Re: [linux-audio-user] Opening up the discussion

On Sun, 2005-07-24 at 19:15, Jono Bacon wrote:

> -> The integration issue is solved or at least reduced if you use
> DeMuDi, Planet CCRMA, AGNULA etc.
>
> This is an interesting point. One side of me thinks, "awesome, this
> solves the problem", but another side of me feels a little weird about
> requiring an entire customised OS to run audio software. Now,
> personally, I use my studio box just for audio, but I know some other
> posters on the list said that it should not be a requirement to use a
> computer just for audio stuff. I do agree here.

    As I said in my earlier post, I used to do all of the configuration
by hand and now I use CCRMA. I'm not sure that you understand what
CCRMA is. I load Fedora Core Whatever on my system and configure it the
way I want. I then download the applications from CCRMA. I also
download a tweaked kernel (which I used to do myself) which will give me
low latency. None of this precludes using all of the standard FC
packages. Unlike some here, my studio system is also my email, web, etc
system.

>
> To me, the integration issue seems largely a distribution problem.
> Issues such as making sound servers, LADSPA, Ardour and Jack talk
> together still seem difficult to solve. As I said before, the
> canonical test is to simply install Ardour and Jack and get it to
> work. Making this work and then using LADSPA and other bits still
> requires some knowledge of the infrastructure.
>

    Yep, if you do it by hand and don't use one of the packages it can
be a real PITA.

> What has been interesting in this discussion has been that onlookers
> outside of this list seem very critical of Linux and audio. This
> article was linked on GNOME footnotes, LinuxToday, OSNews and
> elsewhere, and the comments posted and mails I have had have been
> supportive of the view that it is difficult to get started to an equal
> level of capability on competing systems such as Cubase and
> GarageBand. This seems like a real problem to me, and although I
> accept that audio production is always going to be a complex science,
> there seems to be a slight undercurrent of RTFM from some sides of the
> audio production in Linux community.
>

    You have to realize that Ardour is not meant to be a replacement for
Cubase or GarageBand. It is a Pro Tools competitor. And I'm not
talking about the little PT Lite editions, I'm talking about the 10-15K
Pro Tools. How many Pro Tools users complained about how complex Ardour
was?

> This moves me onto another point, and I would love to hear your
> thoughts on this. I have heard a few loose comments around different
> parts of the net that Ardour is not quite the same as other Open
> Source projects. I have heard that development occurs between a fairly
> limited set of developers, and only a few developers drive the
> direction of development. I also read somewhere that the testing team
> is restricted to a specific group of people and that the author may
> even charge for accessing the development version in the future. Is
> any of this true? How have you found the development of Ardour to be?
> I have not really looked into it, so these points I have heard may be
> rubbish, but I would love to hear your thoughts.
>

    When I first looked at Ardour I thought that I would be able to help
with the programming. I have made a few suggestions and maybe a couple
of my earlier tiny fixes got in. I have been programming scientific
graphics applications for 27 years (that's right, I used to work on
Tektronix 4014s). I have worked in FORTRAN, C, Java, C++, COBOL, Basic,
Pascal, and a couple or three assembly languages. When I dived into
Ardour's code it was obvious to me why there is only a limited set of
developers - you have to either be extremely good at wrapping your head
around very complicated code or you need to devote a *lot* of time to
the project. I didn't have the time ;-) So instead I work on JAMin.

    As far as charging for the development version is concerned you'd
have to check the GPL. Yes, Paul can charge for it but the minute he
releases it he has to provide source code. Once the source code is out
anyone can distribute it. If Paul does decide to charge for it I'll
gladly pay. For the amount of work he's put into it he deserves
something back.

-- 
Jan "Evil Twin" Depner
The Fuzzy Dice
http://myweb.cableone.net/eviltwin69/fuzzy.html
"As we enjoy great advantages from the invention of others, we should be
glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours, and this
we should do freely and generously."
Benjamin Franklin, on declining patents offered by the governor of
Pennsylvania for his "Pennsylvania Fireplace", c. 1744