Beads is a software library written in Java for realtime audio. It was started by Ollie Bown in 2008. It is an open source project and has been developed with support from Monash University in Melbourne, via the Centre for Electronic Media Art’s ARC Discovery Grant Project “Creative Ecosystems”, and a Small Grant for Early Career Researchers from the Faculty of Information Technology. The Beads team includes Ollie Bown, Ben Porter and Benito.

Start here or follow the links to the right.

For more info and requests, contact Ollie, who resides at the domain icarus.nu, or check out the discussion group.

Be warned, Beads is currently still in a beta alpha stage of development, and it may have instabilities and undergo changes. Obviously we’d love to know about any broken things you find. We’re also keen to hear from you if you would be interested in contributing any audio effects, synthesis algorithms, or audio analysis algorithms.