MAP2 — Mackes Audio Platform 2
A modular, real-time audio processing platform that turns commodity Linux hardware into a professional-grade guitar and audio rig — neural amp modeling, convolution reverb, and a full effects chain at single-digit millisecond latency, scalable across nodes over Ethernet.
- Category
- Real-time audio
- Languages
- C++ · Python · TypeScript
- Platform
- Linux · Fedora 44
- Sheet
- E-02
A professional rig built from commodity parts.
MAP2 is modular by design: a low-latency DSP engine at the core, a control backend around it, and a dashboard on top — scaling from a single box to a whole band on one shared backbone.
01Neural amp modeling
Machine-learned amp and cabinet models reproduce the feel of real hardware in real time.
02Convolution reverb
Impulse-response convolution places your signal in real acoustic spaces with studio fidelity.
03Full effects chain
A composable rack of effects — drive, modulation, delay, and more — ordered however you like.
04Single-digit-ms latency
The C++ engine is tuned for round-trip latency low enough to play live without perceptible delay.
05Multi-node clustering
Nodes link over Ethernet into one shared digital backbone, scaling a whole band across machines.
06Modular architecture
Engine, backend, and dashboard are cleanly separated, so each part can evolve independently.
07Web dashboard
A React control surface for patching the signal chain, tuning parameters, and monitoring the rig.
08Commodity hardware
Runs on stock Linux boxes — no specialised DSP silicon required to reach pro-grade results.
The right language for each layer.
MAP2 pairs a native DSP engine with a scripting backend and a typed web front-end — each chosen for what that layer demands.
The real-time audio core, built on JUCE, where every microsecond of latency and every allocation counts.
The control and orchestration backend — a FastAPI service coordinating the engine, clustering, and state.
The browser dashboard, typed end to end for a reliable control surface over the signal chain.
Measured where milliseconds matter.
Real-time audio fails audibly, so MAP2 is validated with signal-level correctness tests and hard latency budgets alongside conventional unit and integration coverage.
- DSP unit tests validate each processing block against known reference output.
- Null tests confirm bit-accurate behaviour where a stage should be transparent.
- Latency benchmarks hold round-trip timing inside the single-digit-millisecond budget.
- Real-time safety checks guard the audio thread against allocations and locks.
- Cluster integration tests exercise multi-node sync across the Ethernet backbone.
- Dashboard type checks keep the TypeScript control surface in step with the backend.
Runs on your gear, on your terms.
MAP2 is built to operate entirely on hardware you own, with dependency licensing tracked and audio staying on your local network.
- Self-hosted — the engine and backend run on your own Linux machines, no cloud required.
- Local-network audio — clustering traffic stays on your Ethernet segment.
- License tracking — JUCE and third-party dependency terms are honoured and documented.
- Reproducible builds — pinned toolchains produce the same binaries on Fedora 44.
- No telemetry — the platform does not phone home during operation.
- Open source — the implementation is published for inspection and reuse.