• http://www.soundtomind.com/

A number of tech news sites last week had articles about a new software created by Toronto's Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning that translates network and server activity into music. Changes in the music can be interpreted to detect problems in the system.

A visit to the www.soundtomind.com website gives some interesting background on the academic origins of this project:

"iSIC (information muSIC) is an alternative approach to remotely monitoring complex systems like communications networks. It presents information in a synergized acoustical format that provides a holistic and uninterrupted audio model of the system under observation. iSIC is meant to complement, not replace traditional visually based systems. iSIC falls under the broader category of the field of sonification. The purpose of any sonification is to allow users to identify patterns in data through sound.

The iSIC project is the culmination of several years of R&D by a group of students, graduates and faculty at the Sheridan Institute of Technology in Oakville, Ontario. iSIC is a completely unique work of intellectual property producing sound which is rich in information and is ergonomically designed for sustained operation. 

The site also says "From the start the main objectives were to academically enrich the Telecommunications Technology program curriculum and to find a research niche with industry partnerships."

Read more at http://www.soundtomind.com/site/whatisit.html. And listen! You can hear some of the music created by this system by going to: http://www.soundtomind.com/site/listen.html.