OSX and Linux status update

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 1:49 pm

vien,

as Tom (astroman) already described, we're (I'm) talking about a community project. This has nothing to do with CW resources, and it's very easy to find devs that are able and willing to do a Linux port for free, but it's quite hard to find OSX devs that are willing to do the same (as Tom pointed out). It's a fact that Linux has a much better tech-savvy community than any other OS (except, maybe, for BSD or QNX Neutrino). And Linux is very important in the embedded sector. Just check Liontracks, Ardis, Fairlight etc... Linux, because of it's modular design, has way better possibilities than any other OS (like, 0.5 ms latency using an Intel 8x0 onboard soundchip - don't try this at home!).

Tom,

you obviously haven't checked Linux in a long time. Linux is very easy to install and set-up these days, and for stuff like JACK: install JACK, install qjackctl, and you're done. qjackctl is a nice GUI to configure JACK, set the audio and MIDI routing and stuff...

Counterparts,

I agree that, right now, OSX is more important than Linux. But I have quite a few Linux devs that are willing and able to help out, but not that many OSX devs. BTW, Linux is better suited for pro-audio by design...

So, I disagree that the Mach microkernel is better than the Linux kernel
- in fact, evern Tannenbaum (one of the real, old-school UNIX gurus) agrees that the semi-monolithic Linux design is better...

Mr Arkadin,

check WETA Digital, ILM, Digital Domain, Hammerhead, Sony Digital, Pixar, Dreamworks, Disney Digital... They are all mostly using Linux these days. It's not all about television...

stardust,

there are people using Linux in music production. Not that many, and most of those that do don't even know it - but they exist (don't know about your studio, but maybe even you rely on Linux without even knowing it...).

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 2:50 pm

wsippel wrote:

check WETA Digital, ILM, Digital Domain, Hammerhead, Sony Digital, Pixar, Dreamworks, Disney Digital... They are all mostly using Linux these days. It's not all about television...

Good point, i was talking about real film/television rather than that CGI stuff.

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 6:14 pm

Mr Arkadin,

yep, in TV, it's not yet there. But believe me, that time will come - as it's already there for movie editing, colour correction and compositing (Especially with discreet's Smoke and Flint, Apple's Shake and D2's Nuke, all available for Linux these days, as well as ifx Piranha, available for Linux and sgi Tezro systems. And eyeon Fusion 5 is also supposed to come for Linux, but then again, so was Fusion 3 and 4...

Then, there's IRIDAS Speedgrade and FrameCycler MP, RaveHD, Avid iNEWS...).

stardust,

VST(i) host sequencer? Let's see... Oh, any JACK (and DSSI/ LADSPA) compatible Linux sequencer is a VST(i) host! And that means pretty much every sequencer for Linux is a VST(i) host! That includes Rosegarden and MusE, as well as Ardour and Protux (those are multitrack recorders). And Hydrogen and Wired should support VST(i)'s soon, too (Hydrogen only supports VST effects through LADSPA and JACK right now)...

Almost every Win32 VST plugin works on Linux, with no noticable performance hit. I don't really like that construct, since it's x86 specific, but there are quite a few people using it every day. See this page for a list of VST plugins working on Linux:

http://www.djcj.org/LAU/ladspavst/

BTW, Manifold Labs Plugzilla and Muse Research Receptor are hardware VST hosts that run Linux (using the same technology as described above, but not for free).

And if you want to help making it happen sooner, and if you know how to code (or just think you could help with your experience), you're free and welcome to join the Hydrogen project. It's a fairly young project, but I think we're getting there (originally intended as a simple drum sequencer, now we're slowly targetting FL Studio)...

[ This Message was edited by: wsippel on 2005-01-06 17:26 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 6:26 pm

It's the evangelists that I am always hearing from regarding Macintosh computers and how "superior" they are. They wouldn't be interested in Linux no matter how good it gets because it is made for the pc. I say screw them! I have heard some good things about the AMD64 with NVIDIA chipset.

While we are on the topic of what the pros use because someone said pros use Macs with Digidesign Avid and not Linux for video... Audio pros use Digidesign Pro Tools for audio and not Creamware!

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 6:29 pm

braincell,

hey! We're the one with the evangelists! No kidding, I really like Macs (somewhat), but I wouldn't exactly consider them superior. The G5/ IBM PPC 970 is a very nice chip, but Apple has no real 64bit OS, and I don't see it coming anytime soon (same for WindowsXP x64).

This thread is not intended as a "My OS is better than your OS" thing. Our project was originally called "Scope4Linux", with Linux being the main focus. Anyway, if you write Unix software hardware independant, it's very easy to build an OSX version from the same codebase, and that's what we intended to do. I think it's honest to say that the OSX port might be more important than the Linux port, form a corporate viewpoint - but that's not the point here...

Post by **hubird** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 7:18 pm

On 2005-01-05 18:29, wsippel wrote:
This thread is not intended as a "My OS is better than your OS" thing. Our project was originally called "Scope4Linux", with Linux being the main focus. Anyway, if you write Unix software hardware independant, it's very easy to build an OSX version from the same codebase, and that's what we intended to do. I think it's honest to say that the OSX port might be more important than the Linux port, form a corporate viewpoint - but that's not the point here...

worth to quote x times

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 11:13 am

wsippel wrote:

BTW, Linux is better suited for pro-audio by design... So, I disagree that the Mach microkernel is better than the Linux kernel

True, although I personally find writing for Linux a PITA

Isn't there an distribution (Linux) which is more tailored for audio/real-time applications?

Royston

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 2:17 pm

Royston,

what exactly is a PITA? Writing software or writing music?

If you mean writing _software_, use Trolltech's Qt + KDevelop. Qt is considered one of the most elegant and powerful C++ based toolkits, for any platform. The only 'problem' with Qt is that you may only write GPL'd software, or buy a rather expensive license. But the result is completely source compatible across all major platforms, as long as any additional library you use is ported. KDevelop is easily the most advanced C++ IDE for Linux, as Eclipse is more suited for Java work.

For audio, you don't have that many options: LADSPA or FST for effect plugins, DSSI or FST for softsynths, JACK for audio I/O, ALSA Seq for MIDI I/O...

And a distro well suited for pro-audio work (low latency optimized) would be Stanford University's CCRMA, a set of audio (=latency) optimized core components and audio applications, based on Redhat/ Fedora Core. Or simply use gentoo, it's easy to tailor for almost any need (including audio), has lots of audio packages available, and is very easy to keep up-to-date - once you got the base system to install...

EDIT: forgot Agnula, a complete distro for audio work. Stupid me...

[ This Message was edited by: wsippel on 2005-01-06 18:51 ]

melenko · Post by **melenko** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 2:45 pm

Wsippel,
"You're simply the best", and i mean it!
Tina Turner

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 5:42 am

wsippel wrote:

what exactly is a PITA? Writing software or writing music?

A "Pain In The Arse"

I've developed for several unices incl. Solaris, BSD and Linux, and found Linux to be the most troublesome of them all. The Montavista distro's interesting though (our company devs for them)...that's probably my current 'favorite' flavour (although 'tis not a freebie by any means!)

Not sure if I have ever 'written' music though...I just 'do it' (when not procrastinating to an Olympiad's standard)

Royston

p.s. currently still developing for embedded DOS and loving it!

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 9:36 am

Royston,

I know the meaning of "PITA"...

But I made quite a different experience - I think Linux is the easiest platform to develop for. Anyway, you might want to give gentoo a spin. Regardless of the hype and the 'leetnes', gentoo is a very well designed distro, and the best one for software development in my opinion.

I never worked with MontaVista Linux, but they did a quite interesting RTOS patchset for the Linux kernel a while ago, based on work by the university of the federal armed forces, Munich. Very promising as far as I know.

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 10:02 am

Sorry, just re-read your previous posting...

Montavista are quite interesting in that they produce "customised" distributions tailored for specific markets, customers or applications. They've done a lot of work in making the platform more stable and efficient.

I'm quite proud that our company is one of only two MV partners in the whole of Europe, certainly the only one in the UK. I believe that there are one or two States-side too.

Check out: http://www.mpc-data.co.uk/

There's an 'About Us' link, which lists our partners. Check out the Xmas photo shoots too!

Royston

Post by **hubird** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 12:30 pm

Off topic:
One other good reason for OSX: Absynth 3, it offers audio-in, surround and three resonators.
No OS9 support anymore...I want that upgrade!

[ This Message was edited by: hubird on 2005-01-07 12:31 ]

jeezs · Post by **jeezs** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 6:30 am

Linux, because of it's modular design, has way better possibilities than any other OS (like, 0.5 ms latency using an Intel 8x0 onboard soundchip - don't try this at home!).

I 've just try 0,5 latency on MacosX and a 1 ghZ Powerbook (not the fastest machine on earth nowadays). and it works without any problem, at least with the internal soundcard, ... Then I try with a Motu 828 MK1 , it works too.
I even work at 0.5 Ms with my USB noah.
All test were done using OSX 10.3.7 plus Logic 7 and a least recording 1 sofsynth and an effect (not only audio routing/recording audio at 0,5Ms)
the processor was not even stress at these latency
A friend of mine try this on a Linux box and never succeed to have a correct sound with such a low latency , ( but he doesn't have an Intel sound card )
Conclusion I think lunix can have ultra low latency in certain condition while OSX does it with any configuration

I know this is not really the topics of this thread and I don't want to criticize linux , wich is an exelent system.
but I just want to be fair and point out, that it is wrong to say that Linux is better at audio task than other os.

wsippel · Post by **wsippel** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 7:16 am

jeezs,

you're right, of course. My system for example, which is mostly used for development purposes, has a latency of 2ms. Not that bad for a machine not tweaked for audio work. But that's what I meant by "modular design" - check MontaVista's realtime Linux patch: it gives you predictable(!) latencies well below 0.5ms. I'm certain that CCRMA or Agnula packages/ patchsets could lead to similar results.

Not long ago, members of LAD (Linux Audio Developers) made a test that lead to the conclusion that a tweaked Linux kernel allows for latencies well below any other general-purpose OS, including OSX 10.3 and the legendary (and overly hyped) BEOS... But that's not true for distros like SUSE or FC, since they aren't layed-out for audio performance.

And I took an Intel soundchip because it's cheap. You could use any other onboard soundchip and have the same results, or use a RME, M-Audio or SEKD soundcard and have even better latency...

pling · Post by **pling** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 7:53 am

can you have ulli settings below 3ms @ 44.1khz with cw boards?

alfonso · Post by **alfonso** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 8:04 am

On 2005-01-09 07:53, pecora wrote:
can you have ulli settings below 3ms @ 44.1khz with cw boards?

I guess no one could try with OSX or Linux...no?

pling · Post by **pling** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 8:17 am

good point

. what i meant: will you have an option in the ulli settings to set it below? or would you have to/are you able to change it manually in the cset.ini?
...still a dumb question

btw, i'd appreciate any linux version of the scope system. i'd be happy with 3ms...
please let it happen!!!

[ This Message was edited by: pecora on 2005-01-09 08:39 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 10:20 am

Of course the ultimate would be complete functionality. A lot of us would use a dual boot system so any functionality would be nice.

Immanuel · Post by **Immanuel** » Sun Jan 09, 2005 11:10 am

I just got a though:

I think it would be complete hell for CWA to release a Linux version. It is bad enough as it is right now with PC-beginners and wannabe pc-nerds totally misunderstanding functions predicted use etc. Now imagine, if those people got hooked on the buzz-sentece "Linux is the best audio-OS". It apears there are so many different Linux distributions, that providing support for peoples experiments could be very time consuming and expensive to CWA. Sorry to say this, but we all know those people who do want to read manuals and expect everything to be easy - WITHOUT knowledge. Let them loose in the apperantly very open and differentiated Linux world and ... jikes. Absurd problems exist due to lack of knowledge. People will record analog instruments and still bother, if they get 0.5 or 0.8 ms latency. 0.8 is 60% more than 0.5. YES! and SO WHAT? Your ADA chain will easily have 4-5ms latency combined. 0.5 or 0.8 from you drivers doesn't matter, if you are into analog sounds. Still, I could easily imagine the storm of support requests from people pissed over those extra 0.3ms.

Ok, ULLI does not go that low, so this isn't really an issue (unless ULLI is changed for the Linux version ... if it isn't, I could see all the whines over "antique" latencies). Still, I just wanted to give an example of a problem, which many people know nothing of, and which could be very expensive to a company trying to give their users support.

Linux (or certain distributions anyway) may be THE OS for audio. From what people say here, I think some things point in that direction. However, my winXP and win98se machines work fine for me (XP for asio and 98 for wave). But ... having been here and on other hardware/pc related fora for years, I am pretty shure, that optimal things are not always optimal for anybody but the knowing people. Ok, if Linux is easy to setup (I only tried once 3 years ago and I quit mainly because I could not use my scroll wheel, and because some of the bundled software just seemed strange to me. Also the "linux explorer" (my name) and file handling definitely wasn't as straight forward.

Anyway, just my thoughts. Sometimes settling for less is settling for more in the long run (here due to more productive use of man power resources at the CWA office). As always, I don't know *hit about business, so there goes a big disclaimer.