A Sound Glossary

Published

December 10, 2025

Modified

December 11, 2025

A Sound Vocabulary

Some terms will show up repeatedly in our work and we should be clear what they mean:

  1. Oscillation: Any periodic change in amplitude. https://natureofcode.com/oscillation/
  2. Sinusoid: A Sine Wave Oscillation, created typically with p5.Oscillator
  3. Waveform/Signal: A graph of amplitude vs time
  4. Frequency: The rate of the oscillation, in cycles per second. Look for a repeating pattern, and measure its time period. \(1/time.period\) will give you frequency in Hertz(Hz)
  5. Amplitude: The height, or scaling factor of the oscillation. Often measured in dB. Easiest to decipher for a simple repeating pattern like sine, square, or triangle.
  6. Phase: The instantaneous angle-position of a rotating vector which generates the wave: Remember the Euler’s Formula. Also the instantaneous angle-value of a repeating wave at a certain amplitude.
  7. Periodic/Aperiodic: A waveform whose amplitude repeats at a fixed period T is called a periodic waveform. Else, aperiodic.
  8. Harmonic: A (usually) Sine Oscillation that is at some integer multiple frequency of a reference Sine Oscillation. 2X = octave; 10X = decade.
  9. Attenuation: Reduction in amplitude of a waveform, usually as result of filter-ing. Measured in dBs.
  10. Transient: TBW
  11. Alias: TBW
  12. Nyquist Frequency: TBW
  13. Sampling Rate: TBW
  14. Low Pass: TBW
  15. High Pass: TBW
  16. Band Pass: TBW
  17. Notch Filter: TBW
  18. Transient: TBW
  19. In-harmonic: TBW
  20. Partials: TBW
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