[PD] plugin~ vs dssi~

Hi everyone,

I just read the recent thread regarding the plugin~ external, and the regrettable problems Kim was having getting a working plugin in host in Pd.

One of the problems here is that plugin~ has a subset of the functionality of dssi~, but yet the 2 projects are still maintained in parallel, with AFAICT no real advantage.

I can only guess the reasons dssi~ is not now the de facto standard for LADSPA and DSSI hosting in Pd:

- it has a dependency on liblo
- people assume that dssi~ only hosts DSSI plugins, not realising that DSSI is built on LADSPA?

So I propose the following solutions:

- I refactor dssi~ to use the iemnet/mrpeach externals for OSC communications (thus removing the liblo dependency)
- I rename dssi~ to pluginhost~ with a view to extending it to other plugin APIs (VST?) at some later point.
- I include a better help file/documentation (Frank?)

Any thoughts on this?

Finally, can I strongly encourage anyone who finds bugs and/or problems with dssi~ to contact me directly, since I read the list infrequently and am much more likely to respond and offer help quickly if I get direct email.

best,

Jamie

-- http://www.jamiebullock.com