[LAA] [ANN] Ecasound 2.8.0 released

[Kai Vehmanen]

1. Summary of changes in this release
-------------------------------------

Important bugfix has been made to sample conversion routines. Many other
minor bugs have been also fixed.

2. What is Ecasound?
--------------------

Ecasound is a software package designed for multitrack audio processing.
It can be used for simple tasks like audio playback, recording and format
conversions, as well as for multitrack effect processing, mixing,
recording and signal recycling. Ecasound supports a wide range of audio
inputs, outputs and effect algorithms. Effects and audio objects can be
combined in various ways, and their parameters can be controlled by
operator objects like oscillators and MIDI-CCs. A versatile console mode
user-interface is included in the package.

Primary platform for running Ecasound is GNU/Linux. Ecasound can also be
run on many UNIX-derived systems such as FreeBSD, Mac OS X and Solaris.
Limited support for Windows is available through Cygwin. Ecasound is
licensed under the GPL. The Ecasound Control Interface (ECI) is licensed
under the LGPL.

3. Changes in 2.8.x series
--------------------------

* The int-float conversion routines have been modified to be symmetric
   (previously asymmetric). As this impacts all use-cases involving fixed
   point audio, the release version was bumped to 2.8 to reflect the change.
   Ecasound now scales with 2^N for both int-to-float and float-to-int.
   For 0dBFS signals created in floating point domain, and normalized
   to [-1,1] range, the positive values are limited just before 0dbFS to
   avoid overflow (positive values exceeding 2^N-1).

   Pointers to how other projects handle this issue:
     - Case for symmetric conversions:
       http://lists.apple.com/archives/coreaudio-api/2009/Dec/msg00120.html
     - Blog entry to which the above is a response:
       http://blog.bjornroche.com/2009/12/int-float-int-its-jungle-out-there.html
     - libsndfile FAQ on the topic:
       http://www.mega-nerd.com/libsndfile/FAQ.html#Q010
     - Discussion around the topic on JACK devel list:
       http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.audio.jackit/20499

* Bugfixes to loop objects, jack_multi, JACK transport support, false runtime
   DBC warnings, seek support for -klg, ecasound-ruby hangs and ALSA output.
   Following bugtracker items closed:
     - http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&aid=2013827&group_id=4605&atid=104605

* Signal handling has been simplified for not-so-POSIX platforms. For
   system/environments which do not provide all three of sigwait(), sigprocmask()
   and pthread_sigmask(), process will terminate immediately without
   the usual cleanup procedure upon receing a signal (SIGINT, TERM, et al).
   The old pause() based kludge has been removed from the codebase. For
   many, if not all, users this has no practical impact.

* JACK transport is now disabled by default in batchmode. In interactive
   mode ('-c' option), the default is still 'sendrecv'. Ecasound now also
   provides better feedback about transport related events. Without graphical
   feedback, the interaction between JACK and Ecasound has been a common
   source of user confusion.

For full list of changes, see git commit history.
  - http://www.eca.cx/ecasound/history.php

4. Interface and configuration file changes in 2.8 series
---------------------------------------------------------

Default JACK transport mode is now "notransport" (do not send nor react to
JACK transport state changes) when running in batchmode. Interactive
mode (when started with '-c') still defaults to "sendrecv" as before. Note
that the transport mode can always be explicitly set by passing '-G'
option (see ecasound(1) man page for details).

5. Contributors to 2.8 series
-----------------------------

Patches - Accepted code, documentation and build system changes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Extracted with 'git-shortlog -s':

v2.8.0:
      1  Alessandro Ghedini
     39  Kai Vehmanen

Bug Hunting - Reports that led to bugfixes (items closed)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

v2.8.0
   * Joel Roth (3)
       wrong sample type displayed for loop objects
       incorrect channel count for jack_multi objects
       -klg does maintain state across seeks
   * Julien Claassen (1)
       runtime DBC warnings
   * Dan Muresan, Sergei Steshenko (1)
       problems of asymmetry in int-float conversions
   * Alessandro Ghedini (1)
       signal handling bug caused problems to ecasound-ruby apps
   * Doug F. (1)
       incomplete playback to ALSA outputs

Feature suggestions - Ideas that led to new features (items)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

None.

6. Links and files
------------------

Web site (and mirrors):
 	http://eca.cx/ecasound (fi)
 	http://ecasound.seul.org (us)
 	http://ecasound.sourceforge.net (us)

Source package:
 	http://eca.cx/ecasound/download.php
 	ecasound-2.8.0.tar.gz, md5sum:
 	8072340f6cd72fdea05d7efa625b78c5

List of distributions with maintained Ecasound support:
 	See http://eca.cx/ecasound/download.php