Using music to communicate computing information

Abstract

The audio channel remains little used in most computing applications, often its use being relegated to providing trivial sound effects whose novelty value soon wears off. Nevertheless, in principle sound offers much to the process of human–computer interaction as for most people the notion of auditory imagery is easily accepted. In this paper we explore how sound, specifically musical sound, can be used to communicate computing information. The findings of two studies are presented. The first investigated how pitch intervals and musical phrases of complex (non-sinusoidal) tones can be recognised. The second study aimed to demonstrate that musical structures could communicate information about high-level programming language structures and program run-time behaviour. Both studies showed that music could successfully be used as a communication medium and that listeners did not need to be musically trained to benefit from the audio signals. Finally, recommendations for further work are made.

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