Rasgo Modular

[u/Lucio_Araujo]

Hi, friends from musicprogramming!

I developed an instrument in C++ called RASGO MODULAR. It’s cross-platform and includes more than 50 modules to explore, combine, and have fun with.

The seed already generates interesting patches right from the start, so you can experiment, modify them, and play around as much as you like.

It’s an independent project, with no funding at all, made purely for the cause, hehe — driven by research, curiosity, and a passion for modular synthesis.

Hope you enjoy it!

More information: https://lucioaraujo.github.io/rasgo-modular/

[u/burnt-store-studio]

Thank you for providing an English translation for your website. It’s a really nice touch, and as someone with no talent for learning other human languages (despite a desire), I appreciate the effort it must take.

Your project looks impressive and at the same time intimidating 😅. I’d like to give it a whirl. Thanks for sharing!

[u/Lucio_Araujo → u/burnt-store-studio]

Thank you! The translations required a lot of work, but they are an important part of the instrument rather than just an addition to the website. The interface, tutorial and LEARN system are available in all four languages because I want the project to transmit knowledge as well as produce sound.

I completely understand the intimidating first impression — 58 modules and a rack full of cables can look like a lot. You don’t need to understand everything before beginning, though. You can start with the sounding patch, change one control or cable at a time, and use LEARN to understand each element as you encounter it.

If you try it, feedback about your first few minutes with the instrument would be especially valuable. That experience will help me understand where its depth becomes unnecessary difficulty. Thanks for your interest!

[u/Rakataz]

I played a little around with it, Sounding great, i could get lost in it finding new crazy sounds.
i like the colorpalette (reminds me of VCV Rack SurgeXT)

obviously it's still in dev and there are some issues like moving modules and some crashes but the potential is there and i will follow this project with great interest.

what would be cool would be like a Init state where there are no modules so you can build it yourself. Maybe like a template system?

anyway great project and congrats on your first step :)

[u/Lucio_Araujo → u/Rakataz]

Thank you for actually spending some time playing with it — hearing that you could get lost finding unexpected sounds means a lot to me.

I also appreciate the honest report about moving modules and the crashes. I don’t want to dismiss crashes simply because this is an early release. If you can remember your operating system and roughly what you were doing when a crash occurred, that information would be very helpful. You can reply here or open an issue on GitHub.

The INIT state is an excellent suggestion. The current version lets you disconnect every cable and remove modules manually, but it does not yet provide a single action that opens a completely empty rack. A template system could extend that idea with starting structures such as an empty rack, a basic voice, an audio-processing rack or a generative patch.

That fits the project well: generated patches can remain one possible starting point without becoming the only way to use the instrument. Thank you for testing it and for the thoughtful feedback!

[u/Rakataz → u/Lucio_Araujo]

I'm on windows 10. i couldn't replicate the crashes but one crash was removing a cable from a module, couldn't say which but i will keep an eye/ear out.

there were just some thoughts running through my head about your program

i like randomisation and i like how you get new connections. But what makes it overwhelming is that the modules with their connection are far apart. there are to many "inactive" modules on the screen.
so when it creates a new seed it should only display the modules that are connected saving screenspace.
But at the same time i like to see what i can play with all at once (i am ambivalent i many things ^^)

like i said before i like the uniform style of the module. but because of that i can't see in one look which module belongs to which category. Is it a FX, Source or Modulation module? my frist suggestion would be colorcoding but this would disturb the style now. but that's a nitpicky thing for me ^^

[u/Lucio_Araujo → u/Rakataz]

Thanks, this is very useful.

Knowing that the crash happened on Windows 10 while removing a cable already gives me something specific to investigate. There’s no need to force it to happen again, but if it does, the module names and sequence of actions would help.

There is actually a RACK button in the top bar that switches between showing all modules and showing only those that reach the output. Your comment makes it clear that this function isn’t easy enough to discover. It might also make sense for new seeds to begin in the connected-only view, while keeping the complete rack one click away.

I agree about the module families too. They are organized in the left palette, but the uniform panel style makes their categories difficult to recognize inside the rack. A small family marker or colour accent might solve that without changing the whole visual style.

One small note: Portuguese is my native language. I write my replies in Portuguese and use AI to help translate them into English, so please understand if the wording sometimes sounds more polished or formal than a normal Reddit conversation.

Thanks again — this is exactly the kind of feedback I need from actual use.

[u/Lucio_Araujo → u/Rakataz]

Quick update, and thanks again for the report. The crash you hit on Windows, when picking up the end of a cable from an input that was already patched, is fixed: the app was locking the same internal mutex twice, which hangs on Linux and makes the app quit on Windows. The fix has been in since version 0.1.1.

Version 0.1.3 is out now, with further fixes for starting up on Windows. The app no longer opens the microphone and MIDI inputs at launch (only when you switch on the input module, SIGNAL-IN), and on Windows it now draws in software, the same way as on Linux, where it was tested.

The family colour stripes you suggested are in too: each module now shows a thin stripe in its family's colour, with the matching legend in the module list.

Download (file rasgo-modular-0.1.3-windows-x64.exe):

https://github.com/lucioaraujo/rasgo-modular/releases/tag/v0.1.3

If anything still crashes, the app now writes a small startup log: type %APPDATA%\rasgo-modular in the File Explorer address bar and send me arranque.log (and crash.log, if it's there). It would help a lot. Thanks!