Hive audio hachathon March 2026: Sound visualizer in Go

This project was coded during one weekend.

Description

This audio visualizer consists of four different visualizers that hook into the computer's default audio input through portaudio. The top visualizer is a loudness graph that represents the maximum intensity in a sample over time, the bottom is a fast fourier transform frequency plot (0 - ~10000 Hz), and the middle two both are plots of the current sample, one as a vertical bar graph, the other as a circular plot with sample intensity offsetting the distance from the center of the circle.

Dependencies & requirements

• Linux (developed on Ubuntu 24.04.1)
• Go (developed with 1.25.5)
• Portaudio (19.6.0-1.2)

The graphics are drawn using raylib, which is used as a Go package.

Installation & running

To run without producing a named executable:

go run .

To get the default named executable and run it:

go build
./visualizer

Custom named executable:

go build -o <custom_name>
./<custom_name>

Ensure that your default sound input device is correctly set up and is not muted.

For routing different sound sources to the default audio input I can recommend Helvum which in turn was recommended to me by a peer who also took part in the audio hackathon.

AI use

Google Gemini was used to help with the correct scaling of the FFT graph, verifying logic, helping with dependency management, compilation, and hunting for bugs.