[linux-audio-user] Some music made with Linux

Pete Bessman ninjadroid at ml1.net
Sun Feb 22 02:55:52 EST 2004


Mon frer, I don't think you're ever gonna like me.

At Sun, 22 Feb 2004 14:40:25 +0900,
Patrick Shirkey wrote:
> 
> Actually I completely understand where you are coming from. You have 
> invested a lot of energy into getting specimen out the door. To a degree 
> your your ethos is intrinsically wound into it's existence.

Reasons I like specimen, in descending order:

1) It works, has a solid user interface, and can make good music
*right now* with ease.

2) It is rapidly improving, and there is a high correlation between my
desire for a feature and its sudden appearance.

3) I wrote it, and everything I touch turns to gold.  The astutue
reader will wonder how I ever manage to "change the oil," to which I
respond that I can't, and hence tend to blow up with vitriol and
venom, fulminating ad infinitum against everything in site, in
response to the slightest provocation.

> The thing is your attitude is of leaning towards the I'm sooooo cool 
> because I wrote my own app persuasion. Drop the hate and we can all move on.

You obviously think I'm an idiot (that's ok, I do to).  How could I
claim to be cool because of Specimen?  Maybe relative to my classmates
who are still learning the mechanics of C++, but I don't think for a
second that my program amounts to much more than a Labrador's red
rocket on a list whose members include the authors of Ardour,
swh-plugins, libsndfile, etc...

> You've obviously got a lot of energy to give. It's how you choose to 
> channel it that counts.

I agree.  In my evaluation, I'm making the best use of said energy.
You think I'm wrong, I think I'm right, oh well.  I'm not hurting
anyone or anything, and if I do turn out to be wrong and LinuxSampler
tears my fool skull from my head, you can piss on my grave.  No point
in raising a fuss.

> > Apart from Evil Laughter(TM), which I thought was funny, I couldn't
> > see one thing irrational about my statement.  The gist of it was "It
> > makes more sense to improve a living project than to have maintainers
> > of said project contribute to the creation of what is currently a
> > castle in the sky."  
> 
> Which turns out to be complete BS. Linux sampler is alive and you just 
> wrote the project off because you couldn't be bothered doing a small 
> amount of research.

I didn't mean to imply that it was dead, bad use of the word "living"
in oppostion to LinuxSampler. Last I checked, it was nearly 10,000 LOC
(about twice as big as Specimen).  However, I don't consider it to be
useable. If you disagree with me there, then once again, there's not
much to be done, but I would like to tempt you yet again with the
possiblity of smugly desecrating my final resting place if I'm wrong,
so you might as well just let me keep on digging.

> > Asking me to pool my efforts with SimSam's author
> > makes sense to me(until you account for the fact that I don't know QT
> > and hate C++, hence Specimen), but I don't see why I should drop my
> > project and work on LinuxSampler.
> > 
> NO one asked you to drop anything.  Why are you so defensive?

Technically correct.  As Mark pointed out, his comment which sent me
into a raging fury wasn't for me.  I misinterpreted it, and got the
impression that he was suggesting that my effort would be better spent
contributing to LinuxSampler.

> I was merely suggesting you could do a lot of good by contributing
> some of your energy to a project which is a very good idea.

And I'm merely suggesting that I am doing *more* good on my own.  In
retrospect, I should have sugar coated it more, since it obviously
rubbed folks the wrong way, but that wasn't the intention.

> We are not all born equal. Personally I'm happy if my tool does what I 
> need it to do. If other people have success with it too then bonus. 
> Unless that person is my girlfriend. Than I'm totally willing to be the 
> pleasure device...

Parse error.

> > P.P.S. Mark: I'm amazed that what I thought was merely an expression
> > of a negative opinion is considered "going off."  Puh-lease.
> 
> Well now you have so if you go any further take a packed lunch ok.

Damn.  Burned.

Patrick - 1
Pete - 0

Anyway, I have known about LinuxSampler since they got the site at
linuxsampler.org, but I got sick of waiting, and I couldn't figure out
what was going on well enough to contribute.  I still can't.  Their
lock-free ring buffer code is something on the order of 300 lines.
Mine is about 30.  As I said before, I am an *extremely* inexperienced
coder, and I think I would hamper their style more than help the
project.

In light of all this, I don't see anything wrong with me writing
Specimen, and I don't see anything wrong with me not liking
LinuxSampler.  I do see the light, however, about controlling my
temper, and I promise to never let it get the best of me again, lest I
find myself stranded in that place where people go when they "go off,"
wishing to dog that I had a powerbar and some gatorade.

[pb]




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