Longish post inspired by the recent discussion about 'Pd as a VST plugin'.
TL:DR: better use a modular JACK (freewheel) approach compared to more 'static' Pd as a plugin approach.
I think that on systems with JACK Audio [1] (Linux mostly, but available on other platforms, albeit maybe not so common nor supported), it would be great to have solid JACK Freewheel [2] support instead of trying to embed Pd as a plugin in rather cumbersome, diverse and (probably) unstable, ways.
Actually JACK freewheel *does* work with Pd on Linux (audio only) with the [jackclock] external by Nicolas Bouillot [3] also used to interact with jack transport, although currently a bit cumbersome if interacting with other applications. What's the big deal? Freewheel is 'faster than realtime', meaning that when activated audio will be generated as fast as the CPU can. The key use case is generating audio to a file at the same time avoiding things such as xruns or other problems due to real-time operation. If you've ever used Ardour [4] and exported audio, it is using JACK freewheel (and in fact you see the playhead moving forward faster than realtime as it processes audio...).
Now imagine instead of having Pd as an LV2, VST or whatever plugin in Ardour, you have your patch(es) open in usual Pd, connect tracks or busses to Pd, reconnect [dac~] to Arour's master et voilà :) - when you need to export you just run with freewhel mode.
Indeed, I _was_ already able to connect through JACK an Ardour audio output to Pd with some simple audio processing, and then, after activating freewheel mode with [jackclock], 'record' the output to a .wav file through both jack_capture and [writesf~] internally (the former more interesting for this use case).
So, just to shift points of view, IMHO strong JACK (maybe including JACK midi) and JACK freewheel support is somewhat more desirable in Pd compared to support for the many plugin types and platforms. If one thinks about it this is more in line with Pd's modular and dataflow approach, also in the long run might be more resilient to plugin format changes, license changes (see VST problems), as well as updates in Pd itself.
Lorenzo. PS. Disclosure: this is not my first post advocating a freewheel approach in the (Linux) audio ecosystem compared to monolithic do-it-all audio software, but just as a user :) [5].
[1] Jack Audio [2] Jack Freewheel in the JACK API: http://jackaudio.org/api/group__ClientCallbacks.html#gae797e2cde20faecb9be51... See also this interesting section in Louigi Verona's 'Linux Audio workshop': https://louigiverona.com/?page=projects&s=writings&t=philosophy&... [3] https://github.com/nicobou/pd-jackclock [4] https://ardour.org/ [5] See e.g http://linux-audio.4202.n7.nabble.com/JACK-Freewheel-mode-thoughts-td102077.... and https://www.mail-archive.com/rosegarden-user@lists.sourceforge.net/msg02632....
I think that sounds great. It's not going to stop me wanting the ability to use Pd as a VST plugin in which I can load and control other VST plugins. So I agree with all but the "instead of" part. I'm currently trying to do basically the same thing, but cross-platform.
Chuckk
On Tue, Mar 12, 2019, 11:14 AM Lorenzo Sutton lorenzofsutton@gmail.com wrote:
Longish post inspired by the recent discussion about 'Pd as a VST plugin'.
TL:DR: better use a modular JACK (freewheel) approach compared to more 'static' Pd as a plugin approach.
I think that on systems with JACK Audio [1] (Linux mostly, but available on other platforms, albeit maybe not so common nor supported), it would be great to have solid JACK Freewheel [2] support instead of trying to embed Pd as a plugin in rather cumbersome, diverse and (probably) unstable, ways.
Actually JACK freewheel *does* work with Pd on Linux (audio only) with the [jackclock] external by Nicolas Bouillot [3] also used to interact with jack transport, although currently a bit cumbersome if interacting with other applications. What's the big deal? Freewheel is 'faster than realtime', meaning that when activated audio will be generated as fast as the CPU can. The key use case is generating audio to a file at the same time avoiding things such as xruns or other problems due to real-time operation. If you've ever used Ardour [4] and exported audio, it is using JACK freewheel (and in fact you see the playhead moving forward faster than realtime as it processes audio...).
Now imagine instead of having Pd as an LV2, VST or whatever plugin in Ardour, you have your patch(es) open in usual Pd, connect tracks or busses to Pd, reconnect [dac~] to Arour's master et voilà :) - when you need to export you just run with freewhel mode.
Indeed, I _was_ already able to connect through JACK an Ardour audio output to Pd with some simple audio processing, and then, after activating freewheel mode with [jackclock], 'record' the output to a .wav file through both jack_capture and [writesf~] internally (the former more interesting for this use case).
So, just to shift points of view, IMHO strong JACK (maybe including JACK midi) and JACK freewheel support is somewhat more desirable in Pd compared to support for the many plugin types and platforms. If one thinks about it this is more in line with Pd's modular and dataflow approach, also in the long run might be more resilient to plugin format changes, license changes (see VST problems), as well as updates in Pd itself.
Lorenzo. PS. Disclosure: this is not my first post advocating a freewheel approach in the (Linux) audio ecosystem compared to monolithic do-it-all audio software, but just as a user :) [5].
[1] Jack Audio [2] Jack Freewheel in the JACK API:
http://jackaudio.org/api/group__ClientCallbacks.html#gae797e2cde20faecb9be51... See also this interesting section in Louigi Verona's 'Linux Audio workshop':
https://louigiverona.com/?page=projects&s=writings&t=philosophy&... [3] https://github.com/nicobou/pd-jackclock [4] https://ardour.org/ [5] See e.g
http://linux-audio.4202.n7.nabble.com/JACK-Freewheel-mode-thoughts-td102077.... and
https://www.mail-archive.com/rosegarden-user@lists.sourceforge.net/msg02632....
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On 3/12/2019 6:11 AM, Lorenzo Sutton wrote:
TL:DR: better use a modular JACK (freewheel) approach compared to more 'static' Pd as a plugin approach.
For more than a decade I've been totally happy with pdvst~. Having the ability to integrate Pd to a DAW channel has been totally productive to my music. Also integration of automation parameters from the DAW to the patch is very valuable.
I guess is totally possible to do a pdladspa~ (or any other open source audio plug-in protocol). As far as I know Pdvst~ is just Pd running an "external scheduler".
Is not that I have anything against your "JACK (freewheel)" approach, just sharing some thought.
:)
Mensaje telepatico asistido por maquinas.
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Chuckk Hubbard -
Lorenzo Sutton -
Lucas Cordiviola