[linux-audio-user] How about creating a sound-patch repository?

[Robert Jonsson]

Hi all,

The topic of the day is softsynts!

I've got this trouble with all softsynths available today under linux: 
-there aren't nearly as many patches available as I'd like. Some of them 
don't have any patches at all.

Now, this could be due to good reason, a lot of the synths are rather young.
- patches may not be supported yet
- patch formats change all the time making it hard to keep up
- ...

Some synths do seem to have very good patch systems, some of them come 
with a few patches, some several... Oftenly though, the patches are more 
proof of concept or tutorial types than finished, usable, sounds.

Anyway, in general I think the available patches are way to few! 
Speaking for myself I only have very limited time to poke around with 
sound apps. When I do have time to do some audio stuff it would be a 
great booster if there where more patches available for the increasing 
amount of softsynths.
Some of the synths are just way to complex for me, I will never 
understand how to utilize them (all these modular whizbang hitech 
synths). Though I'm sure great sounds can be produced with them.

Note that I'm not blaming the authors for not including patches! They 
are doing a great job at creating the synths in the first place! 
(Ofcourse it's great if they have created some nice patches also, but 
that is another issue, they are then working double shifts as users also 
:-).

I was more think along the lines of community effort. We, the users, 
should be able to help ourselves by helping each other.

So... I  throw out the question about a centralized sound-patch repository.
What if we provided a site similar to e.g. themes.org? Interested 
parties should there be able to upload patches and associate them with 
the synth they are made for. This should then be published on a 
searchable web.
We've talked before about application databases ala freshmeat, this 
could be a part in such an endevour.

Some synths are getting to the point where they have a community of 
their own, though I think this is the still the exception, not the rule. 
  By introducing a central repository a lot of extra publicitiy for all 
"smaller" softsynths, and linux audio in general.

It may very well be that we as a community are still to small to support 
things like this, but I'd like to think we have reached critical mass.

What do you guys think? Any takers?


Regards,
Robert