[HN Gopher] Ardour 7.0
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       Ardour 7.0
        
       Author : frankzander
       Score  : 158 points
       Date   : 2022-10-15 15:02 UTC (7 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (ardour.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (ardour.org)
        
       | dang wrote:
       | Related:
       | 
       |  _Ardour -Audacity Alternative to Record, Edit, and Mix on Linux,
       | OS X and Windows_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27740936
       | - July 2021 (55 comments)
       | 
       |  _Paul Davis, lead developer of Ardour on fixing big Linux audio
       | issues_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23739517 - July
       | 2020 (41 comments)
       | 
       |  _Ardour 5.9 released_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14347758 - May 2017 (46
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Ardour 5 released_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12281137 - Aug 2016 (64
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Ardour 4.0 released_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9403131 - April 2015 (1
       | comment)
        
         | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
         | Note that I only started reading HN in 2019, which is why you
         | won't any info from me in earlier items.
        
       | smoldesu wrote:
       | Holy cow, a nice-looking clip based workflow!
       | 
       | The other day I bought Bitwig because I was looking for this
       | _exact thing_ on Linux. I don 't regret it one bit, but it's
       | amazing to see the beginnings of an open source solution to this!
       | Hats off to the contributors who pulled through and made this
       | happen.
        
         | conradfr wrote:
         | Bitwig seems interesting but is so expansive (speaking as a
         | Reaper user).
         | 
         | Were you caught in the Bitwig drama around the release of their
         | plug-ins last week? ;)
        
           | squeaky-clean wrote:
           | I don't know about recent drama but just want to add I won't
           | ever buy Bitwig because if their servers have an error, it
           | can lock you out of the app or crash running sessions. These
           | have happened multiple times. Even if you activated Bitwig
           | offline, it will still try to reach the licensing server
           | every few minutes. If the licensing server throws a 500
           | error, it refuses to open and closes any running sessions
           | without saving.
           | 
           | Most recent incident
           | 
           | https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitwig/comments/nvikhf/psa_dont_ope.
           | ..
           | 
           | https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitwig/comments/nvhy81/bitwig_rever.
           | ..
           | 
           | https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=566368
        
             | AndyPa32 wrote:
             | The recent drama has been resolved. For a week or so there
             | was some uncertainty whether all new Bitwig devices would
             | be part of the Studio edition and therefore covered with
             | the cost of the update plan. Bitwig (the company) put out a
             | paid add-on with new devices and announced that there would
             | be other paid add-ons in the future. That caused a lot of
             | negative responses in the community. After a week the
             | Bitwig company apologized, made the add-on part of the
             | regular Studio distribution and ensured that in the future
             | all new devices would be part of the Studio - effectively
             | no additional paid add-ons.
             | 
             | The thing with the licensing server has been fixed. I tried
             | that by turning off my router. No session closing and no
             | data loss whatsoever.
        
         | gavinray wrote:
         | If you're interested, there's a $20 plugin for REAPER that
         | introduces a fantastic clip-launcher workflow, complete with
         | MIDI controller integration/remote controls.
         | 
         | https://www.helgoboss.org/projects/playtime/
        
           | bambax wrote:
           | Didn't know about that, thank you! (Their terminology is
           | confusing though: a "VST" that only works in Reaper is a
           | Reaper plugin, not a VST proper...?) But anyway, will try it!
        
             | squeaky-clean wrote:
             | Reaper has it's own specific plugin format and language,
             | JSFX (no relation to javascript), so that's probably why
             | they specify it uses the VST format. But also relies on
             | Reaper specific APIs making it only work in Reaper.
        
               | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
               | Reaper has some VST(TM) extensions that only it supports.
               | So if you create a VST(TM) plugin that uses one of them,
               | it will not run (correctly) in other hosts.
        
           | smallerfish wrote:
           | Playtime doesn't support linux though, does it?
        
           | smoldesu wrote:
           | That looks awesome, I'd be interested in giving it a whirl
           | once they add Linux support! Currently I'm sticking with
           | Bitwig for the excellent DrivenByMoss Push1 integration, but
           | eventually I'd like to give Reaper a try (since it has the
           | same Push1 plugins).
        
       | stefanos82 wrote:
       | What is the original story behind Ardour's creation?
       | 
       | What motivated you writing such complicated application?
       | 
       | P.S.: I have the GUI layout and I don't care what people say
       | about GTK!
        
         | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
         | I wanted a DAW to record my own fledging attempts at electronic
         | music. I took a vow in the 80s to never use Windows, Apple
         | systems seemed overpriced, and I had years of *nix experience,
         | including a bit of Linux. In the late 90s there was a Linux app
         | called "Multitrack" which seemed capable on the surface, but it
         | turned out not to be. I called Digidesign to ask them if I
         | could port ProTools to Linux for them (for free), and they
         | laughed. So I thought "how hard could it be to just write my
         | own?" ... 22+ years later, here I am.
         | 
         | A longer version is here:
         | https://discourse.ardour.org/t/ardour-20th-birthday/102333
        
           | protomikron wrote:
           | That's a cool story.
           | 
           | Ardour is awesome and shows that specialized niche software
           | can compete or even out-compete commercial proprietary
           | software (like QGIS in the GIS space).
           | 
           | I hope it will be around for a long time and it's a nice
           | piece of software, thx Paul.
        
         | frankzander wrote:
         | you might find this interesting
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZndTAbjPqm0 - I think Paul
         | talks a bit about the background of Ardour and it's history
        
       | gavinray wrote:
       | This is incredible, massive bunch of features!
       | 
       | Congrats on shipping
        
       | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
       | I'm Ardour's original developer and I'm happy to answer any
       | questions anyone may have about the release.
        
         | keepquestioning wrote:
         | Have you made any money from it?
        
           | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
           | Ardour revenue is about US$180k/yr at present. I make a
           | reasonable middle-class income from it, help support another
           | full time developer, and put aside any surplus to help pay
           | other people associated with the project (e.g. website,
           | documentation).
        
         | mixmastamyk wrote:
         | Does it interact with pipewire any? Or prefers existing apis
         | like jack?
        
           | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
           | No native Pipewire API support and none planned. On Linux,
           | there are audio/MIDI backends for ALSA and JACK. Pipewire
           | mostly supports the JACK API (and likely will do so
           | completely in the near future).
           | 
           | [EDIT: if you can work with playback only (e.g. during
           | editing or mixing), we also have a PulseAudio backend on
           | Linux that will (like JACK) also talk to PipeWire. ]
        
         | slim wrote:
         | Ardour was impressive since the first time I opened it. Thank
         | you for making such high quality software for linux.
         | 
         | what was your motivation to start this project?
         | 
         | how do you use ardour yourself?
         | 
         | do you have any music to share ?
        
           | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
           | Ardour history (also posted downthread):
           | https://discourse.ardour.org/t/ardour-20th-birthday/102333
           | 
           | I don't use Ardour much myself. When I make music, I mostly
           | use the amazing VCV Rack or its slightly-more-FLOSS fork,
           | Cardinal
           | 
           | As for music, not really but last December I did release
           | this: https://pauldavismusic.bandcamp.com/album/suspended-
           | generati...
        
         | yupis wrote:
         | Can I use to make a Dj mix?
        
           | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
           | You'd have to explain what "a DJ mix" means to you before I
           | could answer that.
        
             | nxpnsv wrote:
             | That said, it certainly is possible to make _a_ DJ mix with
             | Ardour...
        
               | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
               | It's all gone Pete Tong.
        
         | stelcodes wrote:
         | Hi Paul, just wanted to say thanks for working so hard on
         | Ardour. I just started playing with Ardour in Fedora on my
         | Framework laptop, but I've been thinking about buying a M1 mac
         | to make music because I miss Logic and Ableton. These release
         | notes have got me hyped because now I might not want to! I'm
         | very excited to try out the clips and freesound features. I'll
         | definitely be buying a license soon. You (and the rest of the
         | brilliant Ardour contributors) seriously rock!
        
           | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
           | Thank you. Just to be clear about one thing: nobody buys a
           | license for Ardour, it is released under the GPL.
           | 
           | You _can_ choose to pay us for the service of building it for
           | you, or if you like, providing a ready-to-run version that we
           | can actually support. That revenue allows myself and other
           | Ardour contributors to work on Ardour as a way of making a
           | living.
        
             | makapuf wrote:
             | Thanks also, I had the privilege to exchange with you on
             | the linux-audio-dev mailing list a few times way back in
             | the time of quasimodo and creation of LADSPA, I learned so
             | much thanks to your dedication and knowledge about audio
             | programming and how to create an useful api !
        
       | beardyw wrote:
       | I installed a copy of Ubuntu Studio on a spare machine a couple
       | of years ago. I had come from Windows and Reaper and was used to
       | one app where everything was controlled by the app. I was
       | relatively new to Linux but kind of new my way around. But I
       | found the principal of separate applications talking to each
       | other a compelling idea, but in practice totally frustrating! I
       | had VSTs I wanted to use and I got some to work though I don't
       | remember how, but many synths just wanted to act alone via
       | communication. Has anyone done anything to make all that less of
       | a headache? Or was I doing it wrong?
       | 
       | Not suggesting this is any fault of Ardour's.
        
         | squarefoot wrote:
         | I've used LinVST in the past to run Windows VSTs on Linux with
         | mixed success, but it was more of a hit and miss; today I'm
         | extremely happy with Yabridge which is a lot more polished,
         | doesn't crap out at every WINE update and also is much quicker
         | to operate.
         | 
         | https://github.com/robbert-vdh/yabridge
        
         | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
         | Plugins on Linux work just the same way they do on macOS and
         | Windows.
         | 
         | But yes, it is true that to some extent, there was a tradition
         | from the late 90s to the 20-teens to create synths as
         | standalone apps for Linux, connected via JACK.
         | 
         | That is really going away now, and you can run U-he synths,
         | Helm, Vitalium, Serge and many others as plugins just like you
         | do on macOS and Windows.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | NexRebular wrote:
       | How's the latency situation nowadays on FreeBSD?
        
       | armitron wrote:
       | I've looked at Ardour in the past but GTK put me off from
       | investing serious time into it. Now that there is REAPER, I have
       | to ask, what does Ardour do better and why would one pick Ardour
       | over REAPER?
        
         | adamnemecek wrote:
         | It's open source.
        
         | frankzander wrote:
         | What's your problem with GTK? I mean I like good UIs and this
         | is what attracts me. So Ardour has a good looking UI (IMHO).
         | How does the window toolkit impact you?
        
         | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
         | Reaper is a fine DAW, and there are many fine DAWs. For the
         | most part, which DAW is better for a given user depends a great
         | deal on their prior experience, specific expectations and
         | likely workflow. Neither Ardour nor REAPER are "better" than
         | the other - they are different, and some people will love one
         | and hate the other. More typically, some people will find a
         | particular workflow that they use cumbersome in one of the DAWs
         | and easier in another.
         | 
         | If you'd like, you can listen to myself (lead dev of Ardour)
         | spend 2.5hrs chatting with Justin Frankel (lead dev of Reaper).
         | It won't do much to answer your specific question, but might
         | reveal that the similarities in our development processes and
         | history and goals are much broader than you might expect:
         | http://adc.equalarea.com/2022/02/07/adc1/
         | 
         | If you're a user of Ardour, why would our choice of GUI toolkit
         | have much impact on your use of the program?
        
           | armitron wrote:
           | I appreciate the time you took in crafting this response, I
           | will listen to the conversation that you linked.
           | 
           | Regarding GTK, I could never stomach the specific "feel" that
           | it has, and it's also been incredibly buggy for me on
           | platforms other than Linux, and I use macOS and Windows a lot
           | too. I haven't found a single GTK app that I can tolerate
           | using on Windows or macOS so far. I find QT a lot better in
           | that regard.
           | 
           | I was a heavy user of Inkscape (GTK) back when there were no
           | free alternatives, but when Krita (QT) matured I switched to
           | it and never looked back.
        
             | PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
             | Not much of Ardour uses GTK (the editor and mixer all use
             | our own stuff). You will find GTK in text entry, treeviews,
             | menus and the filebrowser. In the long term we'd like to
             | drop back to just GDK (window and event primitives), but
             | those 4 "widgets" are major things to implement correctly,
             | and that's not likely to happen any time in foreseeable
             | future.
        
           | spacechild1 wrote:
           | This interview is a gem, thanks a lot for sharing!
        
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       (page generated 2022-10-15 23:00 UTC)