diff --git a/News.php b/News.php index 57bcaee..c945794 100644 --- a/News.php +++ b/News.php @@ -14,77 +14,113 @@ include_once("includes/header.php");

> Carla 2.0 beta6 is here!
- On 2018-01-22 by falkTX + On 2018-01-24 by falkTX

Hello again everyone, we're glad to bring you the 6th beta of the upcoming Carla 2.0 release.
- It has been more than 1 year since the last Carla release, this release fixes things that got broken in the mean time and continues the work towards Carla's 2.0 base features.
- There's quite a lot of changes under the hood, mostly bugfixes and minor but useful additions.
- With that being said, here are some of the highlights: -

-

- juce stuff, no more vst3 and au. win/osx audio + midi support through rtaudio+rtmidi. - has not been extensively tested. - jack support remains the same + It has been more than 1 year since the last Carla release, it was about time. :)
+ This should be the last beta for the 2.0 series, the next one is planned to be release candidate 1.

- Previous experimental plugins removed. carla-zyn no longer exported. - For final release, internal plugins won't be built by default - remove mod-ui + There were quite some changes under the hood, mostly in a good way.
+ Sadly for users this actually means losing some features, the biggest ones being VST3 and AU plugin support.
+ The way audio and MIDI devices are handled on Windows and macOS also changed, no longer having dynamic MIDI ports.
+ See the previous post about Carla to get more details on the "breaking changes".

-Can now build on more systems than just linux/mac/windows -BSD, Hurd and Haiku working, but realtime audio usage has not been tested by me personally. + But let's move on with the good stuff!
+ Here are some of the highlights for this release:

transport -

Transport controls (experimental)

+

Transport controls and Ableton Link support (experimental)

- ...
- also link
+ Previous releases of Carla had basic time controls already, + but it was quite basic and lacked options for JACK transport and BPM control.
+ Now JACK transport is optional, transport works for non-JACK drivers and BPM can be adjusted manually.
+ Link support was added in was well, as another way to sync transport. It was not extensively tested though.
+ Also note that, due to compiler support, the current Carla macOS builds do not support Link.
+

+

+ Transport can misbehave when rolling back or forwards, so this feature is still classified as experimental.
+ The plan is to have transport working fully stable when the final 2.0 version is released.


- - jack-apps + + settings -

Load of JACK applications as plugins (experimental)

+

Tweak of settings page

- ... + Carla's settings dialog got an overhaul.
+ Everything that was not deemed stable was moved into a new 'experimental' page, and disabled by default.
+ So in order to use plugin bridges for example, you need to first enable experimental features, then the bridges.
+ The (experimental) features mentioned on this article all have to be enabled in the same way too.
+ Last but not least, a page dedicated to Wine settings (wine-prefix, wine startup binary, RT variables) was added.


- - export-lv2 + + jack-apps -

Export any loaded plugin or file as a single LV2 plugin (experimental)

+

Load of JACK applications as plugins (Linux only, experimental)

+

+ This is a big one... :)
+ Initially just an idea, that became an ugly hack/test for private use, but that I soon realized to have great potential.
+ So I split the code used for plugin bridges and made it more generic so it could be re-used for such feature.
+ And here we have it, JACK applications running as regular plugins inside Carla - including showing/hiding their main interface.
+ Also applications receive JACK transport as rolling in the host.
+

+

+ In this mode Carla basically becomes a self-contained JACK server, and exposes a special libjack to the client.
+ The client connects to Carla believing it's actually connecting to "JACK", as Carla implements libjack API through its plugin bridge mechanism.
+ Within Carla you first define a fixed number of audio and midi ports at the start.
+ Ports are allocated dynamically on the plugin side, but get mixed down at the end to the number of outputs selected.
+ This is a nice workaround against clients that dynamically register their ports, sometimes with random names too.
+ With Carla jack-apps-as-plugins method, the client ports are persistent.
+

- ... + The full libjack API is not implemented though, only the important parts to get most applications running.
+ The most notable missing calls are related precise timing information and non-callback based processing.
+ But even without this, stuff like audacity, lmms, hydrogen, renoise and vlc work.
+ Also no session management is implemented at the moment. +

+

+ This is a work in progress, but already working quite well considering how new it is.


- - settings + + export-lv2 -

tweak of settings page

+

Export any loaded plugin or file as a single LV2 plugin (experimental)

-wine options settings
-Experimental settings
-...
+ Another big feature of this release is the possibility to export any plugin or sound file loaded in Carla + as its own self-contained (LV2) plugin.
+ This can really be any regular plugin, a sound bank (eg, SFZ file), a plugin bridge or even JACK application.
+ The exported plugin will run with the smallest amount of wrapping possible between the host and the carla loaded plugin.
+ Carla will not appear at all, triggering the "show ui" on the host will show the actual plugin UI.
+ Note that the exported plugins are not portable! They require Carla to be always installed on the same location.
+

+

+ Audio, MIDI, transport information, custom UI are fully working already.
+ The only missing feature at the moment is LV2 state, which needs to map to DSSI configures, VST chunks and other stuff.
+ Although working for non-Linux systems, this was not tested.
+ Testing of this feature in general is very appreciated.

@@ -95,53 +131,43 @@ Experimental settings
freebsd -

.. FreeBSD ...

+

FreeBSD and other non-Linux systems

- ... + After the removal of the juce library from the code-base (discussed before), + Carla was free to be able to support more than just the big 3 OSes.
+ With the help of the community, Carla is now available to install on FreeBSD through its ports system.
+ I was able to build and install it myself as well, and actually make good noise on a BSD system. Neat! :)
+ It's also now possible to build Carla for GNU/Hurd and HaikuOS as well, and I imagine for even more systems if one so desires.
+ If this is something you're interested in and need some help, let me know.


+

Other changes

-? Add artwork and license to about dialog
-? Save and restore canvas positions in new sibling file to project
- -Implement parameter text for plugin bridges, cache last render
-Linear controlled knobs
-Handle integer parameters on rack knobs
-Disable UI bridges on macOS (for now)
-Qt5 now default
-Automatically detect compile target
-Active peaks and keyboard for carla-rack group
-Add carla-rack no-midi-out mode as plugin
-Allow d-and-d of plugin binaries; Fix double-click folders on panel
-Place more parameters per tab in editor dialog
-Kill bridges (child processes) when main carla dies - linux only WIP
-Add prevent-bad-behaviour option, and make it work once again
-Manage UIs now works on macOS and Windows
-Expand usable MIDI keyboard keys a little
-
-cleanup, etc etc
+ There are quite a lot of other smaller changes made in Carla since beta5, these include:

- -

More stuff

-

- The plan is to not make any more betas, but jump for a release candidate next.
- So no new features for now, just polish and making the current Linux features work on other platforms.
-

Special Notes

Downloads

@@ -153,11 +179,6 @@ cleanup, etc etc
- - - - -

> JACK2 1.9.12 release and future plans
On 2017-12-21 by falkTX