List of audio trackers
Encyclopedia
This is a list of music composition programs considered to be "trackers", used to create module file
s, sorted by computer platform.
to produce sound, some of trackers also can use real sound chips connected to host system.
runtime environments, like the Java Runtime Environment.
Module file
Module files are a family of music file formats originating from the MOD file format on Amiga systems used in late 1980s...
s, sorted by computer platform.
Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux
| Name | Latest release | Latest release date | License | Windows Microsoft Windows Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal... port |
Mac OS X Mac OS X Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems... port |
Linux Linux Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds... port |
MID support | MOD MOD (file format) MOD is a computer file format used primarily to represent music, and was the first module file format. MOD files use the “.MOD” file extension, except on the Amiga where the original trackers instead use a “mod.” prefix scheme, e.g. “mod.echoing”... support |
XM XM (file format) XM, standing for "extended module", is an audio file type introduced by Triton's Fast Tracker 2. XM introduced multisampling-capable instruments with volume and panning envelopes, and basic pattern compression... support |
IT support | S3M S3M (file format) The S3M format is an advanced module format, and is the successor to the STM format used by the original Scream Tracker. Both formats are based on the original MOD format used on the Commodore Amiga computer.... support |
MPTM support | XRNS support | Wave WAV Waveform Audio File Format , is a Microsoft and IBM audio file format standard for storing an audio bitstream on PCs... export |
VST Virtual Studio Technology Steinberg's Virtual Studio Technology is an interface for integrating software audio synthesizer and effect plugins with audio editors and hard-disk recording systems. VST and similar technologies use digital signal processing to simulate traditional recording studio hardware with software... support |
ASIO output |
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| Renoise Renoise Renoise is a contemporary digital audio workstation based upon the heritage and development of tracker software. Its primary use is the composition of music using sound samples, soft synths, and effects plug-ins. It is also able to interface with MIDI and OSC equipment... |
2.7.1 | 2011-05 | Commercial | |||||||||||||
| OpenMPT | 1.19.04.00 | 2011-09 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... / BSD BSD licenses BSD licenses are a family of permissive free software licenses. The original license was used for the Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix-like operating system after which it is named.... |
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| SoundTracker SoundTracker SoundTracker is a free tracker for Unix-like operating systems running X Window System for composing music to be saved in module files.- Description :... |
0.6.8 | 2006-02 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... |
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| MilkyTracker | 0.90.85 | 2010-01 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... |
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| ChibiTracker | 1.2 | 2008-03 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... |
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| SunVox SunVox SunVox is a compact cross-platform audio tracker with modular synthesizers.Features:* minimalistic scalable interface for working on any video resolution;... |
1.6.2 | 2011-05 | Freeware Freeware Freeware is computer software that is available for use at no cost or for an optional fee, but usually with one or more restricted usage rights. Freeware is in contrast to commercial software, which is typically sold for profit, but might be distributed for a business or commercial purpose in the... |
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| Psycle Psycle Psycle is a modular music production application to make music on Windows. Based on the tracker interface but featuring up-to-date features like VST compatibility and 96 kHz / 32bit wav rendering.... |
1.8.6 | 2009-11 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... |
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| Schism Tracker | build 20110101 | 2011-01 | GPL GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project.... |
Amiga
- ProtrackerProtrackerProTracker is a popular freeware tracker created by Lars Hamre, Anders Hamre, Sven Vahsen and Rune Johnsrud for the Amiga platform. It is amongst the programs that first allowed for widespread creation of music without studio equipment...
- Lars Hamre, Anders Hamre, Sven Vahsen, Rune Johnsrud, 1990 - OctaMEDOctaMEDOctaMED is a popular sound tracker for the Commodore Amiga, written by Teijo Kinnunen. The first version, 1.12, was released in 1989 under the name MED, which stands for Music EDitor. In April 1990, version 2.00 was released with MIDI support as the main improvement...
- Teijo Kinnunen, 1989 - NoiseTrackerNoiseTrackerNoiseTracker was a freeware tracker created 1989 for the Amiga platform. It was based on the Ultimate Soundtracker and developed by Pex "Mahoney" Tufvesson and Anders “Kaktus” Berkeman. It was used by Amiga game musicians to create music with four channels of sampled stereo sound, e.g. for Shadow...
- Pex Tufvesson, Anders Berkeman, 1989 - Ultimate SoundtrackerUltimate SoundtrackerUltimate Soundtracker, or Soundtracker for short, is a music tracker program for the Commodore Amiga. It is the creation of Karsten Obarski, a German software developer and composer at a game development company; sources differ as to the name of the company, recorded it as reLINE, whereas ...
- Karsten Obarski, 1987
DOS
- Scream TrackerScream TrackerScream Tracker is a tracker . It was created by Psi of Finland's Future Crew It was coded in C and assembly language. The first popular version of Scream Tracker, version 2.2, was published in 1990...
–1990, Sami Tammilehto - One of the first DOS trackers to support sound samples
Sampling (music)In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...
. - Fast TrackerFast TrackerFastTracker 2 is a tracker created by Fredrik "Mr. H" Huss and Magnus "Vogue" Högdahl, two members of the demogroup Triton which set about releasing their own tracker after breaking into the scene in 1992 and winning several demo competitions. The source code of FastTracker 2 is written in Pascal...
– 1995, Triton Demo-Crew - Tracker and XM format was popular in the end 1990s, influential for later Tracker - Impulse TrackerImpulse TrackerImpulse Tracker is a multi-track digital sound tracker . It was one of the last tracker programs for the DOS platform. It was authored by Jeffrey "Pulse" Lim, and example music was provided by Jeffrey Lim and Chris Jarvis...
– 1995, Jeffrey Lim - Impulse Tracker is a popular tracker which supports 64 channels and samples up to 2MB. It uses a Scream Tracker 3 style interface. Its file format, .IT, is supported by many players and other trackers, e.g. ModPlug TrackerModPlug TrackerOpenMPT is an open source audio module tracker for Windows. It was named by Computer Music as one of the top five free music trackers. It originally started out under the name ModPlug Tracker, and was developed by Olivier Lapicque in September 1997....
and RenoiseRenoiseRenoise is a contemporary digital audio workstation based upon the heritage and development of tracker software. Its primary use is the composition of music using sound samples, soft synths, and effects plug-ins. It is also able to interface with MIDI and OSC equipment...
. Erez Aizen of Infected MushroomInfected MushroomInfected Mushroom is an Israeli psychedelic trance DJ act and electronic group originally formed in late 1997 as a duo by producers Erez Eisen and Amit Duvdevani in Haifa...
composed his first trance music on Impulse Tracker and Ian Stocker (known as Rabiteman in the tracking scene) used also IT for the music in the Nintendo DSNintendo DSThe is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
version of The Sims 2The Sims 2The Sims 2 is a strategic life simulation computer game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts. It is the sequel to the best-selling computer game, The Sims, which debuted on February 4, 2000. It was first released on September 14, 2004 for Microsoft Windows. A port to Apple Mac OS X...
.
Nintendo
- Little Sound DJ
2000, Johan Kotlinski - Little Sound DJ is a sound editor and sequencer for the different flavors of the Nintendo Game Boy. - NitroTracker
2006, Tobias Weyland - NitroTracker is a GPL-licensed project for the Nintendo DSNintendo DSThe is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
in the style of FastTracker II.
ZX Spectrum
- Soundtracker
1990, Jaroslaw Burczynski - Soundtracker sequenced the three channels of the AY-3-8910General Instrument AY-3-8910The AY-3-8910 is a 3-voice Programmable Sound Generator designed by General Instrument, initially for use with their 16-bit CP1610 or one of the PIC1650 series of 8-bit microcomputers...
audio chip on the 128K models of ZX SpectrumZX SpectrumThe ZX Spectrum is an 8-bit personal home computer released in the United Kingdom in 1982 by Sinclair Research Ltd...
. Though the instruments were referred to as samples, they were chip-generated sounds. The user is able to modify each sample via use of amplitude envelopes, noise frequency envelopes and pitchPitch (music)Pitch is an auditory perceptual property that allows the ordering of sounds on a frequency-related scale.Pitches are compared as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies,...
modifications. When these "samples" were played in the tracker they could also be modified by arpeggiosArpeggioAn arpeggio is a musical technique where notes in a chord are played or sung in sequence, one after the other, rather than ringing out simultaneously...
(referred to as ornaments). Burczynski ("BZYK") was a member of the Polish demosceneDemosceneThe demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes in producing demos, which are non-interactive audio-visual presentations that run in real-time on a computer...
group Pentagram and released Soundtracker under a public domainPublic domainWorks are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
license. A second program, ST Compiler, allowed Soundtracker songs to be integrated into other code.
Other operating systems
Allows to create music for one system on another. Usually uses emulationEmulator
In computing, an emulator is hardware or software or both that duplicates the functions of a first computer system in a different second computer system, so that the behavior of the second system closely resembles the behavior of the first system...
to produce sound, some of trackers also can use real sound chips connected to host system.
- ChibiTracker (2006, Juan Linietsky) - ChibiTracker has a GNU open-source license and runs on FreeBSD, BeOS and Nintendo DS.
- MilkyTracker (2008, pailes et al.) - MilkyTracker has a GPL open-source license and runs on Linux, FreeBSD, Windows, Windows CE, Mac OS X, AROSArosAros may refer to:*Aros , a river in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium*AROS Research Operating System, a free software implementation of AmigaOS* Aros, the original Viking name of Aarhus, the second largest city in Denmark...
and AmigaOS 4. It supports .MOD and .XM module files, and attempts to recreate the user experience of Fasttracker II.
- LittleGPTracker (2009) - LittleGPTracker is aimed at the GP2XGP2XThe GP2X is an open-source, Linux-based handheld video game console and portable media player developed by South Korean company GamePark Holdings. It was released on November 10, 2005, in South Korea only....
hand-held console, but also runs on PSP, Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.
- SunVoxSunVoxSunVox is a compact cross-platform audio tracker with modular synthesizers.Features:* minimalistic scalable interface for working on any video resolution;...
(2011, Alex Zolotov) - SunVox is freeware for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, PalmOS and Windows Mobile; and available commercially for the iPhone/iPod touch/iPad.
- Schism Tracker
2003, Mrs. Brisby, Storlek et.al. - GPL licensed for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, FreeBSD, WiiWiiThe Wii is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19, 2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii primarily competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others...
, Pandora (console)Pandora (console)The Pandora is a handheld game console designed to take advantage of existing open source software and to be a target for homebrew development...
(and further platforms with GCCGNU Compiler CollectionThe GNU Compiler Collection is a compiler system produced by the GNU Project supporting various programming languages. GCC is a key component of the GNU toolchain...
4 and SDLSimple DirectMedia LayerSimple DirectMedia Layer is a cross-platform, free and open source multimedia library written in C that presents a simple interface to various platforms' graphics, sound, and input devices....
support). Based like the OpenMPT on ModPlug source code, but with focus on Look and FeelLook and feelIn software design, look and feel is a term used in respect of a graphical user interface and comprises aspects of its design, including elements such as colors, shapes, layout, and typefaces , as well as the behavior of dynamic elements such as buttons, boxes, and menus...
and compatibilityCompatibilityCompatibility may refer to:* Astrological compatibility* Compatibilism – a philosophical position* Compatibility * Compatibility * Compatibility * Electromagnetic compatibility* Interpersonal compatibility-Computing:...
to the Impulse TrackerImpulse TrackerImpulse Tracker is a multi-track digital sound tracker . It was one of the last tracker programs for the DOS platform. It was authored by Jeffrey "Pulse" Lim, and example music was provided by Jeffrey Lim and Chris Jarvis...
.
Interpreted platforms
These trackers run in interpretedInterpreter (computing)
In computer science, an interpreter normally means a computer program that executes, i.e. performs, instructions written in a programming language...
runtime environments, like the Java Runtime Environment.
- MikMod (1992, Jean-Paul Mikkers) - Java
- Jeskola BuzzJeskola BuzzJeskola Buzz is a freeware modular software music studio environment designed to run on Microsoft Windows via Microsoft .NET. It is centered around a modular plugin-based machine view and a multiple pattern sequencer tracker .Buzz consists of a plugin architecture that allows the audio to be routed...
runs on the MS.NET.NET FrameworkThe .NET Framework is a software framework that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It includes a large library and supports several programming languages which allows language interoperability...
framework.