step_signvector: Specify a scale's step pattern with a sign vector

In musicMCT: Analyze the Structure of Musical Scales

Specify a scale's step pattern with a sign vector

Description

Rather than calculate the full sign vector from the "modal color" hyperplane arrangement, sometimes it's advantageous to use a sign vector that reflects only the pairwise comparisons on a scale's steps. This function does that.

Usage

step_signvector(set, ineqmat = NULL, edo = 12, rounder = 10)

Arguments

set	Numeric vector of pitch-classes in the set
ineqmat	Specifies which hyperplane arrangement to consider. By default (or by explicitly entering "mct") it supplies the standard "Modal Color Theory" arrangements of getineqmat(), but can be set to strings "white," "black", "gray", "roth", "infrared", "pastel", "rosy", "infrared", or "anaglyph", giving the ineqmats of make_white_ineqmat(), make_black_ineqmat(), make_gray_ineqmat(), make_roth_ineqmat(), make_infrared_ineqmat(), make_pastel_ineqmat(), make_rosy_ineqmat(), make_infrared_ineqmat(), or make_anaglyph_ineqmat(). For other arrangements, this parameter accepts explicit matrices.
edo	Number of unit steps in an octave. Defaults to 12.
rounder	Numeric (expected integer), defaults to 10: number of decimal places to round to when testing for equality.

Value

A vectors of signs, -1, 0, and 1, corresponding to the step-related hyperplanes in the defined ineqmat.

Examples

step_signvector(sc(7, 35)) # Half the length of a full sign vector for heptachords:
signvector(sc(7, 35))

musicMCT documentation built on June 21, 2026, 9:06 a.m.