oscpack

oscpack is an open-source C++ library that implements the Open Sound Control (OSC) protocol. It provides a straightforward API for constructing OSC messages and bundles, encoding their arguments, and decoding received packets. The library supports the core OSC data types (integers, floats, strings, blobs, timetags) and allows messages to be organized into bundles with time tags for scheduled execution.

For transport, oscpack includes components to transmit and receive OSC packets over UDP, enabling integration with networked multimedia setups. The design emphasizes portability and performance, making it suitable for real-time audio and multimedia applications across platforms such as Windows, macOS, and Linux. The library is used by a variety of audio, visualization, and interactive systems to enable inter-application communication.

In typical usage, developers create OSC messages by packing the appropriate arguments, assemble them into bundles if needed, and then send them through UDP sockets or network endpoints. On the receiving side, incoming OSC packets are parsed to extract address patterns and arguments for application logic. oscpack is commonly used in conjunction with other multimedia frameworks and projects, due to its focused scope and cross-platform compatibility.

The project is maintained as an open-source resource with community contributions and documentation available through its hosting repositories. It serves as a practical implementation of OSC for C++ developers who require a lightweight, dependency-light solution for networked control and data exchange. See also OSC and related multimedia networking libraries for alternative implementations.