KXStudio : News

> Small Carla notice for JACK1 users (and 1.2.3 release)
On 2013-12-26 by falkTX

While I was doing a Carla video I got into a show-stopper bug in JACK2 (it kept crashing because of complex MIDI mixdown, see this).
So in the meantime I have to use JACK1, and while doing so I found a pretty nasty bug...
No system connections were shown in the patchbay canvas!

I don't know if others suffered from the bug (I always run JACK2) or though it was how it really worked.
In any case, the Carla patchbay will show all JACK connections now - wherever they are from Carla plugins or system ones.

Updating to version 1.2.3 is recommended, specially if you use JACK1.
For a list of changes you can check the Carla stable git log here, which allows to directly see what changed in the code.

> Carla 2.0 development progress report
On 2013-12-17 by falkTX

This is a progress report for the new Carla, version 2.0.
It will take a while to get a release ready, but there are already a few things done and stuff to show.

Backend

First, the backend is being rewritten to not use any system toolkit.
In 1.x series I've used Qt4 to handle graphics, but that might be a problem soon with Qt5 (cannot mix Qt4 and Qt5 stuff together).
Plus I want the Carla backend to be toolkit agnostic, so that in the future it may be re-usable for others no matter what their main toolkit is.
The main backend header files are now ANSI C compatible, thus increasing the chances of re-usability (as some Linux developers have a weird aversion to C++...).

Because Qt is no longer used in the backend code, I needed something else to handle graphics and other advanced stuff - Juce was selected for this.
Juce is a C++ framework focused on audio applications and plugins, which suits Carla nicely.
There's a lot of useful things inside it that will make developing new features much easier (like the internal patchbay mode).
Other things like AU and VST3 plugin hosting will be possible too thanks to Juce, although they are not relevant to Linux.

Loading Carla as a plugin is also being worked on.
There target two main targets with this:

• Load entire Carla projects - rack or patchbay - as a single plugin in the graph (avoiding clutter);
• Carla itself as an LV2 plugin;

If you been following the LinuxMusicians forums you know that internal Carla plugins are already available as LV2 plugins (yes, that includes zynaddsubfx-lv2!).
Once the Carla internal plugin work is complete, you automatically get an LV2 version of it as well! :D

Front-end

There has been a few changes on the UI side as well.
For example, the plugin edit dialog now looks like this:

As seen the image, the user will be able to use "Stereo Balance" or "Mono Panning".
The new layout also allows for a much smaller window size.

Lastly, there's plans to bring custom skins to plugin "slots", in a similar way to Reason.
This is something I still have to investigate to find the best possible way to do it.
It should be expandable so that random plugins can also use skins, probably via a new LV2 extension.
More on this later.

That's all for now.
Soon there will be a new DISTRHO release, so stay tuned!

> New releases and future plans
On 2013-11-27 by falkTX

Hello everyone, there have been a couple of releases and changes on the KXStudio world.

First of, a new release of the KXStudio Live-DVD is now available.
This is a bug-fix for the 12.04.x series, which current users should already have if their systems are up to date.
Checkout the About or Release Notes to find out more about this release.

Several new versions of Carla have been released since its first announcement, the last one currently being 1.2.2.
For a change-log you can check the git log (stable branch) in github.
This way you can see what actually changed in the code, instead of just seeing a description list.

A new DISTRHO release is planned for release next month, and a few minor plugins.
Hopefully the Plugin Toolkit will be ready by then, which should help the creation of new audio plugins (soon!).

Lastly, after much discussion and consideration, the KXStudio repositories are moving to Debian.
The current 12.04.x release is still fully supported, this is something that will happen slowly through 2014.
Having the KXStudio repos in Debian means any Debian based distribution can make use of KXStudio goods, and not just Ubuntu ones.
Although there are already happy users with Debian + KXStudio, this process is not yet complete.
We'll make a new announcement once the Debian repos are ready for wide use.

Oh, and the KXStudio website is currently being redone a little.
Give it a visit now! http://kxstudio.linuxaudio.org/

> Carla Plugin Host 1.0.0 released!
On 2013-07-03 by falkTX

After more than 2 years in development, here it is - the first stable release of Carla is now available!

Carla Plugin Host, or just Carla, is an audio plugin host, with support for many audio drivers and plugin formats.
It has some nice features like automation of parameters via MIDI CC and full OSC control.

Carla currently supports LADSPA (including LRDF), DSSI, LV2, and VST plugin formats, plus GIG, SF2 and SFZ file support.
It uses JACK as the default and preferred audio driver but also supports native drivers like ALSA, DirectSound or CoreAudio.

We currently release source code plus Windows and Linux binaries (focus goes into the Linux version).
Downloads available at the usual place, KXStudio Downloads.

For more information about Carla check its own application page here.
We'll be updating that page in the next few days, with some tutorials and workflow videos as well, so stay tuned!

You can follow the release discussion over at LinuxMusicians forums.
If you find this application useful and/or want to help further development, please consider a donation.

> KXStudio Mini-Manual
On 2013-05-06 by falkTX

Thanks for the hard work of danboid and wolftune (plus some corrections by falkTX and others), the KXStudio "Mini" Manual is now online,
directly accessible through the KXStudio website:
http://kxstudio.linuxaudio.org/Documentation

There are still minor things that need correction, but overall it looks great.
The manual should be updated regularly from now on.