[linux-audio-dev] Best-performing Linux-friendly MIDI interfaces?

[Jay Vaughan]

>right. so we've already established that the actual nature of the
>problem on linux is different, and much closer to the windows situation
>- a huge variation in hardware types and configurations. jwz solved his
>"problem" by throwing the problem away, and moving into a domain where
>the problem he had wasn't solved, it was eliminated.
>

yes, we have established the actual nature of the problem.  on linux.

the problem is: not enough apps, and what few apps they are: 
'not-standard' and 'not-synced' with the distro's world view of 
things.

the lesson of jwz is this, and its a hard one: if the user even has 
to -think- about setting up their audio system, even just a tiny 
little bit, _BEFORE_ using an app (but not necessarily during or 
after), then linux will be 'behind the big guys'.

when i multi-track on OSX, i don't even think about the 10 channels 
of digital i/o i'm getting from my firepod, nor do i care about the 
megahertz, nor do i have to set a damn iota of it up.  i just use the 
app (cubase/logic/intuem) the way it wants me to use it and i feel 
good about it.  the OS handles the bullshit.

accept this config/usability challenge, or don't.

(y'know, maybe make the linux ISO boot CD the solution to ALSA, not 
the problem...)

>the competing APIs is definitely a problem. the OSS guys continue to
>refuse to accept ALSA,

WHAT OSS guys, and why aren't they paying attention to 
linux-audio-dev if they're such great OSS guys?  i mean, c'mon.  its 
weak to draw such lines in the sand, yo.  show me a great OSS app, 
and then show me 10 ALSA apps, before you make such conundrums out to 
be the excuses they aren't!!!

>and continue to promote the benefits of their API
>and libraries. The layers that have been built on top of them
>(PortAudio, JACK, the arts audio api, gnome-sound, etc) continue to
>compete with each other in various ways.


yeah, and this sucks ass.  to multitrack, depending on my app, i 
could go one of 3 different ways, and only and all because some 
developer decided that writing a few honky lines of code was worth 
more than an e-mail or two to someone else who had already done 'the 
glory work'.  bah!

>what is happening on linux is similar to the windows world: multiple
>audio APIs each of which serve a different purpose (windows own MM api,
>ASIO, GSIF).

if you want to see a community using honky-ass technology, look no 
further than the VST/ASIO crowd.  man, its wonky, but whatever: 
they're using it.

or didn't you notice?

>  OS X has a head start here because they forced everyone,
>even the email client writers, to use a callback model for audio I/O via
>CoreAudio. if we could do that on linux, the biggest headaches could be
>solved quickly. but as you note, we can't.


actually, what i like about the MidiShare effort is that it seems to 
have been written by people who don't really give a shit what the 
model is, they bend it to their own model until its sexy.

in other words, the french.


>  > in all fairness, if there were a hardware vendor willing to follow
>  > the 'known working' path to ALSA glory, we wouldn't be having this
>  > discussion .. or, at least, if we knew of such a vendor (i'm sure
>  > they're out there, those quiet linux VAR's who pack it all up and
>  > send it off, operational-like).
>
>jwz would have refused to buy the equipment from that vendor.

umm.. i think the -only- reason you and i are even talking about jwz 
is the fact that its so -freaking controversial- that he 'switched to 
mac' (and even after the intel thing, what a bone-head) in the first 
place.

because its obvious.  just get a fucking mac, jwz, if audio is so 
important to you.  who gives a shit, mr. million-dollar 
dark-and-lonely-place?  macs have been good for audio since the 
beginning, or didn't you know that?

>he would
>have insisted that it should work on the gear he already has, since ALSA
>says that its supported. "and now they tell me i have to buy a machine
>from this Linux Audio Systems people just to play music at the same time
>as making a skype call. wtf?"
>

linux guys giving the 'jwz should just by an sb-live' argument are 
weaker than piss.  i mentioned jwz in the first place because you 
should know: linux audio needs to be a pop star.  until it is, it 
won't be working well enough.

>there are millions more people doing audio on windows than on osx, and
>yet windows requires *at least* as much work to get setup for pro-audio
>as linux. so what conclusion do we draw from that?
>

sorry, but no.  i set up my firepod, a wonderful audio i/o interface, 
and from that point on it just worked.  setting it up consisted of a 
bit of humble-pie windows driver-.exe downloading, exactly *one* 
'confirm that you want to do this' step, and from that point on it 
was magic.

perhaps what the ALSA crowd need is a crash-course on making 
AUTOPACKAGE shell scripts which leave the stupidity of entering the 
root password up to the user, and from that point on just provide 
what everyone wants: a working AUDIO subsystem.

-- 

;

Jay Vaughan