5 Feb
2013
5 Feb
'13
3:58 p.m.
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary about
the world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to
say where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater
interest to me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the
following plaints and lamentations (in no particular order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own, but
say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these
lists already have ready replies and responses to these and other
criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm
more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain
wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without
flames or dissing other developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking,
I've had enough of that crap, and I'm most thankful these days for such
forum amenities as "mute user" and autodiscard, along with the standard
filters found in mail clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY
Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of
Atlas Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had ceased
to be musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to figure a way to
allow people to be free yet behave themselves with respect towards the
common goal (e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm going to guess that he
was still working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel
free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the
topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Best,
dp
5 Feb
5 Feb
4:07 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 9:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
I've been reading a lot of negative (read:
vitriolic) commentary about the
world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to say
where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater interest to
me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the following plaints
and lamentations (in no particular order) :
The only thing I find lacking in Linux audio are good sample
libraries. If we had something comparable to the big Orchestral or
ethnic instrument libraries like EWQL, VSL, Kontakt, etc., have, I
could do 100% Linux in my studio.
Otherwise, I love Linux audio and can't stand having to deal with
Windows for any kind of audio work.
--
Brett W. McCoy -- http://www.brettwmccoy.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"In the rhythm of music a secret is hidden; If I were to divulge it,
it would overturn the world."
-- Jelaleddin Rumi
4:29 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hey Dave,
let me give you my opinion.
Too many distros - don't see it as a problem
Too many audio-optimized distros - don't see it as a problem
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments. - agree, big problem, would
not speak of instruments only, effects as well
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins. - don't see it as a problem if
we go for our own standard
Too many unstable/unfinished applications. - agree
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins). - agree
Poor external/internal session management. - agree
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live). - agree
Lack of support for contemporary hardware. - probably, although I have no
data as to how big the problem is
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits. - i am confused as to why that
would be a problem with linux audio
Too difficult to set up audio system. - don't agree
JACK is a pain. - don't agree
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community. - don't
see it as a problem
I would have to comment more on the latter. I don't think it is bad or
unavoidable to have fragmentation and conflict. This is natural for most
human interaction. The problem, in my view, is that there are so few
developers (compared to, say, Windows Audio). And because there are so few
devs, fragmentation becomes a problem, since each developer is then just a
one man project with a small audience.
Cheers!
--
Louigi Verona
http://www.louigiverona.ru/
4:37 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On 02/05/2013 10:29 AM, Louigi Verona wrote:
Hey Dave,
let me give you my opinion.
Hi Louigi, I was waiting for your input. :)
Some short replies:
Lack of support for contemporary hardware. - probably, although I have
no data as to how big the problem is
I've found a simple metric. Just open a Sweetwater catalog to the pages
for computer audio interfaces and count the ones with Linux support.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits. - i am
confused as to why
that would be a problem with linux audio
Problem for the developers, not so much for users.
I would have to comment more on the latter. I don't think it is bad or
unavoidable to have fragmentation and conflict. This is natural for
most human interaction. The problem, in my view, is that there are so
few developers (compared to, say, Windows Audio). And because there
are so few devs, fragmentation becomes a problem, since each developer
is then just a one man project with a small audience.
Good point, thank you for the input.
Best,
dp
5:17 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, 5 Feb 2013 18:29:06 +0300
Louigi Verona <louigi.verona(a)gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
I would have to comment more on the latter. I don't think it is bad or
unavoidable to have fragmentation and conflict. This is natural for most
human interaction. The problem, in my view, is that there are so few
developers (compared to, say, Windows Audio). And because there are so few
devs, fragmentation becomes a problem, since each developer is then just a
one man project with a small audience.
That's kind of true. If there were a few thousand more developers, for
example the different session management interfaces wouldn't be a
problem. If you have, say, 3 session management interfaces, and each
app supports one it effectively divides the number of apps you can use
by 3 if you need session mgmt. If there were thousands of developers
and as a result thousands of apps, there would still be a lot of apps
left to choose... But I don't think this will happen any time soon, so
I think it would be better for the existing developers to focus a bit
more on compatibility with other apps. Conclusion: We are few, so we
really need to work together on this ;)
4:47 p.m.
Hi Dave,
My experience as a Linux audio user:
1. not enough instrument plugins
2. poor VST support
3. poor session management
4. inconsistent use of existing standards by apps
My experience as a Linux developer (albeit a small one):
1. too many standards, hard to know what to implement
2. too much fragmentation in the developer community, hinders progress on #1
My opinions on what is a problem for Linux adoption by the wider community of electronic
musicians:
Almost all of the things you mentioned.
Many developers in the Linux community either a.) seem unable to put themselves in the
shoes of a musician coming off of most other professional-grade audio software on
non-Linux platforms, or b.) don't seem to care about catering to that audience's
wants or needs. I know I'm painting with broad strokes here; not everyone is like
that, but most seem to be, IMO.
Michael Bechard
________________________________
From: Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
To: linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org; linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
Sent: Tuesday, February 5, 2013 8:58 AM
Subject: [LAD] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary about the world of
Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to say where, just "the
usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater interest to me is the commentary
itself - it seems to boil down to the following plaints and lamentations (in no particular
order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own, but say what you
will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these lists already have ready replies
and responses to these and other criticisms, many of which have been voiced here
previously. What I'm more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just
plain wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without flames or dissing
other developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of that crap,
and I'm most thankful these days for such forum amenities as "mute user" and
autodiscard, along with the standard filters found in mail clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY Philharmonic
when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of Atlas Eclipticalis, something to
the effect that his concerns had ceased to be musical and had become social, i.e. that he
had to figure a way to allow people to be free yet behave themselves with respect towards
the common goal (e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm going to guess that he was
still working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we lack most and
what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel free to expand your remarks as
you like. I'm planning an article on the topic and will likely use selected comments,
subject to approval of course.
Best,
dp
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
5:07 p.m.
On Tue, 05 Feb 2013 09:58:14 -0500
Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
...
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel
free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the
topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Too much fragmentation/too many standards to choose from. Plugin formats
for example. There is LADSPA which is all good and very useful for its
special niche, but it lacks the ability to create proper instruments
(as opposed to filters, for which it works fine). Also LADSPA has no
support for GUIs. Then there's DSSI which has support for instruments as
well as GUIs, but it lacks certain other things which other formats
such as VST have had for ages; one thing I was missing was the ability
to pass tempo information to the plugins. Then there's LV2 which is so
complex with all its "extensions" and Raptor and whatnot that as a
consequence, almost nobody supports it. I remember a discussion on the
Renoise board where the developers said that they would not support LV2
plugins specifically because it was so complex and it would pull in so
much bloat for so little expected gain. They chose to support DSSI
instead, with all its limitations. Then there's native Linux VSTs of
course. There are few, mostly because Steinberg can't be arsed to make
their API/SDK available in a way which makes painless open source
development possible (this is not the "fault" of Linux audio of
course!). Then MIDI: There's ALSA Midi which most programs use, and
Jack has its *own* implementation which is incompatible with ALSA,
which means that ALSA Midi programs can't talk to Jack Midi programs
and vice versa. (Yes, there are "bridge" applications and stuff, I
know...)
Same thing for session management. The way JACK is built asks for
modular connection of apps, but there's just no way you can reproduce
that song reliably once you have it all setup. There's LASH, at least
one other session management, I forgot its name, and recently JACK
began to grow its own session management extension (only available in
Jack2, but not in Jack1, right?)... For the best chance of good
compatibility, an app would have to support ALL those session
management interfaces. Many don't even support one.
Then JACK is great for what it does, but it really is a pain. It's hard
to setup, and sometimes it and its tools are just plain buggy. At the
sublab (local hackerspace) we tried setting up a moderately low-latency
audio server which networked computers could talk to using Jack. I
remember night-long debugging and setup sessions for that. Once,
everything seemed to be running alright but there was no output. We
found that the jack.plumbing tool had been crashing instantly after
starting for some reason for a while, so connections weren't restored.
I think that was fixed when we switched to Jack2. NetJack apparently
doesn't work when the clients are across a router; it has something to
do with the TTL of network packets which are used to discover the
server. I wrote a patch for it, but we would have to patch the "server"
machine (which isn't called the server in Jack terminology I think) and
all the clients who would be using it, plus configure the router to
forward the packets. Of course, we also want to just stream music at
times, for which Jack is overkill (and not all music apps support/not
all users want Jack), so we have to support PulseAudio too. We now have
PulseAudio running on top of Jack2 which is sorta stable but it took
ages. Jack2 seems to be more stable than Jack1, and the network support
is better IMHO.
I'm a professional software developer and I sometimes also do some
server configuration stuff and the like, but even for me, Linux audio
is often just too complicated to be fun. Especially when I'm in a
"musical mood", I don't want to think about port forwarding,
segmentation violations, problems with session management interfaces,
bugs in low-latency kernels, crashing Wine plugin bridges which worked
last week before the automatic update ran, and stuff like that. When I'm
trying to do music, I want to think about *music* and about using
technology in creative ways for making music, not staring at stack
traces.
And I think this is a problem that will not be fixed by creating some
wrapper script with a nice colorful GUI or even creating one more distro
with a realtime kernel and audio-specific default settings. Usability is
something that has to be thought about and built into the core
interfaces and programs such as Jack from the beginning.
This became something of a rant, sorry... I don't mean to be rude,
there is great potential in Linux audio, great stuff has been done by
many people in the last years, and I would never switch to Windows or
buy an Apple so I could use "The Audio App" (Live) like most everybody
else. But sometimes I think the huge great efforts made by Linux audio
people could be better coordinated to yield more, faster progress.
5:12 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Let's hope this turns into a productive thread and not a flamewar, because
I think this really has potential.
My comments will be the way I see it, and how I understand it from other
musicians I've talked to about Linux audio and music production in general.
Generally, what I think is that what needs to be bridged is the knowledge
gap that hinders people from making the music they want. There are upsides
and downsides to using Linux in this sense, I do think it attracts more
technically proficient users and that that's a good thing in the long run,
but there's only so many of them. Musicians want to record and mess around
with music. They do not want to compile applications or scour the internet
for countless hours looking for suitable plugins.
I think most things can already be done in Linux, even with newer more
MIDI-based musical styels as electronic etc. The issue in my eyes lies with
having something unitary that you can just hand over to people and let them
start messing around themselves with minimal effort.
So in short, what I think is the main issues currently is basically lack of
documentation and "established workflows" that people can just simply get
into using. There's 10 ways to do one thing, and there's rarely information
available to find out easily to use either of the ways.
I got some plans for a small project that will revolve around just
providing a workflow for making electronic music, kind of like gathering
alot of information and provide easy access to a set of plugins, synths and
instruments that people just can start using. The plug-and-play idea I
guess. But that kinds of efforts is what I think is needed more, we do have
alot of very capable technology, people just need to know how to use it.
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 3:58 PM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary about the
world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to say
where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater interest to
me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the following
plaints and lamentations (in no particular order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own, but
say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these
lists already have ready replies and responses to these and other
criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm more
interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain wrong about
the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without flames or dissing
other developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of
that crap, and I'm most thankful these days for such forum amenities as
"mute user" and autodiscard, along with the standard filters found in mail
clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY
Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of Atlas
Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had ceased to be
musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to figure a way to allow
people to be free yet behave themselves with respect towards the common
goal (e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm going to guess that he was still
working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel
free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the
topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Best,
dp
______________________________**_________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user@lists.**linuxaudio.org<Linux-audio-user@lists.linuxaudio.org>
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/**listinfo/linux-audio-user<http://lists.lin…
5:20 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On 02/05/2013 11:12 AM, Gabbe Nord wrote:
Let's hope this turns into a productive thread and
not a flamewar,
because I think this really has potential.
Hear the voice. To all: In the interest of clarity, please avoid dialog.
I want to know what the members of LAD and LAU think about the topic,
not each other (or Microsoft or Apple or Steinberg or [your hobby-horse
here]).
Best,
dp
5:53 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
I'm not saying anything, but if I wanted to troll LAD/LAU, this topic
would be one of my first choices.
On 2/5/13, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
On 02/05/2013 11:20 AM, Dave Phillips wrote:
... In the interest of clarity, please avoid
dialog.
Should have read "unproductive dialog", sorry.
Best,
dp
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
5:19 p.m.
On 02/05/2013 03:58 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
Enlightenment.
--
Thorsten Wilms
thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/
8:09 p.m.
On Tuesday 05 February 2013 17:16:45 Thorsten Wilms wrote:
On 02/05/2013 03:58 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
E17 has been released. At last!
http://enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/e17
Regards.
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user
and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
Enlightenment. 
5:55 p.m.
Hi Dave!
This e-mail will probably not come to LAU and LAD (I hope it will, maybe
with your help :-) (to restrictive settings)) but I hope you get it.
Reply to All / Reply to List
On Tuesday 05 February 2013 09.58.14 Dave Phillips wrote:
...
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do
we lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please
feel free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article
on the topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to
approval of course.
* Bad vendor support. This goes for anything like drivers,
software (IE: editors for different HW) and official support.
* LADs are in general not good to think as musicians,
producers and sound engineers. The stuff they make
are in general very good. But imagine what a Linux-
newbie has to deal with when he see phrases like:
"QT based" and "GTK based". This should be a
developer only thing, nothing that end users who
more and less are in constant right brain hemisphere
moods should have to care about.
* A very geeky community. I see very often the answer:
"read the ALSA matrix" when a poor newbie or a
curious person asks for the best soundcards for Linux.
That something works in Linux does not mean
that it's good for AUDIO recording and studio work
in general.
That said, personally I'm happy, but that's because I have the required
geekyness needed for audio work in Linux. And I'm very grateful for what
the LADs has done for me and I'm grateful for the inspiration the LAU's
gives.
Jostein
6:15 p.m.
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:55 AM, Jostein Chr. Andersen <jostein(a)vait.se>wrote;wrote:
* A very geeky community. I see very often the answer:
"read the ALSA matrix" when a poor newbie or a
curious person asks for the best soundcards for Linux.
That something works in Linux does not mean
that it's good for AUDIO recording and studio work
in general.
so how does this look?
http://ardour.org/files/aspecs.png
6:43 p.m.
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:55 AM, Jostein Chr. Andersen
<jostein(a)vait.se>wrote;wrote:
Very nice, this is a very good answer, let's hope that this URL will be
anywhere! This is helpful for me too as I'm investing in new HW this
days, thanks! :-)
J.
* A very geeky
community. I see very often the answer:
"read the ALSA matrix" when a poor newbie or a
curious person asks for the best soundcards for Linux.
That something works in Linux does not mean
that it's good for AUDIO recording and studio work
in general.
so how does this look?
http://ardour.org/files/aspecs.png
6:56 p.m.
"1.) What else can I do, as a developer, to make users feel more involved?"
Hey Davin!
One of the most responsive devs are those that
a. respond quickly
b. actively develop their software
c. integrate suggestions quickly
In Linux Audio excellent response I get from Rui on his Qtractor and on
Giada.
All in all, it is always best when software is developed actively. Real
problems arise,
when development slows down or comes to a halt.
Louigi.
8:13 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Louigi,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 9:56 AM, Louigi Verona <louigi.verona(a)gmail.com> wrote:
"1.) What else can I do, as a developer, to make
users feel more involved?"
Hey Davin!
One of the most responsive devs are those that
a. respond quickly
b. actively develop their software
c. integrate suggestions quickly
In Linux Audio excellent response I get from Rui on his Qtractor and on
Giada.
All in all, it is always best when software is developed actively. Real
problems arise,
when development slows down or comes to a halt.
Unfortunately, this leaves some developers with a chicken and egg
problem. Developers can't respond at all if there's nothing to
respond to, and there's a real danger of software development coming
to a halt if users don't give feedback on how things can be improved.
I've seen this situation quite a few times:
1.) Developer releases software.
2.) Users download software.
3.) Users don't give feedback, or give very little feedback, on software.
4.) Developer doesn't continue to develop software because (s)he's
unmotivated to continue due to a perceived lack of community interest
and/or because his/her requirements for the software are satisfied.
5.) Bit-rot ensues.
On a more positive note, I think this thread is helping to open a path
of communication between users and developers about advancing our
community that really needed to be addressed.
Thanks again, Dave.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
6 Feb
6 Feb
5:42 a.m.
On 02/05/2013 06:15 PM, Paul Davis wrote:
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:55 AM, Jostein Chr. Andersen
<jostein(a)vait.se <mailto:jostein@vait.se>> wrote:
* A very geeky community. I see very often the answer:
"read the ALSA matrix" when a poor newbie or a
curious person asks for the best soundcards for Linux.
That something works in Linux does not mean
that it's good for AUDIO recording and studio work
in general.
so how does this look?
http://ardour.org/files/aspecs.png
Looks great :D Thinking about getting a 1818VSL now for use on my
desktop and laptop..
Flo
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
--
Florian Paul Schmidt
http://fps.io
5 Feb
5 Feb
6:09 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Dave,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
I think this is one of the key problems with Linux audio. Part of the
problem is that there is no clear mechanism for (non-developer) users
to create their own instruments. Many VSTs are constructed with
modular DSP programs like synthedit and flowstone (formerly
synthmaker). There's probably an opportunity here for Ingen or a new
graphical DSP program based on Faust to fill this hole.
In general, I think that Linux audio has a lot of tools that help
users to create music, but not a lot of tools that help users create
their own tools (e.g. instruments, plugins, sample libraries, etc.) to
help others to create music.
On the development side, I think Aurélien and others like him have the
right idea in taking instruments/plugins that are specific to a Linux
audio application and porting them to LV2. There's a lot of awesome
instruments that are specific to applications (e.g. ALSA Modular
Synth, LMMS, etc.) that would generally be more useful if they were
LV2 plugins.
Poor external/internal session management.
Interacting with external hardware can be frustrating. Commercial
programs like Renoise account for external hardware in their workflows
(e.g. latency management, MIDI clock, MMC, etc.). Most Linux Audio
apps don't do this.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
I've been trying to write something about conflict and fragmentation
for the past 10 minutes. I think this is a complex issue. I'm not
able to find the words to communicate about it right now.
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
As a developer, I'm missing a couple things:
1.) User feedback.
I can't stress this enough. I watch the download counts increase on
the applications I create, but I hardly ever get feedback. I'm
discouraged and frustrated by the lack of feedback.
2.) Non-code developers
We have a lot of dedicated open source developers writing Linux audio
apps, plugins, etc., but I have yet to meet an open source UI
designer, or an open source graphic artist. I think a lot of the apps
we create could benefit from the feedback of a user interface
experience expert.
There's probably more, but these are the two things that occur to me now.
Dave, this is an important topic. Thanks for taking it on.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
6:21 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Short reply to you Devin. I agree with everything you write. A couple of
thoughts on how to adress some of the issues you raise:
User feedback. I always try and provide feedback and suggestions for
whatever I use, and I enjoy doing it too. I think alot of users would like
to do this too, but two general things is kind of lacking in this sense.
These are all general thoughts and nothing to you personally. I remember us
talking about synthclone and I appreciated that very much, so any negatives
shouldn't be taken personally by you ;) :
1. An easy way to provide this feedback, and encouragement to do so.
There's IRC, mailinglists and forums for this, but most apps actually lack
encouragement for feedback. Something as simple as writing "If you like
this software and have ideas/suggestions, please use [insert_method_here]
to contact us, all suggestions are appreciated!". The worst thing that
could happen is that the suggestion isn't used, but I think tons can be
gained by making the user feel more involved.
2. Appreciation for the feedback. Some devs are better then others on
this, but I sadly think it's fairly common that users who try and provide
feedback either get treated as complete idiots, or that the dev takes it as
some form of personal insult.
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:09 PM, Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:
Hi Dave,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
wrote:
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
I think this is one of the key problems with Linux audio. Part of the
problem is that there is no clear mechanism for (non-developer) users
to create their own instruments. Many VSTs are constructed with
modular DSP programs like synthedit and flowstone (formerly
synthmaker). There's probably an opportunity here for Ingen or a new
graphical DSP program based on Faust to fill this hole.
In general, I think that Linux audio has a lot of tools that help
users to create music, but not a lot of tools that help users create
their own tools (e.g. instruments, plugins, sample libraries, etc.) to
help others to create music.
On the development side, I think Aurélien and others like him have the
right idea in taking instruments/plugins that are specific to a Linux
audio application and porting them to LV2. There's a lot of awesome
instruments that are specific to applications (e.g. ALSA Modular
Synth, LMMS, etc.) that would generally be more useful if they were
LV2 plugins.
Poor external/internal session management.
Interacting with external hardware can be frustrating. Commercial
programs like Renoise account for external hardware in their workflows
(e.g. latency management, MIDI clock, MMC, etc.). Most Linux Audio
apps don't do this.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the
development community.
I've been trying to write something about conflict and fragmentation
for the past 10 minutes. I think this is a complex issue. I'm not
able to find the words to communicate about it right now.
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user
and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
As a developer, I'm missing a couple things:
1.) User feedback.
I can't stress this enough. I watch the download counts increase on
the applications I create, but I hardly ever get feedback. I'm
discouraged and frustrated by the lack of feedback.
2.) Non-code developers
We have a lot of dedicated open source developers writing Linux audio
apps, plugins, etc., but I have yet to meet an open source UI
designer, or an open source graphic artist. I think a lot of the apps
we create could benefit from the feedback of a user interface
experience expert.
There's probably more, but these are the two things that occur to me now.
Dave, this is an important topic. Thanks for taking it on.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
6:35 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Gabbe,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 9:21 AM, Gabbe Nord <gabbe.nord(a)gmail.com> wrote:
1. An easy way to provide this feedback, and
encouragement to do so.
There's IRC, mailinglists and forums for this, but most apps actually lack
encouragement for feedback. Something as simple as writing "If you like this
software and have ideas/suggestions, please use [insert_method_here] to
contact us, all suggestions are appreciated!". The worst thing that could
happen is that the suggestion isn't used, but I think tons can be gained by
making the user feel more involved.
Excellent! This is a start. I can add something like this to the
'About' dialog of my applications.
Questions:
1.) What else can I do, as a developer, to make users feel more involved?
2.) On a similar note, what else can I do, as a developer, to make
developers feel more involved?
2. Appreciation for the feedback. Some devs are
better then others on
this, but I sadly think it's fairly common that users who try and provide
feedback either get treated as complete idiots, or that the dev takes it as
some form of personal insult.
I've seen developers do this. It's really unfortunate.
Thanks for your feedback! :)
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
7:33 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
An idea is to make a popup that comes up occasionally (maybe once a month
or so) when starting/closing the application. This popup could do several
things that could increase the participation of users, for example:
a) Provide encouragement for involvement. Like "Do you like this
application? Help improve it by visiting our forums and let us know what
you think!".
b) Provide direct links to ongoing user surveys. This is a golden one for
any application I really think. In UI-design, contact and feedback from the
end-user (the people that actually use your application) is golden.
Especially for smaller development teams, where you've been
developing/designing the same application for very long, which of course
makes every part of the UI natural and intuitive to you
Since it's free and open source, people hopefully/likely won't mind helping
out this way. Not everyone has the economy to donate actual money to all
projects around there, but anyone can sit down and state pro's, con's and
perceived issues with the software. You just need an incentive (that the
dev actually care about what you think, and the fact that you can use the
software for free is probably usually very well enough) and an easy way of
doing it. An ongoing, shorter survey (5-10mins maybe) can give tons of very
very valid and good information form your actual users.
c) Provide an easy way to donate. Some people actually have a good income
and can without a doubt donate money. Nicely asking to donate spare cash if
you're satisfied could probably generate some donations this way, if people
also are somewhat frequently reminded of it.
I have some experience of both UI-design and the principles around that,
and also constructing good surveys, and I would love to help out in any way
I can. Like someone else in this thread said, not everyone can code, but
that shouldn't stop them from being able to contribute.
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:35 PM, Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:
Hi Gabbe,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 9:21 AM, Gabbe Nord <gabbe.nord(a)gmail.com> wrote:
1. An easy way to provide this feedback, and
encouragement to do so.
There's IRC, mailinglists and forums for this, but most apps actually
lack
encouragement for feedback. Something as simple
as writing "If you like
this
software and have ideas/suggestions, please use
[insert_method_here] to
contact us, all suggestions are appreciated!". The worst thing that could
happen is that the suggestion isn't used, but I think tons can be gained
by
making the user feel more involved.
Excellent! This is a start. I can add something like this to the
'About' dialog of my applications.
Questions:
1.) What else can I do, as a developer, to make users feel more involved?
2.) On a similar note, what else can I do, as a developer, to make
developers feel more involved?
2. Appreciation for the feedback. Some devs are
better then others on
this, but I sadly think it's fairly common that users who try and provide
feedback either get treated as complete idiots, or that the dev takes it
as
some form of personal insult.
I've seen developers do this. It's really unfortunate.
Thanks for your feedback! :)
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
8:34 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
HI Gabbe,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 10:33 AM, Gabbe Nord <gabbe.nord(a)gmail.com> wrote:
An idea is to make a popup that comes up occasionally
(maybe once a month or
so) when starting/closing the application. This popup could do several
things that could increase the participation of users, for example:
a) Provide encouragement for involvement. Like "Do you like this
application? Help improve it by visiting our forums and let us know what you
think!".
I think this is a good idea. :)
b) Provide direct links to ongoing user surveys. This
is a golden one for
any application I really think. In UI-design, contact and feedback from the
end-user (the people that actually use your application) is golden.
Especially for smaller development teams, where you've been
developing/designing the same application for very long, which of course
makes every part of the UI natural and intuitive to you
Since it's free and open source, people hopefully/likely won't mind helping
out this way. Not everyone has the economy to donate actual money to all
projects around there, but anyone can sit down and state pro's, con's and
perceived issues with the software. You just need an incentive (that the dev
actually care about what you think, and the fact that you can use the
software for free is probably usually very well enough) and an easy way of
doing it. An ongoing, shorter survey (5-10mins maybe) can give tons of very
very valid and good information form your actual users.
I hadn't considered this. If I created such a survey, I would be
concerned that my own bias would be injected into the questions
themselves. Can you suggest a few sample questions that might exist
in such a survey?
c) Provide an easy way to donate. Some people actually
have a good income
and can without a doubt donate money. Nicely asking to donate spare cash if
you're satisfied could probably generate some donations this way, if people
also are somewhat frequently reminded of it.
I could add a mechanism like this to (a).
I have some experience of both UI-design and the
principles around that, and
also constructing good surveys, and I would love to help out in any way I
can. Like someone else in this thread said, not everyone can code, but that
shouldn't stop them from being able to contribute.
I can't speak for other developers, but I find your suggestions to be
very helpful.
On a personal note, I would absolutely love feedback on the UI design
of both midisnoop and synthclone. I don't have a problem with either
UI, but UI design is *not* my forte, and I have a bias about the
intuitiveness of both UIs, given that I built them.
Thank you for all your help and feedback. :)
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
6 Feb
6 Feb
11:51 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 8:34 PM, Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:
I will for sure try and do some evaluation for you! I think I have enough
time for that this weekend even. I'll send you a personal e-mail about this
later today =) Love your enthusiasm/openness!.
Cheers
HI Gabbe,
I hadn't considered this. If I created such a
survey, I would be
concerned that my own bias would be injected into the questions
themselves. Can you suggest a few sample questions that might exist
in such a survey?
Generally, it's all about thinking about what you're actually after. For
example, simple open questions can be good (Like: "Do you experience any
issues using the interface? Please briefly describe them.") for getting a
general knowledge of where problems might lie. Maybe you've been messing
around with MIDI for several years and take for granted that your users
know that just aswell, when the fact might be that this is one of their
first experiences with MIDI. Also, leading questions are to be avoided
under any circumstances. For example "Do you like feature X?" is a bad way
of trying to find out if your features are good, as it implies you should
actually like feature X. If feature X shows up automatically in a question
like "Are there features you like in the program? If so, please describe
briefly which and why." it's way more accurate. I think the potential
"please the experimenter"-bias is a bit bigger here aswell when users might
feel they owe you to like the software as it's free, which also leads to
more biased answers unless handeled right.
But generally, starting off with fairly open questions to get a general
idea of what people have issues with is a good idea, until you have some
actual knowledge about what the issues might be.
http://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/ <- that's also
something to take a brief look at. Those heuristics are frequently used
when doing quick training of evaluators for usability, and might be worth
looking into when looking over your own UI. Evaluation using this could be
very effective, and easily taught to people. Maybe we should look into
having a couple of people getting trained with that (resources available
online for free naturally, and training is fairly short) so we can aid
developers in Linux Audio if they want the help. I'll look into this, I'd
love to get some more experience with evaluation anyway.
c) Provide an easy way to donate. Some people
actually have a good income
and can without a doubt donate money. Nicely asking to donate spare cash
if
you're satisfied could probably generate some
donations this way, if
people
also are somewhat frequently reminded of it.
I could add a mechanism like this to (a).
I have some experience of both UI-design and the
principles around that,
and
also constructing good surveys, and I would love
to help out in any way I
can. Like someone else in this thread said, not everyone can code, but
that
shouldn't stop them from being able to
contribute.
I can't speak for other developers, but I find your suggestions to be
very helpful.
On a personal note, I would absolutely love feedback on the UI design
of both midisnoop and synthclone. I don't have a problem with either
UI, but UI design is *not* my forte, and I have a bias about the
intuitiveness of both UIs, given that I built them.
Thank you for all your help and feedback. :)
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
7:25 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
I second the frustration on a lack of user feedback...
Michael
________________________________
From: Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>
To: Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
Cc: linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org; linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
Sent: Tuesday, February 5, 2013 11:09 AM
Subject: Re: [LAD] [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Dave,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
I think this is one of the key problems with Linux audio. Part of the
problem is that there is no clear mechanism for (non-developer) users
to create their own instruments. Many VSTs are constructed with
modular DSP programs like synthedit and flowstone (formerly
synthmaker). There's probably an opportunity here for Ingen or a new
graphical DSP program based on Faust to fill this hole.
In general, I think that Linux audio has a lot of tools that help
users to create music, but not a lot of tools that help users create
their own tools (e.g. instruments, plugins, sample libraries, etc.) to
help others to create music.
On the development side, I think Aurélien and others like him have the
right idea in taking instruments/plugins that are specific to a Linux
audio application and porting them to LV2. There's a lot of awesome
instruments that are specific to applications (e.g. ALSA Modular
Synth, LMMS, etc.) that would generally be more useful if they were
LV2 plugins.
Poor external/internal session management.
Interacting with external hardware can be frustrating. Commercial
programs like Renoise account for external hardware in their workflows
(e.g. latency management, MIDI clock, MMC, etc.). Most Linux Audio
apps don't do this.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
I've been trying to write something about conflict and fragmentation
for the past 10 minutes. I think this is a complex issue. I'm not
able to find the words to communicate about it right now.
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
As a developer, I'm missing a couple things:
1.) User feedback.
I can't stress this enough. I watch the download counts increase on
the applications I create, but I hardly ever get feedback. I'm
discouraged and frustrated by the lack of feedback.
2.) Non-code developers
We have a lot of dedicated open source developers writing Linux audio
apps, plugins, etc., but I have yet to meet an open source UI
designer, or an open source graphic artist. I think a lot of the apps
we create could benefit from the feedback of a user interface
experience expert.
There's probably more, but these are the two things that occur to me now.
Dave, this is an important topic. Thanks for taking it on.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
7:27 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Like said before, I think alot of user feedback could be gained if just
there was a simple way to do it, and people got reminded.
On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 7:25 PM, Michael Bechard <gothmagog(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
I second the frustration on a lack of user
feedback...
Michael
------------------------------
*From:* Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>
*To:* Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
*Cc:* linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org;
linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
*Sent:* Tuesday, February 5, 2013 11:09 AM
*Subject:* Re: [LAD] [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Dave,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
wrote:
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
I think this is one of the key problems with Linux audio. Part of the
problem is that there is no clear mechanism for (non-developer) users
to create their own instruments. Many VSTs are constructed with
modular DSP programs like synthedit and flowstone (formerly
synthmaker). There's probably an opportunity here for Ingen or a new
graphical DSP program based on Faust to fill this hole.
In general, I think that Linux audio has a lot of tools that help
users to create music, but not a lot of tools that help users create
their own tools (e.g. instruments, plugins, sample libraries, etc.) to
help others to create music.
On the development side, I think Aurélien and others like him have the
right idea in taking instruments/plugins that are specific to a Linux
audio application and porting them to LV2. There's a lot of awesome
instruments that are specific to applications (e.g. ALSA Modular
Synth, LMMS, etc.) that would generally be more useful if they were
LV2 plugins.
Poor external/internal session management.
Interacting with external hardware can be frustrating. Commercial
programs like Renoise account for external hardware in their workflows
(e.g. latency management, MIDI clock, MMC, etc.). Most Linux Audio
apps don't do this.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the
development community.
I've been trying to write something about conflict and fragmentation
for the past 10 minutes. I think this is a complex issue. I'm not
able to find the words to communicate about it right now.
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user
and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
As a developer, I'm missing a couple things:
1.) User feedback.
I can't stress this enough. I watch the download counts increase on
the applications I create, but I hardly ever get feedback. I'm
discouraged and frustrated by the lack of feedback.
2.) Non-code developers
We have a lot of dedicated open source developers writing Linux audio
apps, plugins, etc., but I have yet to meet an open source UI
designer, or an open source graphic artist. I think a lot of the apps
we create could benefit from the feedback of a user interface
experience expert.
There's probably more, but these are the two things that occur to me now.
Dave, this is an important topic. Thanks for taking it on.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot) com
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
7:53 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Yeah, I posted that before I read the rest of the conversation around that topic. Good
points.
Michael
________________________________
From: Gabbe Nord <gabbe.nord(a)gmail.com>
To: Michael Bechard <gothmagog(a)yahoo.com>
Cc: Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>om>; Dave Phillips
<dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>om>; "linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org"
<linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org>rg>;
"linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org"
<linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, February 6, 2013 12:27 PM
Subject: Re: [LAD] [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Like said before, I think alot of user feedback could be gained if just there was a simple
way to do it, and people got reminded.
On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 7:25 PM, Michael Bechard <gothmagog(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
I second the frustration on a lack of user feedback...
com
Michael
________________________________
From: Devin Anderson <surfacepatterns(a)gmail.com>
To: Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>
Cc: linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org; linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
Sent: Tuesday, February 5, 2013 11:09 AM
Subject: Re: [LAD] [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Dave,
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
and others like him have the
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
I think this is one of the key problems with Linux audio. Part of the
problem is that there is no clear mechanism for (non-developer) users
to create their own instruments. Many VSTs are constructed with
modular DSP programs like synthedit and flowstone (formerly
synthmaker). There's probably an opportunity here for Ingen or a new
graphical DSP program based on Faust to fill this hole.
In general, I think that Linux audio has a lot of tools that help
users to create music, but not a lot of tools that help users create
their own tools (e.g. instruments, plugins, sample libraries, etc.) to
help others to create music.
On the development side, I think Aurélien right idea in taking instruments/plugins that are
specific to a Linux
audio application and porting them to LV2. There's a lot of awesome
instruments that are specific to applications (e.g. ALSA Modular
Synth, LMMS, etc.) that would generally be more useful if they were
LV2 plugins.
and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
Poor external/internal session management.
Interacting with external hardware can be frustrating. Commercial
programs like Renoise account for external hardware in their workflows
(e.g. latency management, MIDI clock, MMC, etc.). Most Linux Audio
apps don't do this.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the
development community.
I've been trying to write something about conflict and fragmentation
for the past 10 minutes. I think this is a complex issue. I'm not
able to find the words to communicate about it right now.
> So, in your honest lack most and
what can we do without that we already have ?
As a developer, I'm missing a couple things:
1.) User feedback.
I can't stress this enough. I watch the download counts increase on
the applications I create, but I hardly ever get feedback. I'm
discouraged and frustrated by the lack of feedback.
2.) Non-code developers
We have a lot of dedicated open source developers writing Linux audio
apps, plugins, etc., but I have yet to meet an open source UI
designer, or an open source graphic artist. I think a lot of the apps
we create could benefit from the feedback of a user interface
experience expert.
There's probably more, but these are the two things that occur to me now.
Dave, this is an important topic. Thanks for taking it on.
--
Devin Anderson
surfacepatterns (at) gmail (dot)
blog - http://surfacepatterns.blogspot.com/
midisnoop - http://midisnoop.googlecode.com/
psinsights - http://psinsights.googlecode.com/
synthclone - http://synthclone.googlecode.com/
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
5 Feb
5 Feb
6:39 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Hi Dave,
2013/2/5 Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>om>:
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel free
to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the topic and
will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
These days I rely a lot on Addictive drums, it's great but the whole
setup using the VST through Wine is very volatile, it works just fine
on my main composition machine but not so good on others so I'm really
fearing the day when it's upgrade time..
So, in short: I'm missing a decent, native, drum plugin.
The second thing is sound interfaces, for the moment I'm all set but
for the long term there should really exist a _good_ sound card with
open design, thereby securing it's availability.
Just my two ören,
Robert
8:07 p.m.
Hi Dave!
This thread seems to have gathered a lot of replies and since I'm not home,
I can't read them right now. In the hope of not duplicating too much, here are
my thoughts:
The plugin-systems seem to get a little diverse. the problem from my
perspective is usability in text mode. These things have to be supported and
it's good to have them supported in one tool (or with one tool chain).
And yes I can see, that working on one plugin system (oir two for
instruments and effects) might not really be possible, since we are so many
and there are so many ideas knocking around, some incompatible). But that's a
price I pay everyday, for all the things I have.
Another problem is syncing MIDI and audio. Especially slaving things to
JACK. Mechanisms are there, but implementation is still rather application
dependent. This is for text-utilities.
The really audio optimised lowlatency kernel is a problewm. there still
appear to be a few patches and the discussion comes up regularly. I am
confused by that. I use the vanilla kernel and I am happy, but my system is
rather special.
Other than that, I am quiote happy. JACK audio is the best thing, that ever
happened to me, even JACK MIDI is getting more support. In Linux I have found
the best possible audio environment yet. I've only had second hand experience
with other operating systems. But I can honestly say, that my equipment is
working, it allows me to be very creative and ever more daring in my
processing.
One last damper is of course, that things are always on the move and if I
stay close to the edge, which is someties required, that means living with
appearing and disappearing bugs. that would happen on every system, only most
people don't get to see software in development. I'd rather be there, speak my
mind, get heard or silenced, than only getting finished products, which might
lack comfort in small ways, that can be so helpful.
Warmly yours
Julien
----------------------------------------
http://juliencoder.de/nama/music.html
11:37 p.m.
On 02/05/2013 03:58 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think
Ableton Live).
Bitwig will hopefully soon provide that (proprietary software, though).
What sucks is that it won't support LV2 when it comes out, but at least
it's planned.
Concerning LV2 and the lack of plugins: That's certainly a sore point.
LV2 isn't overly complicated for what it does, it's just that the
documentation sucks. So David, when are you going to write that book
(http://drobilla.net/2012/11/29/writing-an-lv2-book/)? We need it
quickly. ;-)
What I also need is something like SynthEdit, but I think that Ingen
will soon fill that role, when it becomes stable enough so that I can
use it in my courses.
Talking about experimental and unstable software: Yeah, that sucks, but
the flip side of the coin is that life with Linux audio never gets
boring. :)
Albert
--
Dr. Albert Gr"af
Dept. of Music-Informatics, University of Mainz, Germany
Email: Dr.Graef(a)t-online.de, ag(a)muwiinfa.geschichte.uni-mainz.de
WWW: http://www.musikinformatik.uni-mainz.de/ag
11:56 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary about the
world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to say
where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater interest to
me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the following
plaints and lamentations (in no particular order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own, but
say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these
lists already have ready replies and responses to these and other
criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm more
interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain wrong about
the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without flames or dissing
other developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of
that crap, and I'm most thankful these days for such forum amenities as
"mute user" and autodiscard, along with the standard filters found in mail
clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY
Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of Atlas
Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had ceased to be
musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to figure a way to allow
people to be free yet behave themselves with respect towards the common
goal (e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm going to guess that he was still
working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel
free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the
topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Best,
dp
The biggest problem is that there are more people talking than there are
people doing. There are a 100 people to tell you this or that UI is shit,
but absolutely no-one to step up and do something about it. Users assume
that they're going to get the same level of integration and customer
support from free-software that they get from some $7000 commercial product
and get irate when it doesn't happen. With very few exceptions, LAD
software is not written for 'the users', it is written for the needs of the
developers and gifted to the community without warranty. I think the
conflict comes up more in LAD than other free-software arenas simply
because music attracts more novice/non-technical types (particularly
annoying Windows trolls) than does, say, forensic data analysis. So the
second problem with LAD is unreasonable expectations. Nobody said the goal
of Linux Audio was to replace Non-Linux Audio. The goal of Linux Audio is
simply to provide free-software alternatives for people who give a shit
(this group consists mostly of the LAD developers themselves). Yes, the
many standards/approches can be annoying.. But since when is diversity a
bad thing? This is a living, organic process driven by people with very
limited time and resources. If you want it to move faster or work better,
all you need to do is stop running your mouth and help.
And the problem of there being no such thing as an open source graphic
designer or UX expert applies to all free-software, not just LAD.
6 Feb
6 Feb
3:44 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On 02/05/2013 11:56 PM, J. Liles wrote:
The biggest problem is that there are more people talking than there are
people doing.
That's not a problem, that's how things are. Talking is way easier, so
it stands to reason that it happens more often.
So the second problem with LAD is unreasonable
expectations.
This. EOD (End Of Discussion).
It is just a matter of realizing FOSS developers are normal people, too.
Maybe slightly more skilled in the ways of code and maybe a little more
selfless or community-conscious than the average. But developers have
bills, families, lives, they have to put up with their bosses/customers
demands during their day job... They don't need more little-bosses
telling them what they should do with their free time, thanks. One would
think this would be just common courtesy.
Polite suggestions and feedback are always welcome, but statements like
"Your software isn't as great as Ableton's and it should if you want to
have as many happy users as them, which is surely what you must want
(and, as a bonus, I get commercial-grade software for free, ain't that
convenient?)" are open invitations for sarcasm, or even satire.
L
3:48 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 9:43 AM, Luis Garrido <luis(a)vagar.org> wrote:
Maybe slightly more skilled in the ways of code and maybe a little more
selfless or community-conscious than the average. But developers have
bills, families, lives, they have to put up with their bosses/customers
demands during their day job... They don't need more little-bosses telling
them what they should do with their free time, thanks. One would think this
would be just common courtesy.
there's another dimension to this. Since the users of ardour pay me and
make my life possible, i certainly do want them telling me what to do. but
... there are limits on what i want to actually respond to. most days, i'm
actually really not interested in promoting the style of music creation
that Ableton Live enables. even if lots of people clamor for it, there is
always a chance that its something i just don't want to do. that could
adversely affect ardour's potential audience, and i have to decide whether
or not i care about that.
the same calculus goes on even without notable cash flows, i am sure.
12:56 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
on Tue, Feb 05, 2013 at 09:58:14AM -0500, Dave Phillips wrote:
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary
about the world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't
bother to say where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice.
Of greater interest to me is the commentary itself - it seems to
boil down to the following plaints and lamentations (in no
particular order) :
i'd like to weigh in on some of these as well.
as i post here infrequently, a quick bit of background on me: i am an
electronic musician who also records real instruments, though
infrequently. i have been running Linux exclusively throughout my music
explorations.
i use renoise at the moment.
you can listen to my music at http://soundcloud.com/visinin if you'd
like.
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
i can't comment on these, having been using the same distribution (arch)
for the past 4 or so years.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
absolutely an issue. my workhorse plugin is Loomer Aspect (a
semi-modular synthesizer), which is a native Linux VST. I own several
more Loomer plugins and have been considering picking up a license for
DiscoDSP Discovery.
extent of the jam recently released his Digits synthesizer VST for linux
as well (http://extentofthejam.com/ if you haven't seen it), which is
nice. regardless, though.
Linux audio has this problem of critical mass. when energyXT came out,
nobody really released much new stuff. it was all jorgen porting stuff,
and then jucetice. highlife, discovery, loomer plugs...all fantastic,
certainly, but there's not much of it.
it will be interesting to see what happens if and when bitwig is
released. a lot of people are using JUCE now, and that makes porting at
least possible.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
renoise's plugin support is pretty good. i would really like LV2 support
but that's not my decision to make.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
in order, i've used beast/BSE, seq24 routed into a bunch of fluidsynths,
csound with blue, some toying with ardour, energyXT and finally renoise.
some software i just never got working. i never figured rosegarden out
(but for a long time it couldn't do instrument plugins), compiling MusE
was hit or miss, LMMS is good but I had XT and renoise by then...and
every time i use ardour i crash it somehow. it doesn't seem to like my
little micro-editing aphex-twin-wannabe style.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
i really like LV2 but the documentation is nigh-impenetrable. i've made
a few comments to this effect on drobilla's blog, and i agree that an
LV2 book would go a long way.
side note: did anybody else see pitracker? somebody wrote an LV2 synth
host that runs on the raspberry pi.
https://github.com/Joeboy/pixperiments/tree/master/pitracker
Poor external/internal session management.
haven't tried any, i work entirely inside my host.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think
Ableton Live).
absolutely. everybody likes to use ableton live here, but i still think
we're missing a really good NLE. hell, i own a REAPER license and use it
through wineasio occasionally just because it's so comfortable. i've
tried ardour3 but i crash it every time.
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
i have to disagree here, actually! i would first like to shout out
daniel mack of caiaq for ensuring that all of the native instruments
audio interfaces work on linux, and fantastically well at that. i
recently picked up a focusrite saffire 2i2 and have had no problems at
all with it.
that said, the more pro it gets, the worse the support. i won't even
touch FFADO, i'm sorry, it's just never worked for me. i sold an echo
audiofire2 after i couldn't make it work and i have a secondhand
ultralite mk1 that just gathers dust.
it's interesting to me that manufacturers are starting to make
class-compliant devices just to make them work on apple's iDevices.
also, modern midi controller hardware works on a driver level but very
few programs support it.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
as a dwm user, i will stay out of this one. i don't really like either
gtk or qt though, which sort of limits my options.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
i don't have any issues and i generally run vanilla kernels. lately i've
been playing with the -ck patchset with BFS and have been very happy
with it. i'm comfortable playing live (both djing with xwax and doing
live monome sets with my own software, rove) with this configuration.
maybe i'll drop the JACK buffer size a little.
JACK is a pain.
at least it's not pulseaudio. also, i haven't had any trouble setting
JACK up since i ditched my firewire interfaces. *that* was a nightmare.
but JACK on ALSA? buttery smooth.
JACK could perhaps be a bit better about autodiscovering soundcard
parameters. maybe my memory is failing me here, but i faintly recall
having issues when JACK couldn't get the sample format it wanted.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
maybe? i feel like it's a lot better than it used to be now that there's
just more software around.
it's interesting to me that free (source and/or beer) music software on
OSX and windows has come further than it has on Linux. off the top of
my head:
http://psycle.pastnotecut.org/portal.php
http://www.buzzmachines.com/
is it because of the userbase? is it because of the maturity and
availability of toolkits on other platforms? buzz's website has been
around since 2000. what was audio on linux like then? i'm thinking it
might be the userbase, or at least that makes more sense.
anyway, i've written quite a bit more here than i've intended, but i'm
absolutely up to discuss any of it.
thanks again, dave. you've been a fixture in this scene for as long as i
can remember.
peace,
-w
I'm not so interested in comments on the
commentary, I have my own,
but say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of
these lists already have ready replies and responses to these and
other criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously.
What I'm more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or
just plain wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your
piece without flames or dissing other developers and/or their work.
Frankly speaking, I've had enough of that crap, and I'm most
thankful these days for such forum amenities as "mute user" and
autodiscard, along with the standard filters found in mail clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the
NY Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire
of Atlas Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had
ceased to be musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to
figure a way to allow people to be free yet behave themselves with
respect towards the common goal (e.g. Cage's music and property).
I'm going to guess that he was still working on that up to his
death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what
do we lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
Please feel free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an
article on the topic and will likely use selected comments, subject
to approval of course.
Best,
dp
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
4:45 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:56 PM, William Light <wrl(a)illest.net> wrote:
you can listen to my music at http://soundcloud.com/visinin if you'd
like.
some nice stuff in there. camphor and you was particularly appealing (to me)
.and
every time i use ardour i crash it somehow. it doesn't seem to like my
little micro-editing aphex-twin-wannabe style.
once we get ardour 3.0 out, i hope you'll give it a chance and report back
on the experience.
--p
7 Feb
7 Feb
9:12 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
+1 on your comments regarding:
Too many
unstable/unfinished applications.
in order, i've used beast/BSE, seq24 routed
into a bunch of fluidsynths,
csound with blue, some toying with ardour, energyXT and finally renoise.
some software i just never got working. i never figured rosegarden out
(but for a long time it couldn't do instrument plugins), compiling MusE
was hit or miss, LMMS is good but I had XT and renoise by then...and
every time i use ardour i crash it somehow. it doesn't seem to like my
little micro-editing aphex-twin-wannabe style. Poor support for certain modes of composition
(think Ableton Live).
absolutely. everybody likes to use ableton live here, but i
still think
we're missing a really good NLE. hell, i own a REAPER license and use it
through wineasio occasionally just because it's so comfortable. i've
tried ardour3 but i crash it every time. it's interesting to me that free (source and/or
beer) music software on
OSX and windows has come further than it has on Linux. off the top of
my head:
http://psycle.pastnotecut.org/portal.php
http://www.buzzmachines.com/
I actually have 3 other friends (2 of them work now at NI, degree in CS
+ making music
for >= 15 years) who are avid linux users and made similar comments and
are rather frustrated with the development
of LAD in the last 10 years. I don't want to comment on that topic too
much because it kind of frustrates me myself,
I just wanted to point out that I share share your opinions/statements.
My main point would be -besides all the technical deficiencies that some
LA-F/OSS apps have and the related issue of
entwined dev of toolchains/libraries- that many applications lack a
proper musical work flow for anything that goes beyond
*really* basic tasks. I know this comment pisses almost everyone off on
this list, but I would love to see some projects and devs approach
music creation from a music related angle and not a technical one and
analyze why some widely used tools have such huge *fan*bases...
because from the user perspective the issue is not "what sucks about LA"
but something more along the lines of "what drives me to use my tools and
helps me articulate my musical expression" :)
this is certainly relevant to the development of *generic* audio tools
(versus the specialized tools that developers create for their own needs).
so... please fire up ableton live/fruityloops/* from time to time make
some music, watch some youtube video of a pubescent guy explaining "how
to make basslines
just like skrillex" ;)
2c
10:13 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Maybe someone should start new mailing lists for Linux music software
developers and users. I'm serious - there's clearly a demand for it.
John
6 Feb
6 Feb
4:28 a.m.
Le Tue, 05 Feb 2013 09:58:14 -0500,
Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> a écrit :
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary
about the world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't
bother to say where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of
greater interest to me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil
down to the following plaints and lamentations (in no particular
order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
Every OS is different. The main difference between linux and the other
OS is than we don't have, on linux, big tools that make every thing but
the coffee. We have instead a huge collection of tools, each ones of
them making one thing, and sometime we have duplicated tools, which
make possible to follow different ways.
That imply we need documentation to guide a newbie or a non geek
musician trough all those tools, showing them which tool can make
what and how to set up those tool, and at least as important, which
tool, or which chain of tools, can be used to make a given task.
I also think we must have in mind than most peoples are not rational.
They are more receptive to publicity than to rational thinking or
technical concepts. Musicians and the like are not exceptions. This is
why at the first place, they feel bad instead of fell free when they
show different (audio optimized) distributions, different GUI, WM,
desktop, sound servers, plugins API, ... And this is true also with
linux audio. Sometime (often), we have different ways to make
a task, and many peoples new to linux feel very bad with this
situation. But that's what GNU/linux is about: freedom like in free
speech.
We don't make publicity. The only way to address that lack of publicity
is to make easy to follow documentation which explain how to do things,
and explore the different possibilities an user can encounter to make
a given task, so they will eventually begin to feel free and fly on
the linux audio world.
Dominique
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own,
but say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of
these lists already have ready replies and responses to these and
other criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously.
What I'm more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or
just plain wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your piece
without flames or dissing other developers and/or their work. Frankly
speaking, I've had enough of that crap, and I'm most thankful these
days for such forum amenities as "mute user" and autodiscard, along
with the standard filters found in mail clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY
Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of
Atlas Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had
ceased to be musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to
figure a way to allow people to be free yet behave themselves with
respect towards the common goal (e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm
going to guess that he was still working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do
we lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please
feel free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article
on the topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to
approval of course.
Best,
dp
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
--
"We have the heroes we deserve."
2:09 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 9:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel
free to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the
topic and will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Linux sucks often comes down to, I am not used to it so therefore it sucks
because I don't know it. There are many reasons for this, which I just
won't cover here, but there are also legitimate reasons to dislike using
Linux, or to think it isn't as good as some of the alternatives. To name a
few of my personal ones...
Documentation: I will come back to this.
Plugins:
While we have plugins, it is very difficult to tell exactly what is
decent or isn't without spending a lot of time with it. Some plugins sound
great, but seem to crash my session fairly often with little warning. You
can say this is a problem on other platforms as well, and you would be
correct to an extent when talking about plugins developed in the spare time
of someone, or other 'free' solutions that aren't supported. But I gotta
say, I can't think of the last time one of my commercial plugins crashed a
PT session. Hell even running them through Wine with Festige they are
pretty dang stable(I have had two instances I think where i had to restart
everything, Jack, Festige, etc. as they weren't processing audio correctly,
which may be as much Wine, Festige or any number of things as the
plugins). Many plugins sound horrible, but it is hard to identify these
without going through each of the hundreds of plugins available. And then
you get those few gems that sound great and are stable.
Audio Hardware:
Not just IO hardware, but that is huge as well. And I don't mean to say
this is the fault of the Linux Community, in many cases it is the
manufacturers, straight up. RME is good stuff, don't get me wrong, and I
love my RME interface. I also know that courtesy of FFADO etc. we have
many more selections than we used to and have some solid mid range things,
Focusrite and Echo Audio come to mind especially. I also found that with
little work I could get my Mackie Onyx-i series working if I cared to. All
well and good, but then we have things like Dante, which is picking up
steam in the live sound world, especially for multitrack recording, and
interfaces with a lot of live processing/mixers/etc. Or we have things
like a Metric Halo interface, or any number of interfaces coming out
nowadays that have onboard DSP effects or dynamics processing. The MH
units are a great example because of their flexible nature, but even more
basic like the onboard DSP on many Focusrite or Lexicon interfaces are not
supported. Or even more basic things like my Apogee Duet, which I see
there are reports of it working that doesn't seem to be to certain, I have
never bothered trying, or many interfaces without hardware controls that
depend on software control we just don't have software for. . And then of
course you get to the topic of things like Universal Audio's DSP cards, or
the SSL Duende, etc. All of these would be great for running commercial
plugins on, except we can't use them of course.
Audio 'Drivers':
This is still an issue, and it is an issue because the average user can't
download Ubuntu and install Ardour, and have it run without having to set
it up and tweak it. This is in part due to the blessing and curse both of
'choice' in that for most of us here, we know standard Ubuntu probably
isn't the best choice, or we know that we have to add realtime permissions
to our user, or half a dozen other things. But the average person from a
different OS that doesn't know Linux is going to download Ubuntu, or
Fedora, or whatever distribution they have heard of, or happen across first
in a Google search. Contrast this to OS X, user installs the OS, Download
the app, and runs it, and all permissions, setup etc. are taken care of for
them. Or on Windows where without tweaking at least the damn stuff
opens(Can't say that about the 'typical' Linux install with pro audio that
depends on Jack as it is looking for realtime permissions) even if it
doesn't run well.
Back to Documentation:
We lack a good single reference we can point people to for information.
linuxaudio.org is a start I suppose but I gotta say, if I go there thinking
as a new user looking for information on what hardware works with Linux for
audio, I could go to the site and have no freaking clue where to go from
there. It is set up much more for the people that already know Linux, as
opposed to the people that want to know more about Linux Audio because they
are interested in learning about it. And to clarify, yes I personally know
that under 'Resources' there are some good resources there, but as a new
user, the typical kind I generally have to help in IRC, or elsewhere this
would mean nothing. And even after clicking that it means little looking
at the list of things. I am picking on Linuxaudio.org but that is just one
example of many.
On #Ardour we have known for a long time that good documentation is
needed, but it wasn't till the past couple of years that something
happened. The FLOSS Manual is a strong start, but many people come to IRC
before finding it. What does that say when someone comes to IRC that knows
nothing about Linux, and in many cases might know nothing about IRC, before
they find the manual to a product? What does it say when the most common
question I see about Ardour is, does my hardware work with it? The most
common answer(That I myself give) yes so long as Jack works with it, or so
long as your OS works with it. I say this even though it means nothing to
the people using the hardware. We can send them to ALSA Matrix, or to
FFADO, or tell them so long as their device is 'class-compliant' it will
work, but damn, that is pretty painful compared to them just knowing if it
will work or not form the manufacturer. Even if they can find out if the
device works, they have no idea HOW to get it working if the distribtuion
doesn't do it for them, which leads to the second question, and on. And
what about devices that aren't listed? We list devices that are known to
work, but don't even address often devices that DON'T work, leading to lots
of questions about devices that won't work with Linux just because they
couldn't find a definitive answer anywhere that it wouldn't work. Again I
know FFADO does this to an extent certainly, but the ALSA Matrix for
example doesn't, and we are still sending people to multiple sites to
figure this out.
These are just a couple of examples. Documentation in general just needs
to be rethought as a community I think. But noone will ever be happy with
it, so maybe I am just a grumpy old coot telling you youngins to get off my
lawn as this has been gone around many times:)
Seablade
6:03 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Le Wed, 6 Feb 2013 08:09:01 -0500,
Thomas Vecchione <seablaede(a)gmail.com> a écrit :
These are just a couple of examples. Documentation in general just
needs to be rethought as a community I think. But noone will ever be
happy with it, so maybe I am just a grumpy old coot telling you
youngins to get off my lawn as this has been gone around many times:)
Seablade
For the French speaking linux audio community, we have LinuxMAO
http://linuxmao.org/tikiwiki/tiki-index.php which is a community
driven site with a wiki and a forum. The wiki is for the
documentation. The forum is used both for linux (audio) related
questions which are not answered/understood in the wiki, and for
questions about the content of the wiki. The wiki is focused about
using linux to make professional audio, and it is a section into the
forum about audio development.
I think than to have both a wiki and a forum at the same place is the
best option. In practice, it work very well even if it is not perfect.
To have such a site is very valuable for the community. This is not the
first time we talk about documentation on the LAD, and I think it would
be very valuable for the community if an English or multi-languages
site with both a wiki and a forum could be made.
A solution can be to extend LinuxMAO with English sections on both the
wiki and the forum, and why not other languages. I contribute on a more
or less regular basis, but I am not a site admin. So I have no idea how
they would react to such a proposition, but they are open minded guys.
And someone that doesn't try is sure of only one thing: to get nothing.
I am also not sure if the LAD is the good place to talk about this in
the perspective of making such a site. Maybe lists like the LAU or
alsa-users are more appropriate. Or cross-posting to those 3 lists and
jack-devel too.
My 2 centimes,
Dominique
--
"We have the heroes we deserve."
6:09 p.m.
On Feb 5, 2013, at 09:58 14, Dave Phillips wrote:
I've been reading a lot of negative (read:
vitriolic) commentary about the world of Linux audio development and applications. I
won't bother to say where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of
greater interest to me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the following
plaints and lamentations (in no particular order) :
As someone who primarily addresses a very specialized subset of pro-audio users
(professional radio broadcasters), here is my (admittedly parochial) take on your list of
complaints:
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
These are not problems with the development space so much as with user expectations (but
see more below).
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Don't care, as these are irrelevant to broadcast automation.
Poor external/internal session management.
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
These are real issues, especially the second.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
"With great power comes great responsibility."
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
And here I suspect is the central misconception. The notion of "the development
community" is a misnomer. In fact, what we have are "development
communities" (plural). A real world example may help: Here on LAD I see lots of
discussion about design and development for what I have come to term the "Music
Production Model". There are several assumptions baked into this model, such as that
of a "session" that has a lifetime on the order of several hours, following
which the whole thing is torn down and put away until the next time. The system seeks to
be as self-contained as possible, with capture, processing, editing and even mastering all
being done on the same system ('system' in this sense being understood to include
the possibility of multiple hosts working cooperatively). This in turn entails lots of
concern with *internal* modularity (e.g. JACK, plug-ins), but not so much with the
external world beyond the basic audio interfaces.
Now come peek over the wall with me into the world of broadcast radio automation. Two
primary drivers exist here that are notably weaker and/or absent in the Music Production
Model -- long term reliability, and external interfacing. Broadcast radio playout systems
don't have session lifetimes measured in hours -- weeks or months between application
restarts are the norm! Downtime is not just an inconvenience, but a real cost that can
easily run into the thousands per minute. The system may well be located at a transmitter
site on top of a mountain with 1 M of snow in the winter, so you'd better be able to
monitor and control it remotely. Will it interface with all my external systems, such as
router consoles, traffic billing systems, RDS / PAD encoders, now-playing website widgets,
etc, etc?
Now, please don't get me wrong here. I'm *not* saying that one set of design
goals is somehow more "legitimate" than another. What I am saying is that they
are *different*, and as such require different designs, different paradigms and hence,
quite often, different developers and development communities. In many of the points in
your original list I see an implicit assumption that the goal is One Perfect System that
can host every application without compromises. That's a chimera -- the final
application should always drive the choice of tools used to implement it. And that's
the real power of Linux as an audio platform -- configurability! I suspect that many of
the points in your list about "confusion" and "fragmentation" come
from users who are expecting this One Perfect System and are then disappointed by the
reality of having to make choices and exercise knowledge. (And, even those Other OSes
that purport to deliver this universal platform are more sizzle than steak here, as users
who have attempted to configure multiple applications with varying requirements for MME
vs. DirectSound vs. ASIO can attest). Life is complicated. Linux exposes this and
empowers the user to make choices about what fits *his* application best, rather than
trying to paper them over into an illusion of homogeneity. That's a strength, not a
weakness!
Cheers!
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Frederick F. Gleason, Jr. | Chief Developer |
| | Paravel Systems |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| The wise man doesn't give the right answers, |
| he poses the right questions. |
| -- Claude Levi-Strauss |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------|
7 Feb
7 Feb
9:41 a.m.
On Wed, Feb 06, 2013 at 12:09:17PM -0500, Fred Gleason wrote:
I suspect that many of the points in your list about
"confusion" and
"fragmentation" come from users who are expecting this One Perfect System
and are then disappointed by the reality of having to make choices and
exercise knowledge. (And, even those Other OSes that purport to deliver
this universal platform are more sizzle than steak here, as users who have
attempted to configure multiple applications with varying requirements for
MME vs. DirectSound vs. ASIO can attest). Life is complicated. Linux
exposes this and empowers the user to make choices about what fits *his*
application best, rather than trying to paper them over into an illusion
of homogeneity. That's a strength, not a weakness!
I agree with everything in your post, and especially the above point.
Many here appear to be music makers rather than audio engineers. That's
two totally different sets of requirements.
I use Linux for audio engineering (my job) and find it already meets my
needs better than Windows or OS X. There are only two things missing AFAIC,
and neither is the fault of Linux.
The first is the lack of an effective DAW session exchange program, which I
blame on the deliberately obscured session data formats used by Avid etc. The
second is lack of support for many pro level interfaces, thanks to the lack
of programming information from the manufacturers (RME and a couple of others
excepted).
John
6 Feb
6 Feb
10:34 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
I'm late to this thread, but I'd like to shine some light on why I
switched from Linux to Mac OS for my personal music work, and things
which I believe may continue to hold back Linux development. Keep in
mind that I've only picked at Linux audio for the last 5 years, so
maybe some of these complaints have since been addressed.
- Make it easier for authors to support Linux: I'm the author of a VST
plugin. I decided to go with VSTGUI for my Linux port. However,
despite being an open-source project, VSTGUI is somehow not supported
on Linux. Due to time constraints, this resulted in me just yanking
the GUI support from my Linux version. Also due to time constraints, I
was not able to produce an LV2 version which some people wanted. I get
that VST is technically not a free-free standard. But it's also the
most widely-supported plugin format, with a staggering number of free
plugins. Unless there's something I'm not seeing, this seems perfectly
support-able on Linux (it's halfway there already!).
- Fragmented and not well-supported plugin architectures: It seems
that plugins on Linux have gone through several phases. When I used
it, it was all DSSI. Now I guess it's LV2. I think the most promising
time was when Linux VST was gaining momentum, but now it seems that
maybe this isn't an accepted format on Linux. And don't say JACK--
that's for sharing audio between applications. If I go to KVRAudio.com
and search for Linux plugins, there are only 50.
- Make Linux friendlier for closed-source/commercial devs: Open source
is great; don't get me wrong! But music software and DSP are
specialized areas and DAW and associated software is incredibly
complex. I think for Linux to really succeed in this arena, it will
have to attract commercial development. Easier said than done, I know.
- In the same vein: One thing I notice is that many music packages on
Linux seem to be by-and-for programmers. It's all very flexible and
modular, but this is not necessarily convenient when your brain is in
"music making mode". Ask electronic musicians what their work flow is
like and design applications around that kind of feedback. On the
other hand, coders always want everything to be a modular synth. It's
literally the first kind of synth project everyone I know who's a
coder has done!
- Is there a good all-in-one sequencer for electronic music styles?
This was the thing that really made me switch. I was using Rosegarden
at the time. And I don't want to call out Rosegarden because I do
believe it's a wonderful piece of software for music notation. It just
wasn't suitable for my uses. It had issues handling a
reasonable-but-large amount of MIDI data on my 1ghz machine (I use
pitch wheel for vibrato), and I wasn't ever able to render my song
down to disk in a non-realtime mode. People pointed me to using JACK
freewheel mode, but it seemed like at the time this wasn't supported
by synth developers. Finally, there wasn't a way to use samples other
than SoundFonts (which, IMO, are both squarely within the consumer
realm and are not easily editable) -- again, this was a few years
back, so maybe this has all been addressed.
The irony is that, shortly after, Renoise came out for Linux! :) And
maybe Ardour is suitable for electronic music; I dunno. Like I said,
I've been partially out of the loop.
- Not knowing if your sound card will be supported. It's hard to shop
for sound devices with Linux. "Supported" may mean all kinds of
things. For example, I found issues with the AudioBox 1818VSL which
were down to ALSA incorrectly implementing the UAC2 standard. I do
realize that a lot of hardware support is down to the hardware
developers being more enthusiastic about Linux. But the bottom line
for would-be Linux musicians? You never know how sound hardware will
react with Linux. To be fair, this is still true of Windows to some
extent where latencies are concerned (but not with basic
functionality).
- Clearer documentation for ALSA would help (pretty please :))
Hopefully this isn't too harsh or outdated. And I don't want to just
heap criticism on Linux, because I think it has amazing potential. The
realtime kernels offer amazing performance, and so does ALSA-- I got a
netbook I was using for Maker Faire down to an incredibly low latency
on Linux. It performed much better than ASIO did on the same hardware.
It can be lightweight and incredibly customizable.
Bring on the software!
-Louis
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 6:58 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
Greetings,
I've been reading a lot of negative (read: vitriolic) commentary about the
world of Linux audio development and applications. I won't bother to say
where, just "the usual places" will have to suffice. Of greater interest to
me is the commentary itself - it seems to boil down to the following plaints
and lamentations (in no particular order) :
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
Poor external/internal session management.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think Ableton Live).
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development community.
I'm not so interested in comments on the commentary, I have my own, but say
what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these lists
already have ready replies and responses to these and other criticisms, many
of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm more interested in is
what *you* think is missing most or just plain wrong about the situation.
Please, try to speak your piece without flames or dissing other developers
and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of that crap, and I'm
most thankful these days for such forum amenities as "mute user" and
autodiscard, along with the standard filters found in mail clients.
<aside>
I'm reminded of John Cage's comments regarding the behavior of the NY
Philharmonic when they destroyed his equipment during the premire of Atlas
Eclipticalis, something to the effect that his concerns had ceased to be
musical and had become social, i.e. that he had to figure a way to allow
people to be free yet behave themselves with respect towards the common goal
(e.g. Cage's music and property). I'm going to guess that he was still
working on that up to his death.
</aside>
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ? Please feel free
to expand your remarks as you like. I'm planning an article on the topic and
will likely use selected comments, subject to approval of course.
Best,
dp
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-user mailing list
Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
7 Feb
7 Feb
12:18 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:58 PM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>wrote;wrote:
What I'm more interested in is what *you* think is
missing most or just
plain wrong about the situation.
I started using linux for audio primarily for sooperlooper, which at the
time (over ten years ago i think) was the best if not the only EDP
emulation for any platform. It worked great then, and it still works great,
so from that perspective, nothing is wrong with linux audio for me, except
for the constant hand-wringing and complaining that something is wrong with
linux audio!
But of course, that is not the whole picture. Every now and then I wish
there was a native linux audiomulch equivalent, for example, but then I
usually get to thinking how wrong-headed such desires seem. Windows or OSX
never really evolved as audio platforms trying to emulate Windows or OSX so
much, they evolved as platforms for music creation in their own terms.
That's somewhat naive and an over simplification I realize, because for
sure different software packages emulated and influenced each other, and
even MS and Apple have always had their tensions about who truly innovated
various features (and even linux can stake a claim in that respect).
But my point is that expecting linux to be just like one of those platforms
seems dunderheaded to me. So one of the things wrong with linux audio (for
me) is the constant stream of expectations to replicate the experience of
other platforms. It may happen, but I don't think it is a worthy drive for
development. Yes, certain features may be worth emulating, but often times
I get the feeling that people have a working setup on another platform, and
then complain mostly because they have to give that up when they switch
platforms. They then get increasingly frustrated as they realize things
will just not be the same as they were when they had a working setup on the
other platform. Which often makes me question why some people switch at
all.
A lot of the points raised in this thread are perfectly valid I'm sure from
the perspective of the individuals raising them, and that's what this
thread is about, but I'm going to take a stand against what seems to a
trend of slagging the "audio geeks". For me that is exactly what makes
linux unique, interesting, fun, and yes, sometimes frustrating. It is a
system where the whole system is available to play and learn and grow as
you grow as a musician or sound designer. Its never-ending openness and
diversity limits its effectiveness in emulating windows or OSX, but linux
offers an open palette of learning opportunities. Linux has taught me more
about system design and the bigger picture of digital audio than Windows
and OSX ever did. Of course, that's hard to quantify because who knows what
might have happened if I didn't switch all those years ago (for one thing I
might have made more music and spent less time learning about systems), but
linux is what it is and I'd rather spend time taking advantage of what it
is and then bemoaning what it isn't, as difficult as that can be sometimes.
2 minor units of currency
Michael
12:36 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 3:18 PM, michael noble <looplog(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:58 PM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>wrote;wrote:
Very well put.
What I'm more interested in is what *you*
think is missing most or just
plain wrong about the situation.
I started using linux for audio primarily for sooperlooper, which at the
time (over ten years ago i think) was the best if not the only EDP
emulation for any platform. It worked great then, and it still works great,
so from that perspective, nothing is wrong with linux audio for me, except
for the constant hand-wringing and complaining that something is wrong with
linux audio!
But of course, that is not the whole picture. Every now and then I wish
there was a native linux audiomulch equivalent, for example, but then I
usually get to thinking how wrong-headed such desires seem. Windows or OSX
never really evolved as audio platforms trying to emulate Windows or OSX so
much, they evolved as platforms for music creation in their own terms.
That's somewhat naive and an over simplification I realize, because for
sure different software packages emulated and influenced each other, and
even MS and Apple have always had their tensions about who truly innovated
various features (and even linux can stake a claim in that respect).
But my point is that expecting linux to be just like one of those
platforms seems dunderheaded to me. So one of the things wrong with linux
audio (for me) is the constant stream of expectations to replicate the
experience of other platforms. It may happen, but I don't think it is a
worthy drive for development. Yes, certain features may be worth emulating,
but often times I get the feeling that people have a working setup on
another platform, and then complain mostly because they have to give that
up when they switch platforms. They then get increasingly frustrated as
they realize things will just not be the same as they were when they had a
working setup on the other platform. Which often makes me question why some
people switch at all.
A lot of the points raised in this thread are perfectly valid I'm sure
from the perspective of the individuals raising them, and that's what this
thread is about, but I'm going to take a stand against what seems to a
trend of slagging the "audio geeks". For me that is exactly what makes
linux unique, interesting, fun, and yes, sometimes frustrating. It is a
system where the whole system is available to play and learn and grow as
you grow as a musician or sound designer. Its never-ending openness and
diversity limits its effectiveness in emulating windows or OSX, but linux
offers an open palette of learning opportunities. Linux has taught me more
about system design and the bigger picture of digital audio than Windows
and OSX ever did. Of course, that's hard to quantify because who knows what
might have happened if I didn't switch all those years ago (for one thing I
might have made more music and spent less time learning about systems), but
linux is what it is and I'd rather spend time taking advantage of what it
is and then bemoaning what it isn't, as difficult as that can be sometimes.
2 minor units of currency
Michael
5:47 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
I think others (most?) in this community want to see Linux audio
flourish and not become relegated to an audio environment for
programmers. Nobody's slagging audio geeks, really, we just want to see
some effort put into making the platform more accessible to a wider
audience, and in the process (hopefully) maybe free up that right side
of the brain to do its own thing in our own music-making processes. I
personally do not like to have to think about very technical issues when making music; I
just want to create.
Michael
________________________________
From: J. Liles <malnourite(a)gmail.com>
To: michael noble <looplog(a)gmail.com>
Cc: Linux Audio User <linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org>rg>; Linux Audio Developers
<linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, February 6, 2013 5:36 PM
Subject: Re: [LAD] [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 3:18 PM, michael noble <looplog(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 11:58 PM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com> wrote:
What I'm more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain wrong
about the situation.
I started using linux for audio primarily for sooperlooper, which at the time (over ten
years ago i think) was the best if not the only EDP emulation for any platform. It worked
great then, and it still works great, so from that perspective, nothing is wrong with
linux audio for me, except for the constant hand-wringing and complaining that something
is wrong with linux audio!
But of course, that is not the whole picture. Every now and then I wish there was a native
linux audiomulch equivalent, for example, but then I usually get to thinking how
wrong-headed such desires seem. Windows or OSX never really evolved as audio platforms
trying to emulate Windows or OSX so much, they evolved as platforms for music creation in
their own terms. That's somewhat naive and an over simplification I realize, because
for sure different software packages emulated and influenced each other, and even MS and
Apple have always had their tensions about who truly innovated various features (and even
linux can stake a claim in that respect).
But my point is that expecting linux to be just like one of those platforms seems
dunderheaded to me. So one of the things wrong with linux audio (for me) is the constant
stream of expectations to replicate the experience of other platforms. It may happen, but
I don't think it is a worthy drive for development. Yes, certain features may be worth
emulating, but often times I get the feeling that people have a working setup on another
platform, and then complain mostly because they have to give that up when they switch
platforms. They then get increasingly frustrated as they realize things will just not be
the same as they were when they had a working setup on the other platform. Which often
makes me question why some people switch at all.
A lot of the points raised in this thread are perfectly valid I'm sure from the
perspective of the individuals raising them, and that's what this thread is about, but
I'm going to take a stand against what seems to a trend of slagging the "audio
geeks". For me that is exactly what makes linux unique, interesting, fun, and yes,
sometimes frustrating. It is a system where the whole system is available to play and
learn and grow as you grow as a musician or sound designer. Its never-ending openness and
diversity limits its effectiveness in emulating windows or OSX, but linux offers an
open palette of learning opportunities. Linux has taught me more about system design and
the bigger picture of digital audio than Windows and OSX ever did. Of course, that's
hard to quantify because who knows what might have happened if I didn't switch all
those years ago (for one thing I might have made more music and spent less time learning
about systems), but linux is
what it is and I'd rather spend time taking
advantage of what it is and then bemoaning what it isn't, as difficult as that can be
sometimes.
2 minor units of currencyMichael
Very well put.
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
8:45 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 08:47:55AM -0800, Michael Bechard wrote:
I think others (most?) in this community want to see
Linux audio
flourish and not become relegated to an audio environment for
programmers. Nobody's slagging audio geeks, really, we just want to see
some effort put into making the platform more accessible to a wider
audience, and in the process (hopefully) maybe free up that right side
of the brain to do its own thing in our own music-making processes. I
personally do not like to have to think about very technical issues when
making music; I just want to create.
I should point out that your requirements as a music maker and those of audio
engineers like myself are mutually exclusive in many respects.
I need flexibility and configurability, plus access to the source code,
in order to do my job effectively. Of course it should be possible to cater
to both sets of users, but I don't see how it can be done easily. Don't
Windows and OS X already offer what you describe?
John
4:24 a.m.
On Tue, 2013-02-05 at 09:58 -0500, Dave Phillips wrote:
[...]
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user and/or
developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
Well, post a thread about what people think sucks, and you'll get page
after page after page after page like we see here.
Post a thread asking for actual help on any of these things and I'd be
surprised if you get a single reply.
The one and only thing we lack is people doing constructive work.
Please, try to speak your piece without flames or
dissing other
developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of
that crap, and I'm most thankful these days for such forum amenities
as, "mute user" and autodiscard, along with the standard filters found
in mail clients.
The only appropriate response to complainers. We all complain
sometimes, but people who do nothing but complain are nothing but toxic.
I hope this thread didn't go that way, but I'm sure as hell not going to
read it to find out ;)
-dr
4:42 a.m.
On 02/06/2013 10:24 PM, David Robillard wrote:
... We all complain
sometimes, but people who do nothing but complain are nothing but toxic.
I hope this thread didn't go that way, but I'm sure as hell not going to
read it to find out ;)
So far so good, I'm happy to report. I have a lot to read and consider.
And as always, thanks for your work on LV2, I'm a fan.
Best,
dp
8 Feb
8 Feb
3:31 a.m.
On Wed, 2013-02-06 at 22:42 -0500, Dave Phillips wrote:
On 02/06/2013 10:24 PM, David Robillard wrote:
Good to hear. As an almost entirely infrastructure level person this
sort of thing is firmly in the toxic "actively try to avoid" bucket, but
I'm sure there's more value to it at the user level.
... We all complain
sometimes, but people who do nothing but complain are nothing but toxic.
I hope this thread didn't go that way, but I'm sure as hell not going to
read it to find out ;)
So far so good, I'm happy to report. I have a lot to read and consider. And as always, thanks for your work on LV2, I'm a
fan.
LV2 sucks! ;)
... but it sucks much less than it used to.
If in this process you end up compiling a list of unmet requirements
with respect to plugin APIs, please send them the way of lv2-dev, or the
lv2plug.in tracker, or myself, and they'll be addressed soon enough.
Since 1.0.0 most things are actually quite simple to add, but currently
progress is exclusively driven on a "hacker with an itch" basis, which
tends to be dramatically more esoteric than common user basic use cases.
Because of that and other reasons, I think a high level roadmap is
important, and am trying to establish one at http://lv2plug.in/roadmap
to make it clear where we were, are, and are going, and what needs doing
to get there.
I really don't have the time these days to invent new problems for
myself by guessing (poorly) what others might care about (or be on IRC
all day, or read these tedious threads), but I do have time to
occasionally spend a few hours plowing through the tracker and fixing
what's there. Filing tickets, then, is a very easy way to ensure your
needs are met. Conversely, no ticket => no care.
Cheers,
-dr
7 Feb
7 Feb
1:30 p.m.
2013/2/7 David Robillard <d(a)drobilla.net>
On Tue, 2013-02-05 at 09:58 -0500, Dave Phillips
wrote:
[...]
sad but true ... or not ?
i have been actively contributing to Hydrogen for over 2 years now and i
have spend quite a bit of time trying to get more people involved (the
drumkit contest was the most recent attempt that had some visibility, but
there have been other attempts)
my conclusion is that it _is_ possible to attract new people, but you have
to invest a LOT of time into it. A general 'we are looking for people to
help out' broadcast is ok for a start, but once/if you get a reaction you
need to make sure that you email this person directly, keep in touch and
keep motivating him/her _constantly_
After all you are relying on someones goodwill so you need to keep them
happy. (this might sound weird or plain wrong, but that's the reality)
Lucky for me i'm no good at coding anyway, so i'm not wasting time (that i
could use to write code) talking to people
On the other hand i know that there are a lot of people out there that want
to help, but automatically think that we only need people that write code.
Not true of course !
IMHO keeping the manual/site/forum clean and up to date is JUST AS
IMPORTANT as delivering good apps
Sadly it sometimes happens that we simply scare off these people due to too
much tech talk, or because of the need to 'stay in charge of our beloved
project'
Also this is perfectly understandable, but i feel that any project
would benefit from having 1 ore more non-technical people that 'interface'
between the user and the developer
Hydrogen was the audio app that triggered my interest in linux and linux
audio (now over 7 years ago) but sadly i had to stop working on the project
recently due to a lac of time and a change in priorities.
However, i hope i can find some spare time in the near future and jump back
on board ;-) there is always work to be done !
after writing this i am still left with 1 final question :
It is good that we can have this kind of discussion, and i think we all see
and knowledge that there are several challenges, but ...
will we find a way to come together and make this work ... ?
Linux audio rocks !
Grtz
Thijs
So, in your honest and bold opinion as user
and/or developer, what do we
lack most and what can we do without that we already have ?
Well, post a thread about what people think sucks, and you'll get page
after page after page after page like we see here.
Post a thread asking for actual help on any of these things and I'd be
surprised if you get a single reply.
The one and only thing we lack is people doing constructive work.
--
follow me on my Audio & Linux blog <http://audio-and-linux.blogspot.com/> !
Please, try to speak your piece without flames or
dissing other
developers and/or their work. Frankly speaking, I've had enough of
that crap, and I'm most thankful these days for such forum amenities
as, "mute user" and autodiscard, along with the standard filters found
in mail clients.
The only appropriate response to complainers. We all complain
sometimes, but people who do nothing but complain are nothing but toxic.
I hope this thread didn't go that way, but I'm sure as hell not going to
read it to find out ;)
-dr
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
8 Feb
8 Feb
12:08 a.m.
On Tue, Feb 05, 2013 at 09:58:14AM -0500, Dave Phillips wrote:
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
What should be the problem here ? Natural selection will deal
with this. Those that 'work' will survive.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
That's actually two issues. Regarding GUI toolkits, you use
either Gtk, or Qt, or a thin layer on top of X11 as I'm
doing. All three of them will be available in any distro,
so I don't see a problem with those.
Desktops are another issue. IMHO any app that depends on a
particular desktop environment to work (or fully work) is
just broken. There's a lot of those around, but fortunately
most of them are not audio related.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
It certainly was in its first years and for a large part that
was due to limited system support, immature real-time libs,
etc. Since longer than I can remember it 'just works'.
Assuming you want a system meant to produce music or process
audio, once you have Jack working that's more or less it.
And that hasn't been a problem (for me at least) for a long
time. It's years since I have compiled patched kernels, or
had to install Jack from source.
Fact is that the introduction of PA into mainstream systems has
created a lot a trouble - Jack and PA serve really different
purposes and don't go together easily.
Another problem is that there are still lots of apps around that
have no native Jack support, or broken support usually provided
by some 'cross platform' toolkit. Just dump those. Refuse to use
them. Don't advertise them.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Some things are missing. But why on earth should an instrument
be a plugin ? 'Real' instruments are not plugins, they provide
an input signal to whatever SW you use.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Paul Davis has already pointed out that this can mean two
different things. If someone's workflow *really* depends on
native Windows plugins - repeat *if* repeat *really* - then
why on earth should such a person want to use Linux ?
As regards 'native Linux' VST, I don't see the point of it.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Agree 100%, not just apps but also plugins - there are lots
of those either don't do the thing they are supposed to do,
or do it very poorly, or crash when you give them the right
inputs. Basic lack of care for quality, ignorance, incompetence
or any combination of those. Just let them die and be forgotten.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
None of them being really standard, nor really up to the task.
Which means there will even be more. I wouldn't really want to
see any of the existing ones becoming the only choice. Also,
IMHO there's nothing wrong with an ad-hoc plugin standard, one
tailor-made for a particular app. Since it won't try to be
everything to everyone, it would probably be a lot simpler and
easier to use than one that does. I'm currently developing two
app that will have plugins. They won't have a common standard.
But each of them will be easy to port your code to.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think
Ableton Live).
I really couldn't care less. If someone wants to indulge in those
'modes of composition', he/she should just use the tools that define
them. I do not buy the idea that Linux should offer free clones of
whatever exists in the commercial world.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
Good. We are not a religion or a sect. People will disagree, compete
or just do their own thing and even then share their work anyway,
leaving you with the choice.
Poor external/internal session management.
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Those are real concerns.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
12:47 a.m.
> Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Paul Davis has already pointed out that this can mean
two
different things. If someone's workflow *really* depends on
native Windows plugins - repeat *if* repeat *really* - then
why on earth should such a person want to use Linux ?
As regards 'native Linux' VST, I don't see the point of it.
I'll counter your question with another one; regardless of a user's workflow, why
*wouldn't* we, as LAD's, want to enable as many different kinds of plugins to work
on Linux as possible? From a user's perspective, having more choice is just better,
and there are *tons* of quality DSP tools out there in the VST format; there's
absolutely no down side.
Michael
________________________________
From: Fons Adriaensen <fons(a)linuxaudio.org>
To: linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
Sent: Thursday, February 7, 2013 5:08 PM
Subject: Re: [LAD] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Tue, Feb 05, 2013 at 09:58:14AM -0500, Dave Phillips wrote:
Too many distros.
Too many audio-optimized distros.
What should be the problem here ? Natural selection will deal
with this. Those that 'work' will survive.
Confusion re: desktops, and GUI toolkits.
That's actually two issues. Regarding GUI toolkits, you use
either Gtk, or Qt, or a thin layer on top of X11 as I'm
doing. All three of them will be available in any distro,
so I don't see a problem with those.
Desktops are another issue. IMHO any app that depends on a
particular desktop environment to work (or fully work) is
just broken. There's a lot of those around, but fortunately
most of them are not audio related.
Too difficult to set up audio system.
JACK is a pain.
It certainly was in its first years and for a large part that
was due to limited system support, immature real-time libs,
etc. Since longer than I can remember it 'just works'.
Assuming you want a system meant to produce music or process
audio, once you have Jack working that's more or less it.
And that hasn't been a problem (for me at least) for a long
time. It's years since I have compiled patched kernels, or
had to install Jack from source.
Fact is that the introduction of PA into mainstream systems has
created a lot a trouble - Jack and PA serve really different
purposes and don't go together easily.
Another problem is that there are still lots of apps around that
have no native Jack support, or broken support usually provided
by some 'cross platform' toolkit. Just dump those. Refuse to use
them. Don't advertise them.
Not enough native plugins, esp. instruments.
Some things are missing. But why on earth should an instrument
be a plugin ? 'Real' instruments are not plugins, they provide
an input signal to whatever SW you use.
Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Paul Davis has already pointed out that this can mean two
different things. If someone's workflow *really* depends on
native Windows plugins - repeat *if* repeat *really* - then
why on earth should such a person want to use Linux ?
As regards 'native Linux' VST, I don't see the point of it.
Too many unstable/unfinished applications.
Agree 100%, not just apps but also plugins - there are lots
of those either don't do the thing they are supposed to do,
or do it very poorly, or crash when you give them the right
inputs. Basic lack of care for quality, ignorance, incompetence
or any combination of those. Just let them die and be forgotten.
Too many "standards" (esp. wrt plugins).
None of them being really standard, nor really up to the task.
Which means there will even be more. I wouldn't really want to
see any of the existing ones becoming the only choice. Also,
IMHO there's nothing wrong with an ad-hoc plugin standard, one
tailor-made for a particular app. Since it won't try to be
everything to everyone, it would probably be a lot simpler and
easier to use than one that does. I'm currently developing two
app that will have plugins. They won't have a common standard.
But each of them will be easy to port your code to.
Poor support for certain modes of composition (think
Ableton Live).
I really couldn't care less. If someone wants to indulge in those
'modes of composition', he/she should just use the tools that define
them. I do not buy the idea that Linux should offer free clones of
whatever exists in the commercial world.
Too much conflict/fragmentation within the development
community.
Good. We are not a religion or a sect. People will disagree, compete
or just do their own thing and even then share their work anyway,
leaving you with the choice.
Poor external/internal session management.
Lack of support for contemporary hardware.
Those are real concerns.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
1:05 a.m.
On Thu, Feb 7, 2013 at 6:47 PM, Michael Bechard <gothmagog(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
the down side is that you will be running *Windows* plugins on Linux. this
could be great, then hassle-filled, then non-functional, then great again
depending on the plugins, the state of wine and the precise tools you are
using.
is that "just better" for the user?
> Inconsistent support for VST/VSTi plugins.
Paul Davis has already pointed out that this can
mean two
different things. If someone's workflow *really* depends on
native Windows plugins - repeat *if* repeat *really* - then
why on earth should such a person want to use Linux ?
As regards 'native Linux' VST, I don't see the point of it.
I'll counter your question with another one; regardless of a user's
workflow, why *wouldn't* we, as LAD's, want to enable as many different
kinds of plugins to work on Linux as possible? From a user's perspective,
having more choice is just better, and there are *tons* of quality DSP
tools out there in the VST format; there's absolutely no down side.
1:06 a.m.
On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 03:47:44PM -0800, Michael Bechard wrote:
I'll counter your question with another one;
regardless of a
user's workflow, why *wouldn't* we, as LAD's, want to enable
as many different kinds of plugins to work on Linux as possible?
From a user's perspective, having more choice is just better,
and there are *tons* of quality DSP tools out there in the VST
format; there's absolutely no down side.
Counter-counter question: why not try and run MS Office, Outlook,
etc. under Linux ? More choice for the user !
Those 'tons' of VST plugins are native Windows ones, they require
an emulated Windows environment just as e.g. Outlook would.
Much easier to use them under Windows, if you really want them.
Any anyway, of those 'tons' maybe 1% provides 'quality', the rest
isn't any better than what we already have or could have natively.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
1:25 a.m.
Counter-counter question: why not try and run MS
Office, Outlook,
etc. under Linux ? More choice for the user !
Yep, that would be pretty cool. Difficult, but cool. Does that mean it's not worth
putting effort into?
Any anyway, of those 'tons' maybe 1% provides
'quality', the rest
isn't any better than what we already have or could have natively.
Reeeeaaallly debatable...
Michael
________________________________
From: Fons Adriaensen <fons(a)linuxaudio.org>
To: Michael Bechard <gothmagog(a)yahoo.com>
Cc: "linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org"
<linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org>
Sent: Thursday, February 7, 2013 6:06 PM
Subject: Re: [LAD] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 03:47:44PM -0800, Michael Bechard wrote:
I'll counter your question with another one;
regardless of a
user's workflow, why *wouldn't* we, as LAD's, want to enable
as many different kinds of plugins to work on Linux as possible?
From a user's perspective, having more choice is just better,
and there are *tons* of quality DSP tools out there in the VST
format; there's absolutely no down side.
Counter-counter question: why not try and run MS Office, Outlook,
etc. under Linux ? More choice for the user !
Those 'tons' of VST plugins are native Windows ones, they require
an emulated Windows environment just as e.g. Outlook would.
Much easier to use them under Windows, if you really want them.
Any anyway, of those 'tons' maybe 1% provides 'quality', the rest
isn't any better than what we already have or could have natively.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
2:02 a.m.
On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 04:25:19PM -0800, Michael Bechard wrote:
Could be.
At the place where I work we also have a MAC which has 'a ton' of
Waves plugins available in either Logic or PT. Waves is a *very*
respected name, they don't produce crap, on the contrary all their
stuff works and works quite well.
But do you really think that when doing a mix, the quality of the
final result will depend on which of the 15 or so general purpose
equalisers you use on any particular track ? It doesn't - you could
as well believe in the wonders of unobtainium cables filled with left
twisting electrons and hand woven by Yorkshire virgins. The result
will depend only on your skill in using any one of those EQs. Same
for most other standard plugin functions. A few of them do something
really unique, that's the 1% I referred to.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
> Counter-counter question: why not try and run MS
Office, Outlook,
> etc. under Linux ? More choice for the user !
Yep, that would be pretty cool. Difficult, but cool.
Does that mean
it's not worth putting effort into?
It's wasted effort. Just run those things under the system they were
designed for. Use a VM if you don't want to waste any hardware.
Any anyway, of
those 'tons' maybe 1% provides 'quality', the rest
isn't any better than what we already have or could have natively.
Reeeeaaallly debatable... 
1:22 p.m.
On 8 February 2013 02:02, Fons Adriaensen <fons(a)linuxaudio.org> wrote:
On Thu, Feb 07, 2013 at 04:25:19PM -0800, Michael
Bechard wrote:
Could be.
At the place where I work we also have a MAC which has 'a ton' of
Waves plugins available in either Logic or PT. Waves is a *very*
respected name, they don't produce crap, on the contrary all their
stuff works and works quite well.
But do you really think that when doing a mix, the quality of the
final result will depend on which of the 15 or so general purpose
equalisers you use on any particular track ? It doesn't - you could
as well believe in the wonders of unobtainium cables filled with left
twisting electrons and hand woven by Yorkshire virgins. The result
will depend only on your skill in using any one of those EQs. Same
for most other standard plugin functions. A few of them do something
really unique, that's the 1% I referred to.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
There are differences between the win and mac way of doing things, and the
"collective of smaller parts" philosophy of Linux Audio. This requires a
different mindset. The notion of sessions is much less apparent in the more
monolithic commercial world, and imho, far more important in ours. Male and
Fons are both right, imho, that we don't need to chase tails, but i will
add that a common agreement and enthusiasm for a "LinuxAudio session
protocol", AND a dumb user (count me in) session interface would go quite
some way to unifying disparate elements, and make linux audio more
presentable to users. User expectations are as excessive in win and mac as
they are in linuxaudio, so i don't think that's a viable reason for debate.
(generally) User input to devs is important, as i've discovered. YMMV for
response, but that's just as true for dealing with commercial vendors,
where the user is far more likely to encounter the "corporate wall of
silence" when asking those companies to fix bugs in their latest grope in
the consumer's wallet.
Personally, i don't care about VSTs or AUs, and i had just as much trouble
with them in the past, as i've had problems with the rapidly developing LV2
format. (And this is 2 allegedly "stable" protocols, versus one growing
before our very eyes. VST and AU were just as problematic in the beginning,
and took quite a bit longer to mature) We have a good collection of plugs,
and rather than push and push for thousands, i'd like to see great plugs of
high quality (which we have some of already) even if this means i have 8
favourites, and "only" 258 others. (Irony noted i hope)
Users need to put up or shut up, and i say that as a user who's had to
learn the "linux way" over some years, when interacting with devs, making
plenty of mistakes along the way. I continue to live and learn.
Good bug reports, well thought out and detailed feature requests (which may
or may not be accepted) to give the devs a clearer idea of what you're
actually trying to say, and some sort of contribution in writing docs,
making vidoes, and/or relentless testing, etc, go a long way. Quality
control is not just the province of devs, but users too, and frankly, if
you as a user finds a problem and doesn't report it, then you deserve what
you get. Whether the dev is interested in your reports or not is up to the
dev, but it's likely that a persistently unreceptive dev will find out soon
enough that bleating about a lack of user interest will fall on deaf ears.
It works both ways here, with the proviso that devs are coding in their own
time, and users are testing and reporting in their own time as well.
Likewise, and i think Fons is right here, if a project is dying, and
there's little to no user interest, then let it die. I'd rather see the
very few devs we have working on live stuff, with regular user input, than
dragging a dead horse to a brothel. Example, i was enthusiastic about using
Rezound but it hasn't built here for some time. At first i was keen to see
it revived by "someone" but learned quickly that my perception of what i
thought was an important linuxaudio app, was in fact just my perception, so
i moved on. Such is life, and part of the rolling evolution.
I don't think we're in as bad shape as is implied in some posts, but the
incomplete or evolving session management required to manipulate our
modular by design collection of apps, coupled with what seems like a
universally accepted concern about hardware drivers do contribute, imho, to
a often exaggerated perception that linux audio is perpetually poor.
A new robust and persistent client name system for jack would be good too.
(in relation to opening the same app more than once in a single session,
and having each instance, plus its presets and settings saved and named the
same way for each session instance) Maybe an addition to the API?
My two Kr.s worth.
Fons, there are no virgins in Yorkshire.
Alex.
> Counter-counter question: why not try and
run MS Office, Outlook,
> etc. under Linux ? More choice for the user !
Yep, that would be pretty cool. Difficult, but
cool. Does that mean
it's not worth putting effort into?
It's wasted effort. Just run those things under the system they were
designed for. Use a VM if you don't want to waste any hardware.
Any
anyway, of those 'tons' maybe 1% provides 'quality', the rest
isn't any better than what we already have or could have natively.
Reeeeaaallly debatable...
4:18 p.m.
On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 01:02:13AM +0000, Fons Adriaensen wrote:
But do you really think that when doing a mix, the
quality of the
final result will depend on which of the 15 or so general purpose
equalisers you use on any particular track ?
No, it depends on which esoteric piece of hardware the pretty picture
on the GUI looks like, of course.
The result will depend only on your skill in using any
one of
those EQs.
Heresy!
John
7:38 p.m.
On Fri, Feb 8, 2013 at 7:29 AM, John Rigg <ladev3(a)jrigg.co.uk> wrote:
On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 01:02:13AM +0000, Fons
Adriaensen wrote:
Heh. Exactly. Sometimes I get the impression that users of windows and mac
have no clue that those 10,000 awesome free VST/AU plugins simply represent
the permutations of the mathematical functions of a few LADSPA plugins.
Personally, I'd rather assemble those functions myself than have some Brand
Name (TM) do it for me and slap a stupid shiny GUI on it.
But do you really think that when doing a mix,
the quality of the
final result will depend on which of the 15 or so general purpose
equalisers you use on any particular track ?
No, it depends on which esoteric piece of hardware the pretty picture
on the GUI looks like, of course.
The result will depend only on your skill in
using any one of
those EQs.
Heresy!
7:55 p.m.
By the way, to once again put up a little defense of people on Windows and
Mac, I advice everyone to watch a masterclass with Ritchie Hawtin, a
popular minimal house producer and dj. It is available on YouTube and he
speaks about how he is using a modular software and hardware setup by using
MIDI and OSC to create a complicated audio and video setup. It is amazing
and it shows that many people on Mac and Win are experimenting and even
writing their own software for themselves, like Richie Hawtin and his team.
11:18 p.m.
On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 09:55:14PM +0300, Louigi Verona wrote:
By the way, to once again put up a little defense of
people on Windows and
Mac, I advice everyone to watch a masterclass with Ritchie Hawtin, a
popular minimal house producer and dj. It is available on YouTube and he
speaks about how he is using a modular software and hardware setup by using
MIDI and OSC to create a complicated audio and video setup. It is amazing
and it shows that many people on Mac and Win are experimenting and even
writing their own software for themselves, like Richie Hawtin and his team.
To be fair I wasn't really slagging off Windows and Mac users. Most pro audio
engineers are using those after all. I'm just bemused by the attitude that
audio processing tools should be anything more than that. Pretty pictures
and dumbed down control ranges don't help me make better mixes, they just
get in my way.
John
9 Feb
9 Feb
10:03 a.m.
On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 2:29 AM, John Rigg <ladev3(a)jrigg.co.uk> wrote:
To be fair I wasn't really slagging off Windows and Mac users. Most pro
audio
engineers are using those after all. I'm just bemused by the attitude that
audio processing tools should be anything more than that. Pretty pictures
and dumbed down control ranges don't help me make better mixes, they just
get in my way.
But why instantly "dumbed down"? Or are the generic LADSPA controls so
intellectual?
I think beautifully down interface adds to the inspiration as opposed to
stuff
that all looks like coding examples.
--
Louigi Verona
http://www.louigiverona.ru/
12:05 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 09, 2013 at 12:03:41PM +0300, Louigi Verona wrote:
On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 2:29 AM, John Rigg
<ladev3(a)jrigg.co.uk> wrote:
By "dumbed down" I mean restricted in a way which may result in
inexperienced users making fewer mistakes, but will also inconvenience
more advanced users. An example of this would be a high mid EQ that won't
sweep above 8kHz. What if I need to EQ 12kHz? There's some excuse for this
kind of thing on analogue hardware, as component cost has to be kept down,
but in a plugin it's totally unnecessary.
Another pet peeve is lack of a text entry field on controls, as it makes
it difficult to set a parameter to an exact amount. Even worse are detented
controls. What if I need an intermediate setting? The reason for detents on
analogue hardware is for repeatability of settings, but it's totally
redundant in software, unless the developer has neglected to provide
text entry!
I will stress that I'm talking about audio engineering tools, not music
creation software here. I do appreciate that users of the latter have very
different requirements.
John
To be fair I wasn't really slagging off
Windows and Mac users. Most pro
audio
engineers are using those after all. I'm just bemused by the attitude that
audio processing tools should be anything more than that. Pretty pictures
and dumbed down control ranges don't help me make better mixes, they just
get in my way.
But why instantly "dumbed down"? Or are the generic LADSPA controls so
intellectual?
I think beautifully down interface adds to the inspiration as opposed to
stuff
that all looks like coding examples.
12:20 p.m.
Right, I hear you John. But I did look at pro mastering software on
Windows, I don't
remember any unnecessary restrictions.
My message would that I oppose this sort of a sweeping judgment of a whole
audio platform.
There might be some concrete examples, sure, but if you mean that in
general all or most
software on Windows is restricted in such a manner, I personally would want
some proof.
For instance, what restrictions of that sort can you name in iZotope Ozone?
L.V.
2:15 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 09, 2013 at 02:20:58PM +0300, Louigi Verona wrote:
Right, I hear you John. But I did look at pro
mastering software on
Windows, I don't
remember any unnecessary restrictions.
My message would that I oppose this sort of a sweeping judgment of a whole
audio platform.
There might be some concrete examples, sure, but if you mean that in
general all or most
software on Windows is restricted in such a manner, I personally would want
some proof.
There's a misunderstanding here. I'm criticising plugin design choices which
make my job difficult, regardless of platform. That includes Linux.
John
2:18 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 5:26 PM, John Rigg <ladev3(a)jrigg.co.uk> wrote:
On Sat, Feb 09, 2013 at 02:20:58PM +0300, Louigi
Verona wrote:
John, got ya, fair enough :)
--
Louigi Verona
http://www.louigiverona.ru/
Right, I hear you John. But I did look at pro
mastering software on
Windows, I don't
remember any unnecessary restrictions.
My message would that I oppose this sort of a sweeping judgment of a
whole
audio platform.
There might be some concrete examples, sure, but if you mean that in
general all or most
software on Windows is restricted in such a manner, I personally would
want
some proof.
There's a misunderstanding here. I'm criticising plugin design choices
which
make my job difficult, regardless of platform. That includes Linux.
John
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
1:08 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 09, 2013 at 11:16:48AM +0000, John Rigg wrote:
By "dumbed down" I mean restricted in a way
which may result in
inexperienced users making fewer mistakes, but will also inconvenience
more advanced users. An example of this would be a high mid EQ that won't
sweep above 8kHz. What if I need to EQ 12kHz? There's some excuse for this
kind of thing on analogue hardware, as component cost has to be kept down,
but in a plugin it's totally unnecessary.
I've seen some EQ plugins that actually become unstable near FS/2. And even
some where the author didn't bother to limit the F range in that case - move
the slider too far with some others at the right value and watch the smoke
from your tweeters.
Lots of plugins are written by people who apparently never have used real
audio engineering gear ever, and don't bother to test their code or even
understand what exactly it will do.
Some ten years ago someone wrote an 'RMS' routine as part of a compressor
plugin. It does a sliding window calculation over 256 samples. You can
find verbatim copies of it in at least 5 other dynamics plugins and also
in 'VU' meters (which are not even supposed to use RMS). While it's not
entirely wrong, the result is that the compressor (or whatever) will be
completely insensitive to level variations at some frequencies. For example,
at 48 or 44.1 kHz, any modulation by around 90 Hz (or integer multiples)
will be completely ignored. Five millisecs attack time ? Forget it - you get
some attack time that depends on input content in a completely haphazard way.
And of course the same lenght is used at whatever sample rate. The result is
then presented as an 'RMS' compressor...
Another pet peeve is lack of a text entry field on
controls, as it makes
it difficult to set a parameter to an exact amount. Even worse are detented
controls. What if I need an intermediate setting? The reason for detents on
analogue hardware is for repeatability of settings, but it's totally
redundant in software, unless the developer has neglected to provide
text entry!
I generally dislike text input on audio engineering tools. The controls
should have sufficient resolution. More often than not the author just
accepts the display resolution (e.g. standard toolkit sliders), and if
these don't have fixed sizes you don't even have repeatable settings.
For EQ frequencies I usually have steps 1/3 or 1/6 octave depending on
filter type, with finer steps availiable using a modifier key.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
2:41 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 11:16 AM, John Rigg <ladev3(a)jrigg.co.uk> wrote:
I will stress that I'm talking about audio
engineering tools, not music
creation software here. I do appreciate that users of the latter have very
different requirements.
I was reading your post, about to vocalize the counter-argument, but you're
right, they're two entirely different things.
I'd like to add to my list of "what don't we have", music creation
software. I mean, dumbed down controls: where every settings sounds *ok*,
and some sound amazing. No amplitude spikes just cause you adjust a control
to a non-integer multiple of the blah blah, and upon filing a bug report
recieving "you should know better than to do that".
Live musicians can't deal with the chance the software will do something
crazy.
More (LV2 instrument & effect) software with dumbed down controls :)
-Harry
8 Feb
8 Feb
11:14 p.m.
On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 03:29:06PM +0000, John Rigg wrote:
No, it depends on which esoteric piece of hardware the
pretty picture
on the GUI looks like, of course.
:-)
Digital emulations of well-known analog equalisers have become a genre
of their own... Usually the 'good imperfections' (noise, distortion,...)
are emulated as well, as if the creators of those EQs actually added
them on purpose. I can't imagine any of the designers at e.g. Neve or
SSL ever doing that - they went for the best technical specs they could
have.
Not that all equalisers are equal, far from it. Some of those classic
designs had some unusual features such as higher order shelf filters
which are actually quite nice to have.
I wrote an equaliser having those some years ago (not yet published,
maybe I will some day), and it has become my 'workhorse'. You can
see some of the frequency responses here:
<http://kokkinizita.linuxaudio.org/linuxaudio/shelf2filt.html>
It's possible to obtain almost the same with a 'classic' parametric +
shelf EQ, but it requires using two or three sections in a coordinated
way - not very practical.
Ciao,
--
FA
A world of exhaustive, reliable metadata would be an utopia.
It's also a pipe-dream, founded on self-delusion, nerd hubris
and hysterically inflated market opportunities. (Cory Doctorow)
9 Feb
9 Feb
12:15 a.m.
On Fri, Feb 08, 2013 at 10:14:58PM +0000, Fons Adriaensen wrote:
Digital emulations of well-known analog equalisers
have become a genre
of their own... Usually the 'good imperfections' (noise, distortion,...)
are emulated as well, as if the creators of those EQs actually added
them on purpose. I can't imagine any of the designers at e.g. Neve or
SSL ever doing that - they went for the best technical specs they could
have.
Agreed. Some types of distortion can sound nice on the right material,
but I prefer to add that separately if I think it's required. I don't
want an EQ to make that decision for me.
Not that all equalisers are equal, far from it. Some
of those classic
designs had some unusual features such as higher order shelf filters
which are actually quite nice to have.
I wrote an equaliser having those some years ago (not yet published,
maybe I will some day), and it has become my 'workhorse'. You can
see some of the frequency responses here:
<http://kokkinizita.linuxaudio.org/linuxaudio/shelf2filt.html>
Please do consider releasing that if you get time. I can think of several
situations where it would have been very useful to have that :-)
John
10 Feb
10 Feb
12:25 p.m.
On 02/05/2013 03:58 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
Greetings,
<snip>
I'm not so interested in comments on the
commentary, I have my own, but
say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these
lists already have ready replies and responses to these and other
criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm
more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain
wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without
flames or dissing other developers and/or their work.
[drum roll, the following with at least 15% THD and the distinct sound
of a 50s ribbon mike after long abuse:]
ask not what free software can do for you, ask what you can do for free
software!
[enter brass band with some heroic yet totally cheesy hymn arrangement,
think charles ives stealing frank zappa's reggae horn arrangement of the
stairway to heaven solo.]
free software, my friends, is a natural resource. complaining about the
lack of this or that is just about as clever or useful as complaining
about the utter lack of oil or rare earth metals on your home turf,
which unjustly prevents you from becoming the next rockefeller.
making linux audio more approachable to people who have not grasped this
basic fact has no benefits at all, neither to developers nor to users.
personally, i find my days of linux audio evangelism are over. it suits
my needs better than ever before, and i make very sure that people i
talk to are made aware of the treasure trove of linux audio tools.
and of course i assume the lotus position and put on my most radiating
smile when people who have just figured that i'm a sort of computer
person then start complaining about their problems with operating system
$FOO and how proprietary tool $BAR is just a millstone around their
necks. but that's it.
if they need guitar rig or protools or garageband, we can't give it to
them, so obviously they are better off on other platforms. that is good.
it's even better than turning them into frustrated converts who then
keep complaining how they can't run TDM or RTAS plugins or their VSTs
keep crashing or whatever.
if somebody decides to take the plunge (which also implies some other
basic skills, such as being able to use email in a constructive manner,
learning what IRC is, aiming at learning to compile one's own software,
and so on), i will try to share tricks and help out as best as i can.
but why press-gang perfectly happy users of proprietary software into
linux, or put up with jerks who think the world has to support their
personal way of composing? that's just the lamest thing i can imagine.
don't get me wrong, i think it's perfectly ok for non-programmers to try
and nudge developers gently towards what you think are good ideas. i do
it myself all the time, but i try to do it
_from_the_inside_of_a_project. that means i try to make myself a little
useful, subscribe to the mailing list, learn the software, build from
the latest dev tree, lose some productive time dealing with crashes and
try to provide useful feedback. only then do i sound off about what new
stuff i'd like to see.
anything else is just bikeshedding.
my 200 €.
jörn
--
Jörn Nettingsmeier
Lortzingstr. 11, 45128 Essen, Tel. +49 177 7937487
Meister für Veranstaltungstechnik (Bühne/Studio)
Tonmeister VDT
http://stackingdwarves.net
2:12 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ?
Am 10.02.2013 12:25, schrieb Jörn Nettingsmeier:
On 02/05/2013 03:58 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
+me
Often it sucks me, that, with my limited knowledge of the English
language, I wasn't able to put things right on the point, like you have
done it here.
Gladly that others could do, and do it.
Many thanks for this.
hermann
Greetings,
<snip>
I'm not so interested in comments on the
commentary, I have my own, but
say what you will about the list. I figure that most denizens of these
lists already have ready replies and responses to these and other
criticisms, many of which have been voiced here previously. What I'm
more interested in is what *you* think is missing most or just plain
wrong about the situation. Please, try to speak your piece without
flames or dissing other developers and/or their work.
[drum roll, the following with at least 15% THD and the distinct sound
of a 50s ribbon mike after long abuse:]
ask not what free software can do for you, ask what you can do for
free software!
[enter brass band with some heroic yet totally cheesy hymn
arrangement, think charles ives stealing frank zappa's reggae horn
arrangement of the stairway to heaven solo.]
free software, my friends, is a natural resource. complaining about
the lack of this or that is just about as clever or useful as
complaining about the utter lack of oil or rare earth metals on your
home turf, which unjustly prevents you from becoming the next
rockefeller.
making linux audio more approachable to people who have not grasped
this basic fact has no benefits at all, neither to developers nor to
users.
personally, i find my days of linux audio evangelism are over. it
suits my needs better than ever before, and i make very sure that
people i talk to are made aware of the treasure trove of linux audio
tools.
and of course i assume the lotus position and put on my most radiating
smile when people who have just figured that i'm a sort of computer
person then start complaining about their problems with operating
system $FOO and how proprietary tool $BAR is just a millstone around
their necks. but that's it.
if they need guitar rig or protools or garageband, we can't give it to
them, so obviously they are better off on other platforms. that is
good. it's even better than turning them into frustrated converts who
then keep complaining how they can't run TDM or RTAS plugins or their
VSTs keep crashing or whatever.
if somebody decides to take the plunge (which also implies some other
basic skills, such as being able to use email in a constructive
manner, learning what IRC is, aiming at learning to compile one's own
software, and so on), i will try to share tricks and help out as best
as i can.
but why press-gang perfectly happy users of proprietary software into
linux, or put up with jerks who think the world has to support their
personal way of composing? that's just the lamest thing i can imagine.
don't get me wrong, i think it's perfectly ok for non-programmers to
try and nudge developers gently towards what you think are good ideas.
i do it myself all the time, but i try to do it
_from_the_inside_of_a_project. that means i try to make myself a
little useful, subscribe to the mailing list, learn the software,
build from the latest dev tree, lose some productive time dealing with
crashes and try to provide useful feedback. only then do i sound off
about what new stuff i'd like to see.
anything else is just bikeshedding.
my 200 €.
jörn
3:43 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
Greetings,
I've spent this morning reading through the ~200 replies to the topic.
IMO the thread has devolved gracefully and I have the information I was
looking for.
I'll make a fuller reply after I get into my article, but it's clear
that the most pressing need is for more skilled developers. This is in
stark contrast to the scene in 2000 - at that time virtually every
member of LAU/LAD was a developer and/or technically involved user. Few
of us were "just musicians". Now it looks like the musicians outnumber
the devs, a not entirely unhappy situation, despite evident problems
rising from the imbalance.
A great "Thank you!" to everyone who replied. For the most part the
thread stayed on-topic, and I hope that your time was not wasted. I'll
notify the lists when the article is published and when it's publicly
readable (LWN subscribers get first look).
Best,
dp
5:18 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
On 02/10/2013 03:43 PM, Dave Phillips wrote:
Greetings,
Hi Dave,
I've spent this morning reading through the ~200
replies to the topic.
IMO the thread has devolved gracefully and I have the information I was
looking for.
I've been waiting for that to say: I can find nothing that sucks about
Linux Audio ('xept maybe ~200 w[h]ining users :))
Looking forward to your article,
robin
10:52 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
On Sun, Feb 10, 2013 at 8:43 AM, Dave Phillips <dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com>wrote;wrote:
Greetings,
I've spent this morning reading through the ~200 replies to the topic. IMO
the thread has devolved gracefully and I have the information I was looking
for.
I'll make a fuller reply after I get into my article, but it's clear that
the most pressing need is for more skilled developers. This is in stark
contrast to the scene in 2000 - at that time virtually every member of
LAU/LAD was a developer and/or technically involved user. Few of us were
"just musicians". Now it looks like the musicians outnumber the devs, a not
entirely unhappy situation, despite evident problems rising from the
imbalance.
It would be great if we could get more students involved in linux audio. 8
years ago, I picked up linux in order to program some DSP audio code that I
was thinking about. It really lowered the barrier of entry into audio
programming. I think more engineering students could get involved, knowing
some of the things you can do with linux.
My university didn't have an audio program--there were maybe just a few
engineers I knew that were strongly inclined to work on audio or
acoustics. There is a lack of collaboration between engineering and
art/music students here and very little direction from professors
concerning art and technology--but I see some of that beginning to change.
I think that linux is much more well known and it's easier than ever to get
started. So--might I suggest to do something more for student outreach?
What do you think would make a difference?
Chuck
12 Feb
12 Feb
1:12 a.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
Hi Chuck and list
A few time ago I wrote in javascript some small code generator. A few
friends wanted to learn audio programming and I did it because it is not
easy to start with an API and sometimes the code wrap takes to much time.
These things also help me in some fast prototypes.
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/LADSPA-generator/LADSPA_generator.html
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/PDExternal-generator/PDExternal_generator.html
The main idea of both is to have a ready-to-use wraper and so one can
spend time really coding audio DSP.
Best regards
F Schiavoni
My university didn't have an audio program--there
were maybe just a few
engineers I knew that were strongly inclined to work on audio or
acoustics. There is a lack of collaboration between engineering and
art/music students here and very little direction from professors
concerning art and technology--but I see some of that beginning to change.
I think that linux is much more well known and it's easier than ever to
get
started. So--might I suggest to do something more for student outreach?
What do you think would make a difference?
Chuck
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
6:02 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
Flavio,
These are really awesome! Looks like a great way for newcomers to get
started. I usually start by copy/paste..find/replace from an existing
class, but have to remove anything that's specific to that class. You have
a better approach here.
Chuck
On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 6:04 PM, <fls(a)rendera.com.br> wrote:
Hi Chuck and list
A few time ago I wrote in javascript some small code generator. A few
friends wanted to learn audio programming and I did it because it is not
easy to start with an API and sometimes the code wrap takes to much time.
These things also help me in some fast prototypes.
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/LADSPA-generator/LADSPA_generator.html
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/PDExternal-generator/PDExternal_generator.html
The main idea of both is to have a ready-to-use wraper and so one can
spend time really coding audio DSP.
Best regards
F Schiavoni
My university didn't have an audio
program--there were maybe just a few
engineers I knew that were strongly inclined to work on audio or
acoustics. There is a lack of collaboration between engineering and
art/music students here and very little direction from professors
concerning art and technology--but I see some of that beginning to
change.
I think that linux is much more well known and it's easier than ever to
get
started. So--might I suggest to do something more for student outreach?
What do you think would make a difference?
Chuck
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
9:04 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
Chuck,
Thanks for your reply. Just a few cents about: how to get students
involved in Linux audio development. We used this code generator in a kind
of DSP course. With this "wrapper" was possible to take some classic DSP
algorythms and create LADSPA plugins. Some results can be seen here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/jaimeffects/
I'm pretty sure that these plugins are not new, awesome or anything. But
it was good to develop them and see them running.
cheers
f schiavoni
Flavio,
These are really awesome! Looks like a great way for newcomers to get
started. I usually start by copy/paste..find/replace from an existing
class, but have to remove anything that's specific to that class. You
have
a better approach here.
Chuck
On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 6:04 PM, <fls(a)rendera.com.br> wrote:
Hi Chuck and list
A few time ago I wrote in javascript some small code generator. A few
friends wanted to learn audio programming and I did it because it is not
easy to start with an API and sometimes the code wrap takes to much
time.
These things also help me in some fast prototypes.
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/LADSPA-generator/LADSPA_generator.html
http://www.ime.usp.br/~fls/PDExternal-generator/PDExternal_generator.html
The main idea of both is to have a ready-to-use wraper and so one can
spend time really coding audio DSP.
Best regards
F Schiavoni
My university didn't have an audio
program--there were maybe just a
few
engineers I knew that were strongly inclined to
work on audio or
acoustics. There is a lack of collaboration between engineering and
art/music students here and very little direction from professors
concerning art and technology--but I see some of that beginning to
change.
I think that linux is much more well known and it's easier than ever
to
get
started. So--might I suggest to do something more for student
outreach?
What do you think would make a difference?
Chuck
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
_______________________________________________
Linux-audio-dev mailing list
Linux-audio-dev(a)lists.linuxaudio.org
http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
9:15 p.m.
New subject: [LAU] So what do you think sucks about Linux audio ? OP reply.
On Tue, 2013-02-12 at 17:56 -0200, fls(a)rendera.com.br wrote:
--> http://compmus.ime.usp.br/en
A picture of a Fairlight instead of a Linux DAW? Bad boy ;)!
4225
days inactive
4232
days old
linux-audio-dev@lists.linuxaudio.org
80 comments
37 participants
participants (37)
-
Albert Graef -
Alex Stone -
Brett McCoy -
Charles Z Henry -
Dan -
Dave Phillips -
David Robillard -
Devin Anderson -
Dominique Michel -
Florian Paul Schmidt -
fls＠rendera.com.br -
Fons Adriaensen -
Fred Gleason -
Gabbe Nord -
Harry van Haaren -
hermann meyer -
J. Liles -
Johannes Kroll -
John Rigg -
Jostein Chr. Andersen -
Julien Claassen -
Jörn Nettingsmeier -
Louigi Verona -
Louis Gorenfeld -
Luis Garrido -
Michael Bechard -
michael noble -
Niklas Klügel -
Paul Davis -
Pedro Lopez-Cabanillas -
Ralf Mardorf -
Robert Jonsson -
Robin Gareus -
Thijs van severen -
Thomas Vecchione -
Thorsten Wilms -
William Light