Subject: Re: [linux-audio-dev] ardour, LADSPA, a marriage
From: Tom Pincince (stillone_AT_snowcrest.net)
Date: Sun Nov 12 2000 - 23:01:28 EET
>i am pleased to mention that after a pleasantly short amount of
>hacking, ardour CVS now has preliminary support for *real-time* LADSPA
>plugins applied to EDL-based data streams. its far from where i want
This added functionality raises a question. Do you plan to develop
ardour into a monolithic daw application?
>yes, this is an interesting dilemma for ardour. in fact, you could
>argue that reverb is really an N-channel effect, but is typically
>implemented with N=2. i really don't know how to do this in ardour's
>current model where each track is NOT panned to 2+ output channels,
>but is delivered directly to its output channel. this comes primarily
>because of its roots as recording device, not a mixer.
My original understanding was that ardour was to be a hd replacement for
a rack of adats, interfacing with a hardware mixer in a physical
studio. Adding edl functionality was a logical development that allows
it to become a rack of random access adats.
>but ardour is *currently* designed around the notion that it is
>outputting to a multichannel device, not stereo (or even 5.1) outs
>(even if the number of channels is actually 2), and is therefore not
>concerned with mixdown in any way. to use mixer terminology, we only
>have inserts, no sends, no busses, no auxes. i think i got that right
:)
While the primary function of a mixer is mixing, it is also the home of
the channel strip which contains inserts. Since ardour does no mixing,
a mixer is still necessary and it will have inserts and the ability to
handle stereo i/o fx. By adding inserts to ardour you have begun the
process of fitting a mixer into ardour. All plugins of the insert
variety are mono, or linked stereo like a compressor. Stereo plugins
like reverb and ping pong delay are not fed by inserts. They are fed by
aux sends. You could feed them by mono inserts but you will still need
to address stereo output. Adding this kind of functionality to ardour
creates momentum for monolithic development.
>>I am not talking about something external. I am talking about the way
>>software gets layed out. How is anyone going to understand the block
>>diagram? It's very important to understand the signal chain. Software
>>has been making this a blurry mess.
>
>i agree that this is very important. i'll do what i can as ardour
>evolves to make sure that this stays visible and clear and
>controllable.
>
>i can see hints of a major redesign in the future ...
...if you plan on developing a monolithic software daw. You could go
modular, allowing ardour to stay as ardour. This approach would require
the identification of the main components of a hardware studio,
developing equivalent software modules, and developing a standard
communication protocol between modules. To me the main modules are the
recorder, mixer, router (patch bay), and sequencer. The recorder would
only have direct access to the soundcard if no mixer was used. If a
mixer was used then the router would interface with the soundcard, and
both the recorder and the mixer could have simultaneous access to any
physical input, etc...
At any single moment in time the monolithic model offers the most power
because there is less communication overhead. However, new developments
like 5.1 mixing are harder to implement if they must be integrated into
a pre-existing monolithic application. Assuming that hardware
technology development will continue to advance, communication overhead
will be a non-issue (and for modest track counts it probably is
already). The modular approach will allow users to assemble virtual
studios, with individual modules plugging into each other in a fully
compatible mix-and-match way just like current analog technology. On
the development side it may eliminate so much reinventing of the wheel,
since someone developing a 5.1 mixer may start from scratch because he
feels that would be easier than starting with an application that has
recorder roots. He would probably be right but he would also loose all
of the fine tuning in ardour regarding issues such as disk i/o.
It may be that the effort to fit a mixer into ardour would be more
useful if it were applied to the creation of a communication protocol
that allowed ardour to stay as it is. It seems that adding plugin
support is the defining moment regarding monolithic or modular
development. At the very least it provided fuel for some pleasant
Sunday morning philosophizing.
Tom
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