations!

As others on this thread have commented, you haven't specified a license. Don't jump on the first thing you think of. Consider the various OSS licenses and decide which one suits you best.

croisillon 4 hours ago||
does it have to be dark mode?
conradfr 9 hours ago||
Cool work, the weird part is effects being item based instead of track based and that selecting an effect stops the playing and you apply it blind.
pantelisk 9 hours ago|
Thanks for your comment :) you can press "preview" (and there is a little on/off) in the effect's modal window. But I agree with you, an automation type system that operates on the entire track might be better
conradfr 5 hours ago||
Ah yes I miss the preview + space to play.
nocodeg 5 hours ago||
Brilliant project and great execution. Well done!
sailingcode 11 hours ago||
Impressive, congratulations for the nice work.
djfobbz 17 hours ago||
This is a very impressive undertaking. Great job!!!
gunapologist99 14 hours ago||
Is this open source? No license.
boje 10 hours ago|
I'm surprised no one has noticed this yet.
boje 9 hours ago|||
Digging further, this has been shown before in 2020:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23337091

The author mentions in the thread that he eventually plans to have a proper license for it and needs to figure out the licensing of some of the dependencies, but that was six years ago.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23338538

This is not directed at the quality of the project itself, however, which seems to be good.

pantelisk 9 hours ago|||
Author here. License is pretty much do whatever you want with it (free as in free information and free beer), I suppose the closest one to that would be MIT, but I don't like its serious legalese tone. I prefer the whimsical "free as in..." phrase
keithluu 17 hours ago|
Awesome tool. Is this the a new version? I used this few weeks ago and it looked a bit different.
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