rncbc's blog

I'm back! from this years journey to Linux Audio Conference 2012, held at the CCRMA Stanford, CA of course :) Good riddance of a +0800 jet lag, it took me almost 3 days do recover in full, sort of. Still speachless though. Well, I never was a good speacher nor writer anyhow, even on my own native mother's language (european portuguese for the clueless). The LAC journeys are mostly the single opportunity on each year when I get to exercise some spoken english, as awful as my own version of it may sound to tender ears. Move along.

Yes. Another year, another LAC, one can cynically say. And yet, this year marked an ephemeral 10th anniversary and it went all just so perfect and smooth as much of that kind numerology can go. It might be kind of lazy to say there were zero (0) incidents to rant about. It's amazing what so much can be done with so few good people (or so I think). Sure that we all missed some old faces and habitués, most notably Frank Neumann aka. AudioFranky. But the few who mastered the steering wheel have done a whole hell of a job. Fernando Lopez-Lezcano, Bruno Ruviaro, Robin Gareus, Julius O.Smith and Jörn Nettingsmeier at the backstage, as always.

The talks were great, the coffee was lousy but the latter got completely obscured by any sip of wine I could find from Napa Valley, which was just excellent, in fact exceeding all my best expectations. From this egg-head of yours, yet coming from a proud-and-traditional-wine-makers country like Portugal is... well, well... that was nice, really nice :)

Apart from all the frivolousness I had to pursuit just because it was my first chance laying my foot at the American continent, add to that that I was zombie-like compelled to touch with my own eyes and get my feet wet by what I call the Magellan effect ;) I had to stare and touch the Pacific ocean once in a life time :) Half Moon Bay was the place, home of the famous Mavericks surf spot. And speaking of it, well, it isn't that a big epiphany compared to what I have back home (Portugal). While stood in awe I did scratched my bald head and thought: -- Hell, this is no big deal, compared to what I have back there. In fact, you'll be amazed about how the west coast of Portugal is almost a copycat of this. Trade Atlantic by Pacific and you're done. Ah! Garret Mcnamara might just have a point in there :)

Back to reality. I am sorry not telling you the whole story and experience this time, compared to last years perhaps. Yeah, so much to tell, so short words to comply.

Nevertheless,

• all my lousy and unedited photos taken during the whole journey are here:
  http://www.rncbc.org/lac2012
• a couple of videos (actually 3) were shot during the Linux Sound Night, LSN2012@COHO-Stanford, are there too:
  http://www.youtube.com/user/rncbchannel

That's all folks!

See y'all next year on LAC2013@IEM-Graz :)

Cheers && Enjoy.

Howdy,

There's no victory over anything whatsoever. Read it again, it's just a codename. If that serves anything at all, to my own defense that is, Qtractor is still a pet project hobby of mine, as all things in Linux audio world for that matter.

There's been too many saying and comparing Ardour vs. Qtractor. I'm seeing if often said in too many sentences lately and, believe me, I cannot stand comfortable with that saying no more.

So here it goes: Ardour is a full fledged, pro-level DAW and, for crying out loud on its own, the flagship of the free/open-source pro-audio fleet and movement, not only Linux anymore nowadays. On the other hand, Qtractor is a sequencer (hinted by its own subtitle, in case you didn't notice) with a twist and a few of a DAW features. And it strictly runs on the Linux platform only and most important yet, it has been targeted to a (re)creational personal home-studio audience ever since.

Heard about the techno-boy bedroom (with a guitar) folk? Well, that's exactly what it is, from day zero. Hope you all get the picture ;)

Enough whining.

Release highlights:

• Panic command button (NEW)
• Improved audio/MIDI file resource management (NEW)
• MIDI SysEx for instrument plugins (NEW)
• MIDI Controller auto-hook option (NEW)
• MIDI Tools resize ramp (NEW)
• Revised plugin search directory paths (FIX)
• MIDI zero-duration note-on/off queuing (FIX)
• Audio linked-clips looping (FIX)

TYOQA is over.

nuff said.

Impromptu highlights:

• Clip drag-and-move stepping with keyboard arrow-keys (FIX)
• Plugin parameter automation GUI feedback (FIX)
• LV2 plugin Qt4 GUI support (FIX)
• Clip/Split on current play-head location (FIX)

Slaintheva!

Aha, TYOQA is finally coming to an end.

Are we getting pre-beta status? No way. Not there yet. And quite frankly, it will never be. As most of you who know my stance on this alpha-and-omega-thing, may well rejoice: this is alphaaaaa!...

Now, let's get some more cynicism to the extreme, an activity that I've been criticized more than often: the previous dot release nailed the day when a bitten-fruit boss passed away. I am no prophet, but could it be that we're witnessing the dawn of a brand new-age passover? I wonder what will happen this time.

Let's get over it, or better said, through it!

Time will tell or else, never mind.

This solstice release comes with a long overdue loop-recording/takes featuritis breakout. As a matter of fact, it is actually the relevant feature being introduced this season. BTW, happy holidays--before too late ;)

Well, I've tried to do something barely useful, at least for the lone, one-(wo)man-band and over-dubber, that is. There's still a point on the old motto, remember? That techno-boy(gal)-bedroom studio? Now I think he/she can have a guitar ;) In other words, I'm not really sure this is going to be the best user-interface or paradigm, model, whatever.

You tell me :)

Release highlights:

• Default session file format option (NEW)
• LV2 State extension support (NEW)
• Loop-recording/takes implementation (NEW)
• Options dialog re-arrangement (FIX)
• Improved in-flight recording display (FIX)
• MIDI clip file revision numbering (FIX)
• Clip "Unlink" option (NEW)

or not even close...

Loop-recording/takes is now being featured right from Qtractor SVN trunk (aka. qtractor 0.5.1.18+). That means you now have the option to automatically fold any recording clip into so called takes, each take sliced from each loop run. Worth noting is that this all works somewhat seamless, whether you have the (loop recording mode) option turned on or else.