Similar to [pack ] and [unpack ] but instead of the default atom type being a float, the default type is anything.
Also comes with a new creation arg 'a' for anything. Numbers and unrecognized types will also default to anything.
For strict type checking, use f(loat), s(ymbol), and p(ointer).
The pak object will also store unrecognized types as symbols and interpret 'b' as a 'bang' symbol.
You can send lists to any of the additional pak inlets and it will store the list values with the inlet as the starting point. For example, sending the message [foo bar 3 baz( to the 2nd inlet of [pak 1 2 3 4] would result in the list: 1 foo bar 3
The example includes another object called [x ], which is a kind of trigger object that dehusks lists that consist of only 1 element when you use 'a' or nothing for creation args. For pd-vanilla users, the example also requires zexy's [demux].
You can also use "." to skip inlets and assign only specific ones.
For example, sending the message [. . 123( would assign 123 to the 3rd inlet and leave the first two values the same as they were. You can send these messages to any inlet.
The skip arg feature only applies to list and anything type messages, so if you really want to, you can still assign a single period to an inlet by sending it as a symbol.
There are two more objects [@pak] / [@unpak] - reverse pak/unpak, which output the lists in reverse order.
Strict-type error messages are muted by default and to unmute them, you need to send [mute 0( to the 1st inlet. The number sent to mute acts as a bit mask for the inlets, so when a bit is turned on, the associated inlet will output error messages.