[linux-audio-user] Linux Audio Direction (was New Sound Subsystem Needed For Qt4/KDE4)

[hanaghan at starband.net]

(snip)
> This thread has not come about because LAU desperately needs KDE. It has
> come about because the audio professionals in your Linux familiy see an
> opportunity to move the Linux environment forward in an area where it
> currently lags and languishes in indecision and neglect. KDE can choose
> to say "We're not interested," but that will only push the problem on
> for the next group which comes to a major rearchitecting. But, sooner or
> later, the issues will be addressed -- or this environment will wither.
> I'm convinced it's that fundamental--but that's another email. The only
> question for KDE is whether they want to be leaders or followers.
(snip-done)


So here's the "but that's another e-mail"...

I'm curious on the general direction LAU contributors feel Linux audio in
general is taking. Obviousley, there has been growth and with that there
are natural associated "growing pains".  With the "professional vs
non-pro" piece removed from the discussion...where are we going? By that I
mean should the nature of open source be the driver in Linux audio and
leave it such that there a *many* options (applications) for you to do the
same job but none of them really "talk" to each other well or play nice
together. should more cohesive methods of application development be
created? WOuld that remove a fundamental reason / motivation that
developers even bother to pour thru code in Linux in the first place? What
would the comgregational effort look like if it were warranted without it
looking / smelling like a M$ type solution (It's mine...i'll do it my way
because I can...not because I think it will be usefull to you)

To the current Linux audio devs...Muse, Jack, Ardour, Rosegarden, Csound,
Wired, etc all and any...what motivates you to create these apps? Surely
it's not money? :) So what is it? Are you genuinely magnanamous? Did you
have a need for yourself and decided to share? Are you a visionary? Do you
do it just 'cause without need for acknowledgement?? This is not a
judgemental statement on my part. If you will indulge me, I want to know
what makes you spend the time you do on this stuff so guys like me can
pilfer legally and freely your hard works and then subsequently bitch at
random about how it doesn't work! :)(tongue in cheek bit).  If you had
your druthers and were tasked with organising one desktop dev group, along
with the full crew of audio related devs and any other individual or
clustered components needed (RT capable kernels, file systems, etc), how
would you propose it be done. What parts might you organise and others
leave as is? Is doing this in Linux a mutually exclusive based wall that
was never intended to be scaled?

Personally, I don't think it can or should be done in large scale...but
the "low hanging fruit" in this topic could generate some interesting
perspective. And as the originating topic demonstrates, there certainly
seems to be conflicting conceptual opinion between development groups in
different corners of the OS in general...

R~