For an alternate view of the programming considerations involved, may I recommend reading the following:
http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/6
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I agree we've moved to the (unnecessary) debate PC vs. Mac.
I haven't been into Windows-bashing in about 10 years and I'm not about to do so. I usually don't reply to Mac-bashing either but on a forum like this it seemed appropriate : I don't see what value there is from someone at VSL to give subjective arguments against the Mac platform, and, by extension, Mac owners. Especially knowing Mac owners probably represent a good sum of VSL clients!
On a more general note, when I visit this board, I do not expect to hear from VSL "it's Apple's fault if our product doesn't work". You have chosen to develop an app on a platform, then bear with its advantages and disadvantages. Don't put the fault on someone else's shoulder. Others companies don't and quickly work it out (MOTU and Digidesign are a good example of this).
If you can't bear the Mac platform, because Apple is stupid (and it sometimes *really* is, I am the first to admit it), then don't develop for the Mac. It, to me, is a little hypocritical to try to get Mac users to buy your software when you really seem to hate Apple and the Mac platform. That's all I'm saying. Heck, AFAIK most of VSL guys don't use them... and you don't even have the top-of-the-line computer (8-core Mac Pro with 16GB) to test your software on. Knowing that Apple basically comes out with a new, top-of-the-line computer every year or so, I find this disturbing. Come on, it's not like I it would be a huge spending. Right now, your users have to make the test for you.
Listen - I'm not asking VSL to get a Leopard version as soon as the new OS is available. I frankly couldn't care less... All I wanted to know was what was the timeframe for a 64-bit version of VE. Other plug-ins manufacturers are also going 64-bit (EastWest being one of them) and having an idea into where you guys were going with that is interesting to plan new purchases. Your answer was - basically - we don't know because it depends on another company's software, which - in turns - blame Apple for "lying" about Carbon. Well, everybody's happy, it's Apple fault! woohoo!
Makes my day... :)
J.
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Dude-- you make some great points while still missing some of the important subtleties. If Apple hasn't given the green light to developers, there's nothing for anyone to do but wait.
Listen - I'm not asking VSL to get a Leopard version as soon as the new OS is available. I frankly couldn't care less... All I wanted to know was what was the timeframe for a 64-bit version of VE. Other plug-ins manufacturers are also going 64-bit (EastWest being one of them) and having an idea into where you guys were going with that is interesting to plan new purchases. Your answer was - basically - we don't know because it depends on another company's software, which - in turns - blame Apple for "lying" about Carbon. Well, everybody's happy, it's Apple fault! woohoo!
And it appears that you might the "happiest" of us all? Look, it is indeed bittersweet all around. A time frame is hard to predict when there's nothing to work with at the moment. Their announcement in June came as surprise and a setback for all. I don't know how the facts might have been rephrased to make them easier to bear, but I do know that only people who really care will tell you the truth, even if the truth is not necessarily good news.
Makes my day... 😊
J.
As for East West, they are in the same boat right now. Their announcement about the PLAY engine going to 64-bit on the Mac back in the spring was innocently premature. They, like so many other companies, are indeed *going* to 64-bit but got broadsided by the same announcement that 64-bit Carbon frameworks would not be supported. It's not as if EW has a 64-bit version of its plugins in Leopard now. In fact, Apple doesn't have anything running at full 64 bit yet!
But even patience will require additional patience. To be honest, I'm not expecting for all the apps and plugins I need to make it for another year, after which time it may take another 6-12 for all components to mature into some semblance of stability. If it happens sooner, all the better.
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Thanks for your post, interesting. Just to add: I don't think (personally speaking) it is as much about the OS as it is about good engineering and design. CM: May I venture once again to suggest that it is windows that is the legacy platform for which you are having to compensate for, not the mac, and it merely comes to your mind that the Mac is the "troublesome" platform to develop for simply because you have to develop for windows. If windows didn't exist, there wouldn't be a problem right? Generally speaking I mean. So, it is a matter of perspective, which can be driven politically, or in your case, perhaps simply because windows is the "staple" [as opposed to stable - a different word!! and I say sta_p_le, though not for good reasons or reasons of superior design or engineering). Naturally you have to stick with whatever is the dominant market force. Mac users would be lost without your mac developments! I really understand what you say about the technical issues being faced, but from my point of view it is *windows* that is the legacy product here... yes it's religious statement, but I don't pretend about that. :) There is an interesting article by the way I think on slash dot about Leopard being 85% market share of OS only sales in Japan for October, and windows flavours were down to around 4.5% something like that anyway. Could this be a hopeful sign for the mac faithful!? Miklos.
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The thing is, VSL develop cross-platform products so that work for Windows - and then! they make sure it works for Mac. If possible. Meaning, if Apple didn't "screw up" somewhere. If they did, well then, too bad, no 64-bit support for you guys until... well... until... hmmm... who knows?
Why don't they do the contrary? Develop for Mac first. And screw Windows. MOTU does that and they're doing a great job at it :)
It's not only about 64-bit (although that topic started on that). Should I remind you that VE for Mac didn't come out *at the same time* than the Windows version came out? Oh, sure - it did only a few days later - but when it actually came out it was a *beta*! Weirdly, it's never the other way around (Mac first and then three days later a Windows beta). But they're probably going to tell us it's Apple's fault if the program was buggy... :)
Anyway, I don't believe Apple is going to make using 64-bit Carbon any easier. That's the Apple way - they force you to move ahead. It's not always good, but overall it's been working pretty well in my opinion (I don't regret throwing out my floppy disks 4 years ago.)
J.
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When you say Apple has not given the green light - that is not exactly correct. Cocoa is 64bit, Carbon, the more "legacy" line of api's is not - Since the VSL products are written according to christian in C++ it means that it works for them to use carbon to port their clever proprietary code to the mac platform. Unfortunately apple spontaneously and unexpectedly announced at the public release of leopard that carbon would NOT go 64bit as an api or platform when they said from the leopard announcement and for almost the whole time during the leopard beta that it WOULD be. So there is no blame on VSL on this point whatsoever as far as I can tell. They cannot help the situation. I am sure Apple engineers did it for one reason or another, I just hope that it was not because they were out of time, or not confident at the release, which, if that was the case they could have at least simply delayed it a few months. Clearly it was not working, or they just want to really send a message that Carbon was a legacy product since the start of OS X, and they have been encouraging developers to drop it for many years via subtle hints (I would say.) On that point, I think VSL could have seen the road signs, Carbon was on the way out, yet, on the other hand Apple did formally say they would support 64bit Carbon... so what can you do. On apples side, supporting a legacy product in both 32bit, 64bit on PPC and Intel !! They must have just gotten fed up with it. It was designed to make it easy for people to port their apps from the old OS 9... and it's just been dragging on. These things happen. Bottom line, it was easier and cheaper for VSL to port to Carbon all these years and write their code, presumably, mostly in windows. If they want to go 64bit now, they're going to have to run for Cocoa. An argumentative person would say "well they should have done that years ago, or at least got started on it" but from VSL's perspective why would you when Carbon is going to go 64bit (now not going to happen). But I've always thought Cocoa was a superior api anyway and a better platform all around although I understand the chain of decisions. Bottom line, they're going to have to rewrite some large amounts of code if apple doesn't change their mind, and it looks like they very definitely won't unless there is a lot of hoo haa from dvelopers, and since most developers are perfectly happy with a 32 bit carbon api, and don't care about speed or memory access of 64bit, that's it. I read also that adobe is mostly still written using carbon, so they won't be happy since most of their apps would greatly benefit from 64bit code! What a shame for them, Perhaps between companies like adobe and VSL there will indeed be enough pressure to get apple to support a 64bit carbon api, and perhaps just on intel 64 bit machines?? Or PPC's as well - I hope so! The all in one box set up is absolutely in my opinion the ideal - a super fast 8 core machine, 16 Gb's ram, ample fast hard drives for samples and freeze and audio tracks, and 64bit host and sample software so that you can stably load the amount of samples you need to get a project done in one box. Other people feel differently but I think this is always going to be the most straight forward powerful option if properly implemented, so I do hope, despite the up front cost (as I do think it will even out as an expense over time) that VSL will most to cocoa 64 bit apps. It doesn't really matter if logic or cubase are 64 bit providing ensemble is run externally, then logic is just routing audio. Miklos.
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There is an interesting article by the way I think on slash dot about Leopard being 85% market share of OS only sales in Japan for October, and windows flavours were down to around 4.5% something like that anyway.
Hmmm... actually that was only an increase in "market share" for Box sales (not OEM); so it's not really surprising since Leopard juste came out! That doesn't mean Windows sold less copies, just that there has been a lot of Leopard sold... which means that in the following months everything will go back to "normal" (ie. 80% windows, 10% Leopard). Don't hold your breath ;)
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Miklos-
I agree with most of what you said. I don't blame VSL for using Carbon. I blame VSL for being (overall) Windows-centered and (too often) blaming Apple when something's not working. Even though they did develop a Mac version, I hate reading stuff (basically) like, "we do care much more about Apple than we would like to have to.". To me this means, "we do it but it's really because we have to and I (secretly) wish we weren't."
If you don't want to develop for Mac, don't. If you want to and you're committed to it, then any amount of time is not a problem. I know when I was a webdesigner I would put the extra work to make sure my websites worked perfectly on Safari and Firefox; whatever the amount of time needed I simply wouldn't deliver a single website that didn't work on IE, Firefox *and* Safari (and at the time considering my layouts it was a challenge in itself, only to benefit a very little amount of people).
J.
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I agree I wish they would develop the mac version first then port to windows. I'm not saying they will do that or that this is the best option for VSL,but as a mac user, that would be my preference from a selfish point of view... but it seems to me that these days all things being equal Mac os is a far superior product to develop on if you work within the framework apple suggests and has worked hard to prepare for developers, namely, cocoa, not carbon which was always plugged in to the OS (properly mind you) as a legacy item. There was the darwin core, then the classic emulation was a "plug in" emulation, that is now no longer used - the carbon, and it was stated since the begginning this was transitional, although would be supported for a lot longer than classic , and finally cocoa, which is the preferred "standard". It seems to me this is case of just having to take the hard road to a good finish - and face up to the fact that cocoa is the modern standard development platform for the mac, and it's not as easy to port from windows, because it's a good deal further away from the windows world than carbon was... but I argue further, that that is a very good thing at least from an engineering perspective, even if it is, in the short term, easy to view it as impractical, and inconvenient, we could call it an inconvenient truth that a re-design is in order, in order to future proof the software on the mac platform in 64bit.?? Perhaps I'll get flamed for this post! All I know is that I find it frustrating that we mac users have to suffer for the inconsistencies and bad design of the windows platform, but then again, the mac would not have been quite the under dog and therefore quite the surviver and therefore quite the survivalist that it has become over the years without crummy windows and the fact that apple nearly got completely squashed before lord steve returned... still that lessens not my lack of mercy to windows and microsoft! All things being fair, we have to respect that what VSL has done alone given the state of affairs, logic being apple only, the operating system changes, hardware changes and so on over the years, given that VSL is, correctly as Christian very much "push your consumer hardware to the limits" cutting edge use of standard hardware... they've done a good job. One more point, I do think if they favourited the mac or at least equalled it as a platform for VSL compared to windows, they would find their VSL mac community would indeed grow as a direct result, because these days, except for hard core windows fans, you can't beat a mac for music production using VSL, excepting the fact that on windows you know you are a little better supported. And one other thing - Apple should be supporting VSL directly because the filter down effect of having technology like VSL superiorly supported on the Mac and how that translates in studios and perception of the platform, it only makes sense that they should befriend and fully support a clever company like VSL, If I were working at apple I would make sure VSL always had the latest test gear and was as well informed as their top VIP developers, it only makes sense and it can only help the cause! Miklos.
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Hi Will - re your post below - I do agree that this is clearly the perception that is given. So lets say for our part - you and me - we wish to offer VSL some feedback in that, it "appears" to be the case that it is as you have said below, but we don't accuse anybody of anything! Perhaps it is a PR thing, but yes, over the years, I have found too that what you have said is more or less on the money, and although I like the VSL team very much, I feel annoyed by that too, as I do like Macs a lot and I would never use a PC except by physical force!! It is annoying when you know that, if you want to see it a certain way, yes macs are difficult, but viewed another way, they are really better. It's like when people say Ferraris are noisy and hard to drive, and impractical, and I think, hmmm, well that's a fair opinion but on the other hand!!!! come on, they're a master piece of engineering, ok I'm not comparing macs to ferraris!! by any means! don't misunderstand, but what I"m saying is that, you know you can see negative things in there if you want to when looking at something like a ferrari, that is a masterpiece most of them. Re your webdesign issues, I know I am very much mac centered, and I find with web design it's very frustrating to make a site that works on firefox, opera, safari, but not IE..... and I wonder if they didn't do that on purpose by breaking convention. I truly hate microsoft as a company and all their products including office... I think it's the worst... but that's just me and I reserve the right to my own opinion and don't force it on anyone else. But what you say is right there is at the least an impression that VSL would rather just do windows and drop the mac but do it only out of sheer pressure, and as a mac user I agree with you that we would like to see and feel that we are as important as a platform. I agree it's great we can talk civily to each other. I wouldn't call this discussion heated, unless we are pissing off windows advocates... (sorry). Look the article in PC world magazine recently said that for running vista the fastest laptop in the world right now is an Apple Macbook Pro.... stick that in your pipe and smoke it 😊 So I think yeah, macs should be equally supported, even though they are a smaller market share even in this type of software, they are very important musically as a platform. A disclaimer: All respect to those who use windows, you can't be blamed for what you don't know. Miklos.
Miklos-
I agree with most of what you said. I don't blame VSL for using Carbon. I blame VSL for being (overall) Windows-centered and (too often) blaming Apple when something's not working. Even though they did develop a Mac version, I hate reading stuff (basically) like, "we do care much more about Apple than we would like to have to.". To me this means, "we do it but it's really because we have to and I (secretly) wish we weren't."
If you don't want to develop for Mac, don't. If you want to and you're committed to it, then any amount of time is not a problem. I know when I was a webdesigner I would put the extra work to make sure my websites worked perfectly on Safari and Firefox; whatever the amount of time needed I simply wouldn't deliver a single website that didn't work on IE, Firefox *and* Safari (and at the time considering my layouts it was a challenge in itself, only to benefit a very little amount of people).
J.
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stevesong, thx for the link - the article is well considered and i pickup and return to a point it mentions (which has btw. been the initial start of this thread):
what about companies with a vast existing codebase like adobe (or in the case of VSL a nifty but not so huge codebase but less ressources than adobe)?
and consider even _if_ everything would be transitioned to Cocoa - how to compile the windows versions from it, or maintain two seperate codebases or actually have two development teams ... forget about it or see the speed of development slowing down (i'm assuming now nobody would ask to abandon windows versions to improve development of mac versions).
so one has to accept we are facing a kind of oneway and have to live with it, though i'd wish we wouldn't have to. such a wish should be understandable.
christian
and remember: only a CRAY can run an endless loop in just three seconds. -
@cm said:
(i'm assuming now nobody would ask to abandon windows versions to improve development of mac versions).I wouldn't mind... 😊
In all seriousness, that's the whole problem, and VSL is definitely not alone in that respect.
Adobe, Sibelius, the Mozilla Foundation, Native Instruments, Propellerhead.... there are countless companies who develop both for Windows and OS X, and the end result is that the Mac versions tend to be not as good as the Windows version. These products simply don't "feel" native. The interface doesn't follow OS X guidelines (Firefox), things are not working the way they should (I'm thinking about mouse scrolling in Sibelius for example), the file browser is proprietary (Reason), etc, etc. I don't know any cross-platform app which really "feel" native on Mac - but it (of course) always does on Windows.
This is why, whenever I can, I favor a native app, developed primarily for OS X. I've found that by doing that I have far less problems and it's much more consistent in terms of interface and/or functionality. It makes my life easier, and I actually enjoy my computing experience more.
Yes, I wish that some companies would be doing the same as MOTU and focusing on only one platform. They would then be able to use the advantages of *that* platform. The problem is that most sample companies have now become software companies as well and as a result have to spend huge resources into software development; and considering their user base it makes complete business sense to develop cross-platform apps (and it makes complete business sense to spend as less time as possible to make that cross-platform app work in two environments.) But the fact that I understand that cross-platform is a necessity doesn't make the product more attractive to me from a Mac-user standpoint.
J.
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Christian:
Thanks for your comment. I do appreciate your frustration, but at least the article suggests that the decision to abandon Carbon was not completely thoughtless or arbitrary - - although that is small comfort to developers with existing Carbon codebases..... Right now, as you have pointed out in other places, there are alternatives for Mac users seeking to exceed the 2.5 GB sample load limit. In experimenting with Logic 8, OS 10.5.1 and VE, I have been able to create a file that simultaneously addresses and plays - - with reasonable success, the VE standalone, the VE plugin, the VI plugin, EXS 24 plugin and the Kompakt standalone (Logic 8 refuses to validate Kompakt under OS 10.5.1 although it successfully validated it under OS 10.4.11.) (For the audio from the standalones I am using SoundFlower to route the audio back into Logic via AUX channels - - not an ideal solution as Soundflower seems prone to introducing artifacts - - clicks and pops.) Such a setup is made infinitely more practical with Leopard's new "Spaces" feature which allows one to move instantly from one program or one page to another....as I said in an earlier post, it's almost like having 4 monitors.
Willross:
Although an ardent Mac user, I couldn't disagree more with your point of view. I am incredibly glad that most companies do cross-platform development since it helps them stay in business and continue development. I am, for example, very, very, very glad that I do not have to purchase a Windows machine to access the VSL library. What's important to me is what you can do with the software, not whether or not it is sufficiently "mac-like" to suit my taste. I am not an adherent of the Mac "religion," I just want access to maximum functionality for making music.
Stephen
Dual 2.5 GHz G5
7GB RAM
OS 10.5.1 (and 10.4.11)
MOTI 2408
Logic 7 & 8
DP 4.6.1
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Stephen-- Hmm, my name is Jerome, for some reason now the board shows the login name when you don't check "Show Full Names" in your profile... rather annoying because I wouldn't like my boss to think I'm speaking on his behalf (which I am *not*!)
But anyway- I should have been clearer - In the debate regarding native vs. cross-platform, I was specifically talking about stand-alone apps. As a plug-in, I think VE (and VI for that matter) are perfectly fine. The release of plug-ins both as Audio Units and VST is a good example of cross-platform apps that don't make me specifically realize they've been developed on another system (Except then the scroll wheel doesn't work on Mac :) )
Stand-alone apps are usually another story though.
JEROME. ;)
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jerome, your displayed name was the username of will ross because you are posting logged in to his account instead of using yours ... (which already has displayed name Jerome) - email me if you can't remember the respective email address.
btw: i've already asked you earlier a similar question because icouldn't find registered products for *Jerome* ...
soso ... motu concentrates on mac ... is this the reason their drivers are working so well (for both platforms)?
christian
and remember: only a CRAY can run an endless loop in just three seconds. -
There's no registered products for *Jerome*... All the registered products I am using are at my boss' studio. Not sure which message board account I should use then?
I personally think MOTU's Windows drivers are so-so. Compared to their Mac drivers anyway.
But MOTU is far from being perfect either :) And I don't really want to compare VSL and MOTU since they don't do exactly the same kind of business (although maybe VSL will come out with a MIR hardware box one day).
J.
ps. I also really don't like that new forum where I have to enter html code to get correct formatting... am I doing something wrong here?
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jerome - this for example http://community.vsl.co.at/forums/p/17077/122290.aspx#122290 is a post you made with your account (287 posts).
so i would ask you to revert will's account to what it has been and return to using your own account.
i'm sorry to hear you are also a victim of the tinyMCE - safari issue which we are trying to overcome, but i would ask you to continue such a discussion in the website issues forum so we don't get a third topic into this thread.
and of course you don't want to compare MOTU with VSL if their drivers are so-so, whereas VI software is not ;-) SCNR
christian
and remember: only a CRAY can run an endless loop in just three seconds. -
Ah! Back in business :)
Well, to re-center that discussion on topic - should we basically understand that you guys have no idea as to when a 64-bit version will come around? Like, can you at least say "in six month", or "in two years" or "when hell will freeze over"? :D
The thing I don't understand is the fact you announced the 64-bit Leopard version of VE would come out a few weeks after Leopard's release - although at that time the "no-64bit-Carbon" issue had been known for 3 months already...?
J.
ps. regarding the forum - see what I meant when I said "Windows first, Mac second"? :D
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Just to keep things in the right perspective:
VSL invests a lot more time, manpower and money in OSX developement, testing and support than we do in windows (double to tripple amount).
We do have more windows user than OSX users, so we simply invest much more ressources in our OSX userbase.
Therefor this whole discussion is really strange for me.
best
Herb
