Post by Admin on Jun 24, 2017 7:55:02 GMT
The days of Linux being a barren plug-in desert may at last be over. And if you’re a developer, there are some other nice things happening to VST development on all platforms.
Steinberg has quietly rolled out the 3.6.7 version of their plug-in SDK for Windows, Mac, iOS, and now Linux. Actually, your plug-ins may be using their SDK even if you’re unaware – because many plug-ins that appear as “AU” use a wrapper from VST to Apple’s Audio Unit. (One is included in the SDK.)
For end users, the important things to know are, you may be getting more VST3 plug-ins (with some fancy new features), and you may at last see more native plug-ins available for Linux. That Linux support comes at just the right time, as Bitwig Studio is maturing as a DAW choice on the platform, and new hardware options like the Raspberry Pi are making embedded solutions start to appeal. (I kind of hesitate to utter these words, as I know that desktop Linux is still very, very niche, but – this doesn’t have to mean people installing Ubuntu on laptops. We’ll see where it goes.)
For developers, there’s a bunch of nice stuff here. My favorites:
cmake support
VST3 SDK on GitHub: github.com/steinbergmedia/vst3sdk
GPL v3 license is now alongside the proprietary license (necessary for some open projects)
How ’bout them apples? I didn’t expect to be following Steinberg on GitHub.
The open license and Linux support to me suggest that, for instance, finally seeing Pure Data work with plug-ins again could be a possibility. And we’ll see where this goes.
This is one of those that I know is worth putting on CDM, because the handful of people who care about such things and can do something with them are reading along. So let us know.
More:
sdk.steinberg.net
So what has happened in the Linux music community now that it should be possible to transfer more and more VST's to a Linux environment?
And how will this influence VST support for future instruments running on an embedded Linux version?
To me this is very exciting news, having an extensive Linux background, and with an upcomming interest in Bitwig 2 which also runs in Linux.