[LAD] Dumb Idea #27: LV2 host as kernel?

[Darren Landrum]

If one were to build a "kernel" to a digital audio workstation that was
itself a bare-bones LV2 host, could things like audio tracks, midi
tracks, and mixer channels and the like be built as LV2 plug-ins?

I've been thinking a lot about a comment made a while back about how
monolithic applications are very ill-suited to the open-source method of
development. So I got to thinking about how an operating system works
(at a high level; my meager coding skills are no matches for people
well-versed in operating systems) and began to ask some questions.

This "kernel" would have to handle things like audio routing, and
message passing between two "processes" (the LV2 plug-ins), and would
jockey the audio in and out of the plug-in graph. It would need to
support the GUI and event extensions, and probably a few others, at the
very least.

The hope might be that if such a kernel could be made, it might then be
a lot easier for many people to contribute the small pieces that would
make for a usable application. Please feel free to consider this
mindless brainstorming if you'd like.

-- Darren