[LAD] AMS to Ingen: VC to PCM

[Fons Adriaensen]

On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 05:11:13PM -0400, David Robillard wrote:
 
> This problem was always the most blatant LADSPA inadequacy for modulars
> to me...

At least LADSPA allows to do this (to have control inputs that are
at audio rate). And if a LADSPA plugin designed to work in AMS
(such as the MCP ones) doesn't make much sense in an environment
that assumes that audio rate == audio signal, so be it. There is
no rule that says a plugin must be usable in all hosts. 

In particular, synth plugins (VCOs, VCFs, etc.) are fundamentally
different from general audio processing ones (EQ, dynamics, etc.).
This doesn't exclude the possibility that some may be useful in
both contexts.

One of the reasons for this is that 'multichannel' is not the same
as 'polyphonic'. For a polyphonic plugin (typically found in a
synthesis environment), the only data shared between voices are
the values of GUI widgets. Everything else, internal state and
control inputs that are not mapped to a GUI widget but appear as
a patchable port, is 'per voice'. It even makes sense to mark
each voice as 'active' or not so you don't waste CPU cycles
on inactive ones, and to distribute the per voice processing
over multiple CPUs.

For a multichannel plugin (typically found in a general audio
processing environment, e.g. a mixer) this is not the case: for
example the gain factor used by a multichannel compressor does
not depend only on the input level of the channel it is applied
to, but either on all channels, or on a fixed single one (as for
Ambisonics, or when using a sidechain input).

Another typical feature of multichannel processors is that the
the CPU cycles required for the 'per channel' part are a tiny
fraction of what is required for the 'common' part (for example
calculating interpolated internal parameter trajectories). Which
also means you wouldn't distribute channels over multiple CPUs.

This means that you can't just replicate a single channel plugin
- either you have specific versions for each channel count (not
a practical solution), or the plugin system has to explicitly
support the separation of the  'common' and 'per channel' code. 


Ciao,

-- 
FA