Renoise License

Well, after lots of evaluation I have bought a license for Renoise.

The more I use it, the more I like it, and it definately helps you lay down ideas very quickly. There are lots of features I haven't even explored yet, so I'm confident that I will find even more useful stuff in there. It is great that they have a native Linux version, and it is very stable.

I have also been playing around a lot with QTractor, an open source DAW/Sequencer. While it has a lot of features that I like, it is not yet ready for everyday intensive use - this is no surprise as it is still described as being Alpha software. Even though I have bought Renoise, I will still use Qtractor here and there - when I find bugs or missing features I will be sure to report them in the interest of product improvement.

But for now, Renoise is King - I have been using it to put together my entry for the Depeche Mode remix contest. Stay tuned for more news on that.

Renoise

I've been spending quite a lot of time lately checking out the Linux version of Renoise. I must admit I was a bit bemused at first, as I had never used a tracker type sequencer before, but the guys at Renoise have a lot of useful documentation to get you quickly up and running.

Since I've been playing with it for a few days now I can say that I really like it. It is quick to lay down tracks, and editing is quick and painless (I do more MIDI sequencing than audio tracks). I like the fact that it has it's own built in sampler (which is very flexible), and it happily co-exists with LADSPA so you have a bunch of effects at your disposal from the off. It also integrates well with JACK.

There are a couple of limitations - it doesn't host DSSI plugins, so you have to use them as external MIDI devices and there are no dedicated audio tracks.

I'm not quite done with my evaluation yet, I haven't tried recording any audio yet, but I'm pleased with it so far. It has proved to be very stable. Other options I'll be checking out are QTractor & EnergyXT (I've all but ruled out Rosegarden - I've tried it before and didn't like the plugin setup workflow amongst other things).

As I've said before, I don't mind paying for a decent bit of software if I have to, what is more important to me is that I have something reliable and flexible to work with.

Some more native Linux VSTs

I've found a few more native Linux VSTs - I haven't tried any of these yet, but they are in my downloads folder ready to try! These are all free by the way.

Hypercyclic - This is described as an 'LFO-driven MIDI arpeggiator, gate effect and step sequencer for mangling MIDI input chords.' This won 2nd prize in the KVR Developer Challenge 2007.

Mr Alias 2 - Not really sure how to describe this synth, so here is their own description of it: 'Mr. Alias 2 uses non-bandlimited oscillators which can be transposed near to and beyond the Nyquist frequency, causing most of their spectra to be aliased back into audible non-harmonic frequencies. The sound can then be further processed by a number of crude "effects."'

Also from the same developer as Mr Alias are a number of MIDI processing VST plugins.

I am especialy keen to try Hypercyclic and Mr Alias, and will report back when I have done so.

Loomer Aspect VST for Linux

While trying out Renoise and various other sequencers, I have also been trying out the demo for Aspect, a commercial VST synth plug in. After Disco DSP's Discovery, it is only the second commercially available Linux VST.



This is a very flexible synth, with lots of modulation routings possible. With so many routings possible, it is nice to see a decent number of modulation sources available - 3 envelopes & 3 LFOs, as well as the ability to use the Oscillators and Filter outputs as modulation sources too.

It also has an easy to use MIDI learn function, so you can map your controllers to the various parameters - I have been able to map the 16 or so sliders/knobs on my Evolution controller keyboard to key parameters; it makes editing so much easier.

CPU usage can be quite high on patches that use a high number of voices or unison, although recent updates have bought the CPU usage down, so this shouldn't be a big problem.

It is quite difficult to categorise the sound the synth produces - it can sound quite analog at times, but also can sound quite digital. That's not to say it can't do either very well, but more like it has quite a distinct sound, and a very good one too. I'm very happy with it and have gone ahead and bought the full version.

Loomer also have two Effects VSTs available for Linux, but I haven't tried those out yet. It is good to see some commercial VSTs available for Linux - although there are a few good synths available for Linux, most have been around for quite some time so it is good to freshen things up a bit.

The Loomer plugins are built using the JUCE development kit, hopefully this is the first of more commercial Linux releases, as more developers start to use JUCE.

Choosing a Sequencer

Now I have a reliable audio setup, I need to choose a sequencer. In the Linux world, there is quite a choice, both free and commercial - Rosegarden, Qtractor, Muse, SEQ24, EnergyXT (commercial) & Renoise (commercial). There may be others, but they seem the most widely used.

I'm looking for something that has a quick and simple workflow, is reliable and can also work with audio files. I don't mind using a commercial program if I need to.

I used to use Tracktion in my Windows days, and loved the simplicity that it offered - vitually everything was accessed from the main screen without needing to delve into various menus. The only thing that let it down slightly was the MIDI editing was a bit weak, but I would happily use it again now. In fact, it's a shame there is no Linux version available, after all it is built with the JUCE toolkit, which is a cross platform development library which is available for Linux.

I'm probably going to rule out SEQ24 straight away - it is a MIDI sequencer only, and to be honest when I briefly tried it I didn't get on with the workflow.

I am going to try Renoise first. I've heard good things about it and it supports native Linux VSTs. I've never used a tracker before so it should be an interesting ride...

JACK Configuration

After checking that the Lexicon Omega was working under Ubuntu, it was time to configure JACK properly for realtime support and low latency.

If you don't already know, JACK is the system used for handing low latency, real-time audio in Linux. It can take a bit of trial and error to get it working OK...

When I first enabled the real-time option, JACK wouldn't start at all. It was throwing up an error:

cannot use real-time scheduling (FIFO at priority 10) [for thread -1210643584, from thread -1210643584] (1: Operation not permitted)
cannot create engine

After looking around, it seems this is a well known issue, and after reading the Ubuntu Studio guide, I needed to add a few settings to /etc/security/limits.conf, specifically:

sudo su -c 'echo @audio - rtprio 99 >> /etc/security/limits.conf'
sudo su -c 'echo @audio - nice -19 >> /etc/security/limits.conf'
sudo su -c 'echo @audio - memlock unlimited >> /etc/security/limits.conf'

However, even though JACK now started, I was still getting lots of xruns and other errors, of the type:

delay of 21343.000 usecs exceeds estimated spare time of 21075.000; restart...

I tried in vain for hours to get rid of these errors, when I realised that at some point during the various reboots I was doing, the hardware device in the JACK copnfiguration had switched to the internal sound card, rather than the Omega. Although the same hardware device was still selected in JACK, the system had swapped the USB Omega to another device. I had also added the same configuration settings in /etc/security/limits.conf to my user name.

Now JACK is running with no xruns at all, except for when starting or exiting applications, which is normal. Now I need to start seriously playing around with the various sequencers/DAWs/plugins and see which works best for me.

Lexicon Omega running on Linux

I ordered a Lexicon Omega, which is a 4 input audio/midi interface to use with my Linux laptop and external gear. I opted for this as I had seen a couple of reports that it worked well in Linux.

Sure enough, after plugging it in it was immediately recognised by the system and was picked up by Jack.



I was a bit confused at first, as under the audio tab it doesn't appear under it's own name like it does on the ALSA tab, it just appears as 'System'.

Also visible in the screenshot you can see that my USB keyboard, an Evolution MK-449C has been recognised by the system without having to install any drivers.

With these two pieces of equipment working well I can now use them to control my external synth as well using the audio software in Ubuntu Studio.

Now I just need to try and configure Jack properly so it is working optimally with the Omega.

Using Ubuntu for creating Music

Many moons ago, I used to have a home recording studio in the spare bedroom. As more children came along, this unfortunately had to be sacrificed as we had run out of space. I kept my modular synthesizer that I had built, but sold everything else and instead bought a laptop. Over time I used this less and less (unsurprisingly with small children keeping me busy), but would often try and tinker around with it.

Although I mainly used the laptop for Music only, the inevitable happened and Windows managed to corrupt itself. After replacing it with Ubuntu, even worse things were to come when one of the children trod on it and broke the LCD.

To cut a long story short, I now have a new laptop (Dell 1525) with Ubuntu, onto which I have installed the Ubuntu Studio packages. I am now trying to make a concerted effort to get back into making music again, and am going to try to do it all on Ubuntu/Linux.

I have ordered a Lexicon Omega audio interface (which apparently work well in Linux) so I will see how I go. I will blog whatever problems/triumphs I encounter along the way!

pygtk Recent File Chooser

I have started working on a new opensource project, using pygtk and Python (details on the project at a later stage). I wanted to add the ability to select recent files from the main menu. While pygtk provides classes to enable this (RecentManager, RecentChooserMenu), I couldn't find any code examples. So here is an example that adds a Recent Files submenu to a menu item.
The code assumes there is an existing menu item 'self.mnuRecent' that the recent files sub menu will be attached to.


#Add a recent projects menu item
manager = gtk.recent_manager_get_default()
#define a RecentChooserMenu object
recent_menu_chooser = gtk.RecentChooserMenu(manager)
#define a file filter, otherwise all file types will show up
filter = gtk.RecentFilter()
filter.add_pattern("*.avi") #set this to whatever file type you want
#add the filter to the RecentChooserMenu object
recent_menu_chooser.add_filter(filter)
#add a signal to open the selected file
recent_menu_chooser.connect('item-activated', self.recent_item_activated)
#Attach the RecentChooserMenu to the main menu item
mnurecent = self.mnuRecent
mnurecent.set_submenu(recent_menu_chooser)

##

def recent_item_activated(self, widget):
"""Activated when an item from the recent projects menu is clicked"""
uri = widget.get_current_item().get_uri()
# Strip 'file://' from the beginning of the uri
file_to_open = uri[7:]
#code here to open the selected file

## In your code where you open a file, you need to add the file to the recent items manager

manager = gtk.recent_manager_get_default()
manager.add_item('file://' + file_uri)


Hopefully someone will find this example useful.

phoNIX Beta

In my previous post I mentioned the educational software I have been developing, phoNIX. This has now reached beta release status, and is available for download at the project website.

Developing software for Ubuntu

By day, I am a software developer. OK, software developer is a bit grand, but I work in the development department for a fund manager, developing reports, applications, SQL etc., all on Windows.

After running Ubuntu for some time now on my home machines (desktop, laptop & file server), I have been keen to try developing for Ubuntu/Linux. Python is a popular language for developing Linux applications so I decided to try and learn python by creating some applications.

The trouble is trying to think of something worthwhile to develop. My first attempt, a media cataloguing application, started off quite well and taught me quite a lot about developing in Python & GTK. However it became obvious that there was already a very good solution out there, so not wishing to reinvent the wheel, I stopped working on that.

My next idea for an application came about while looking for some software for my young children. At school, they use the Phonics system of learning to read and write. I was looking for some phonics software that ran on Linux but couldn't find any - so I thought I would create my own.

So that is what I have been doing for the last month or two. The application is nearly finished, the only thing remaining is to record the sound samples it will use. I have setup a website dedicated to this (free, open source project) at http://phonix.org.uk.

Moving to Ubuntu: Part one

As I have decided to move to Ubuntu, the first step in this process is to check whether my current hardware is compatible. Handily, Ubuntu provide an easy way to achieve this - the installation CD doubles up as a 'live' CD. This means you can boot your PC from the CD, and it will run Ubuntu without installing it. Of course, running from the CD is nowhere near as fast as running from an installed system, but it is a great way to try it out and check if your hardware is compatible, and also if you like the Ubuntu way of working.

So, last night I booted from the Ubuntu CD, and very quickly the system booted into Ubuntu. My PC is 2-3 years old, so I wasn't entirely sure whether everything would work. But I'm relieved to say that not only did it work, it was no slower than my normal XP installation.

I even switched on the desktop effects, expecting to find my ultra cheap graphics card either wasn't supported, or couldn't handle it, but, again, it worked like a dream.

So, now that little test is out of the way I need to clean up my XP installation (remove all but the absolutely essential software to reclaim as much disk space as I can), and back up my data to an external drive. I've already got a list of applications I currently use, and what their equivalents will be in Ubuntu, and so far I haven't found any gaps.

This may sound incredibly 'geeky', but after trying out Ubuntu, I can't wait to install it and get it up and running properly.

Bye Bye Windows

I have made a big decision - I am going to move my main desktop PC over to Ubuntu from Windows XP. Why am I going to do this?

Quite frankly, I have had enough of Windows. An organisation the size of Microsoft ought to be able to through enough resources at an OS to make it extremely robust and stable. Instead, I find things that just stop working, have to spend too long applying various anti virus and firewall patches, and constantly patch Windows itself.

I recently finished re-installing a friends XP machine that had been crippled with a virus that had wrecked the networking side of things, including internet connectivity. They had a Packard Bell computer, but lo and behold they had lost the XP CD that came with the machine. We tried different XP discs that we were able to get hold of, but none worked with their serial number printed on the label on the PC. Fortunately, another friend had a spare license from their Microsoft Action Pack subscription, so we were able to use that to rebuild their machine. This took more evenings than I care to count, trying all the different discs and serial numbers.

Now I find that my PC is going to need re-installing. The sound has stopped working, and no matter what codecs or drivers I install, nothing works. I have tried re-extracting the required Windows dlls but no luck. So the only thing I can see left to try is a re-install. But, lo and behold, I seem to have lost my XP CD as well! Despite being able to find every worthless bloody driver CD I have ever had, the time I need the important one, I can't find it.

So, I'm not going to bother. I have no intention of ever going to Vista - the prices Microsoft charge in the UK are way over the top for a system that seems focused on stopping you doing more things than it allows you to do. I recently installed Ubuntu on my music server to run Slimserver, and I like the look of that, so I have decided to kiss goodbye to Microsoft and their unreliable, insecure software, and say hello to Ubuntu Feisty Fawn. Who knows, perhaps it will be no more reliable than XP, but at least I will no longer have the worry about losing license keys or discs or worrying about how many times I can install it without breaching the license.

New Linux Server results

After recently completing the installation of my new server to run SlimServer, I thought I would post some results.

My requirements were for a quiet, low-power consumption machine that would be easy to manage. I opted to build my own machine, based around a Jetway J7F2 mini-ITX motherboard. This uses the low power VIA C7 1.2 Ghz processor. The board is a fanless design, satisfying my requirement for low noise. As I will be using the server to house my music files, I opted for a large 320Gb Western Digital 3.5" drive. These are very quiet in operation. The system was built into a Noah mini-ITX case. I installed the maximum 1GB memory that the board supports.

The case has a fan, which is fairly quiet, and is the only source of mechanical noise in the system (apart from when the hard drive is reading/writing). I may yet remove the fan, but I need to see how hot the hard drive runs without it.

The ideal situation would have been to have a drive for the OS, and a separate drive for the music files, but the Noah case doesn't have room for this. An external drive wasn't really an option, with three kids running around the house leaving a trail of destruction in their wake ;->

For the OS, I decided to go for the Ubuntu variation of Linux. This was mainly because it was free, and a number of people on the Slim Devices forums were successfully running SlimServer on Ubuntu.

I was a bit apprehensive as I had no experience of Linux, but the install went smoothly. The install of SlimServer was equally straightforward, using the Slim deb package.

As I intend to run the machine headless (without a monitor/keyboard), I needed some way to control the machine from my main Windows XP desktop. This was easy, as Ubuntu has a VNC based remote desktop facility built in, so it was a simple case of installing the free edition of RealVNC on the Windows machine, and setting the preferences in Ubuntu.

Sharing the music files on the Linux machine with the Windows machine was a bit more involved, but I found some instructions on how to do this here, using Samba.

Now it is all up & running, the performance of the machine is very good. Considering it is a low speed processor by todays standards, it has no problems running SlimServer. When it is streaming music to the Squeezebox, the CPU runs at 15-30%. The system is using about 190MB of memory, out of the 1GB installed. I'm not sure why, but the interface on the Squeezebox is a lot quicker than when it was running from my much higher spec Windows machine. I think MYSQL runs a lot better out of the box on Linux compared to Windows, but I don't have any figures to back that up.

There are still one or two things to fine tune in the setup. The board supports ACPI power management (which means you can set the machine to do a safe shut down when pressing the power button, for example), but I need to fine tune this as at the moment Ubuntu pops up the standard shutdown dialogue, rather than just shutting down.

In the end, there was no need to worry about using Ubuntu, it all installed very well. The machine is a lot quieter than my noisy Windows desktop machine (an Acer), so I'm very happy with the results.

New server for SlimServer

Up till now I have run Slimserver from my main desktop Windows PC. While it has run OK, I have always been a bit uncomfortable with having to have the PC running and consuming anything up to 190W of electricity just to play some music. I thought about a NAS solution, but wasn't happy with the current NAS solutions. Instead, I decided to build a mini-ITX based system. These have the advantage of low power consumption (around 25W flat out), plus the board I chose (a Jetway J7F2) has no onboard fan, so it would also be quiet.

Initially I was going to stick Windows on the new machine, but in the end decided to go for Ubuntu, a flavour of Linux. I was a bit apprehensive, as I had no prior experience of using Linux (or building my own PC for that matter), but it all went rather well.

Initial impressions are that the interface on the Squeezebox is a lot snappier than when run from my higher spec Windows machine. But I will spend some time trying more things out before I come to any firm conclusions.

There were one or two Linux related pitfalls along the way, which I will document later, but it was a good learning expereince, which now has me tempted to run Ubuntu on my main machine...