ChipPiano

A lightweight, cross-platform piano synthesizer built from scratch in C99 with modern tooling.
 

ChipPiano is a simple but powerful digital piano simulator. It features polyphonic sound synthesis and a responsive visual keyboard, all rendered using the cross-platform SDL3 library.

Key Features

• 🎶 Polyphonic Sound Synthesis: Play multiple notes simultaneously, generated in real-time.
• 🎹 Interactive Visual Keyboard: A 46-key piano keyboard, from D3 to B6.
• ⚡ Low-Latency Audio: Built on the SDL3 audio API for responsive sound playback.
• 🗂️ In-App Menu: A "menu bar" and information dialogs.
• 🔊 Volume Control: Amplitude adjustment with up/down arrow keys.
• 🚫 Automatic Note Stop on Focus Loss: All currently playing notes are automatically stopped when the window loses focus, ensuring no lingering sounds if you switch to another application.
• 💻 Modern C99: Written with a focus on clarity, performance, and portability.
• 🌍 Cross-Platform Build: Uses CMake and Conan for a streamlined and reliable build process on any platform.

Tech Stack

• Language: C (C99)
• Graphics & Audio: SDL3
• Font Rendering: FreeType
• Build System: CMake
• Dependency Management: Conan

Getting Started

Follow these instructions to get a local copy up and running.

Prerequisites

• A C99 compatible compiler (GCC, Clang, MSVC)
• Python 3 (for Conan)
• CMake 3.15+
• Conan 2.x

Installation & Building

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/hnthap/chip-piano.git
   cd chip-piano

2. Install dependencies with Conan: This command downloads and builds the required libraries (SDL3, FreeType).

   conan install . --output-folder=build --build=missing

3. Configure the project with CMake: This step generates the build files for your system.

   cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE="build/build/Release/generators/conan_toolchain.cmake" -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release

4. Build the application:

   cmake --build build

Running the Application

You can run the executable directly from the build output directory or use the custom CMake target for convenience.

cmake --build build --target run

Usage & Keyboard Layout

ChipPiano maps your QWERTY keyboard to a 46-key piano (D3 → B6).
Play the lower octaves with Z–/, move up with A–RET, Q–], and 1–=.

Octave 3 (D3–B3)
PC Keys:   Z   X   C   V   B   N   M   ,   .   /
Notes:     D3  D#3 E3  F3  F#3 G3  G#3 A3  A#3 B3

Octave 4 (C4–B4)
PC Keys:   A   S   D   F   G   H   J   K   L   ;   '   RET
Notes:     C4  C#4 D4  D#4 E4  F4  F#4 G4  G#4 A4  A#4 B4

Octave 5 (C5–B5)
PC Keys:   Q   W   E   R   T   Y   U   I   O   P   \[   ]
Notes:     C5  C#5 D5  D#5 E5  F5  F#5 G5  G#5 A5  A#5 B5

Octave 6 (C6–B6)
PC Keys:   1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9   0   -   =
Notes:     C6  C#6 D6  D#6 E6  F6  F#6 G6  G#6 A6  A#6 B6

Other useful shortcuts:

Shortcut	Action
F1	Shows About dialog
F2	Shows Help dialog
F12	Toggle visual key labels
ESC	Quit/exit application
Up/Down Arrows	Adjust volume

Contributing

Contributions are what make the open-source community such an amazing place to learn, inspire, and create. Any contributions you make are greatly appreciated.

If you have a suggestion that would make this better, please fork the repo and create a pull request. You can also simply open an issue with the tag "enhancement".

Support

If you find this project useful and want to support its development, thank you!

Licenses

This project is licensed under MIT license. See LICENSE.txt for the full license text.

This project uses Noto Serif, which is licensed under the SIL Open Font License 1.1. See LICENSE-OFL.txt for the full license text.