Wed Jun 21, 2023 10:05 pm
Hi,
TL;DR Here I share my thoughts on LMMS.
I discovered LMMS a long time ago. I started using it about fifteen years ago. I stopped using it a couple of years. I stopped producing music at all some years ago. But I started to use it again some months ago. I’d like to say a very big thank you to all LMMS’s developers, from the bottom of my art. What you’ve done is amazing. This software was very good when I stopped using it, and now, I can see that it just got even better, and incidentally more popular!
I haven’t participate much myself to say the least. I had made what was the first french translation at the time, probably outdated now. But I didn’t even look at the translation file since I started to use the application again. I’ll try to do so, and to help if I can.
I also proposed the Kicker plugin. I’ll always remember how astonished and happy I was to see that Tobias Doerffel implemented it just a few weeks later, with some clever additions to my proposal (even if he may have it already in mind himself). I (maybe) now have another idea to make it even better. I’ll detail that in another post, this one being long enough already.
Important information: I always use the last master branch from Github. I build the software on a Debian Sid desktop. I don’t use jackd, I really like the idea of having all I need within only one software like LMMS, even if I sometime use Audacity for some audio editing. I already tested jackd. I get the whole idea and how it’s powerful, but it’s a bit tiresome/complex having to restart all your different programs, patch bay and such. So I stick to ALSA with LMMS so far.
So… let’s go !
This is my feature requests list, ordered by the neediness I have of each (most needed first):
1) Show the knob’s value when mouse-overing it (currently it needs a click, and a click often leads to an unwanted modification).
2) Better way to set the loop start position and the loop end position in the song editor. Currently, moving the loop end position when I’m zoomed-in near song’s begin, or reciprocally, moving the loop start position when zoomed-in near the song‘s end is not very easy. It seems that right-click selects the loop start marker if clicked in the starting half of the loop bar, and selects the loop end marker if it’s the ending half (?). Sometime I’d like to set the loop at the place I’m zoomed-in. Currently, I have to zoom out, set my loop markers approximately, then zoom in back to the region I’m working on to set the loop markers exactly where I want.
3) A finer horizontal zoom in the song editor. Let’s say with a 1% step. Currently it’s 12,5, 25%; 50%, etc… Quite frustrating sometimes not being able to make your song use the whole screen width because of that.
4) Volume setting for sample/plugin preview. I’d like to hear the preview at near the same loudness that my song or track currently is.
5) Do not scroll the whole workspace when scrolling in the song editor when it reaches the bottom. In fact, I’d say scrolling the whole workspace should happen only when starting to scroll outside any editor/instrument.
6) Dry/Wet knob for plugin would better be at a default of 0 instead of 1. Just my humble opinion, what’s your?
7) Save/restore all the settings of the song editor. Lke auto-scrolling or horizontal zoom, which currently is not.
8) Would be nice having the possibility to change the display height of each track in the song editor and pattern editor. In particular for automation tracks, where currently it’s difficult to see what the curve looks like just from the song editor. Open it in the automation editor does not permit to see how it fit relatively to the other tracks.
9) This point is linked to the previous one. I’d be nice to have the possibility to fold/unfold a track or pattern in the editors.
10) The Space key should start and stop playing the song whatever widget has focus (except in the pattern editor and piano-roll editor for witch it should play the aforementioned editor). It would be useful particularly from the mixer widget.
11) The knife tool should be able to split repeated pattern clips too.
12) Save and restore any plugin settings. Possibility to set a default setting for any given plugin. And why not, a save/restore functionality for plugins, as it exists for instruments.
13) Restore all widgets visibility and position (and “stay on top” toggle) when loading a project. Would be so nice!
14) I noticed that the star that appears right to the filename in the main windows title, which is, I guess, supposed to show that the project has been modified since last saved, desn’t appear for some modifications.
15) Some functionalities for the mixer:
- A stereo/mono switch (I know there is a plugin that can achieve that, but still).
- A “set all fader to zero” button (something I like to do when I want to start the whole mixing from ground).
- A save/restore functionality for the mixer. But it would not be very useful, as saving multiple versions of the whole project for different mixes is not a problem.
- Possibility to stretch it vertically.
16) Magnetic windows.
And those are the questions I have about LMMS:
1) I recently built LMMS with the Carla plugin for the first time. I can see it’s a possible solution to run VST and LV2 plugins. I’ve always struggle to build the native VST support in LMMS. I think I managed to build it only one or twice. But I understand that in building LMMS on Debian Sid, aka unstable, I don’t give myself the best chance to succeed… In addition, I’m happy using LMMS without any VST support, so I didn’t try so hard anyway… I wonder if using a VST instrument via Carla results in a CPU overhead ? Comparing to using the same instrument with the proper VST support ? Is Carla an overhead in general? I wonder about LV2 plugins too. I’ve been able to build LV2 support a few days ago, with SUIL, but after an upgrade of my system I wasn‘t anymore (missing file, didn’t investigate). As I said, this is not a problem for me anyway.
2) Does the spectrum analyzer consumes CPU when it’s not displayed?
3) What’s the greatest challenges LMMS development is facing nowadays, if any?
4) Does the CPU meter in LMMS show the CPU usage of LMMS only? Or the CPU usage of the whole OS?
Thanks for reading so far. Don’t hesitate to ask me anything. I’ve certainly been unclear some times. English is not my native language.
Have a nice and loud day!
TL;DR Here I share my thoughts on LMMS.
I discovered LMMS a long time ago. I started using it about fifteen years ago. I stopped using it a couple of years. I stopped producing music at all some years ago. But I started to use it again some months ago. I’d like to say a very big thank you to all LMMS’s developers, from the bottom of my art. What you’ve done is amazing. This software was very good when I stopped using it, and now, I can see that it just got even better, and incidentally more popular!
I haven’t participate much myself to say the least. I had made what was the first french translation at the time, probably outdated now. But I didn’t even look at the translation file since I started to use the application again. I’ll try to do so, and to help if I can.
I also proposed the Kicker plugin. I’ll always remember how astonished and happy I was to see that Tobias Doerffel implemented it just a few weeks later, with some clever additions to my proposal (even if he may have it already in mind himself). I (maybe) now have another idea to make it even better. I’ll detail that in another post, this one being long enough already.
Important information: I always use the last master branch from Github. I build the software on a Debian Sid desktop. I don’t use jackd, I really like the idea of having all I need within only one software like LMMS, even if I sometime use Audacity for some audio editing. I already tested jackd. I get the whole idea and how it’s powerful, but it’s a bit tiresome/complex having to restart all your different programs, patch bay and such. So I stick to ALSA with LMMS so far.
So… let’s go !
This is my feature requests list, ordered by the neediness I have of each (most needed first):
1) Show the knob’s value when mouse-overing it (currently it needs a click, and a click often leads to an unwanted modification).
2) Better way to set the loop start position and the loop end position in the song editor. Currently, moving the loop end position when I’m zoomed-in near song’s begin, or reciprocally, moving the loop start position when zoomed-in near the song‘s end is not very easy. It seems that right-click selects the loop start marker if clicked in the starting half of the loop bar, and selects the loop end marker if it’s the ending half (?). Sometime I’d like to set the loop at the place I’m zoomed-in. Currently, I have to zoom out, set my loop markers approximately, then zoom in back to the region I’m working on to set the loop markers exactly where I want.
3) A finer horizontal zoom in the song editor. Let’s say with a 1% step. Currently it’s 12,5, 25%; 50%, etc… Quite frustrating sometimes not being able to make your song use the whole screen width because of that.
4) Volume setting for sample/plugin preview. I’d like to hear the preview at near the same loudness that my song or track currently is.
5) Do not scroll the whole workspace when scrolling in the song editor when it reaches the bottom. In fact, I’d say scrolling the whole workspace should happen only when starting to scroll outside any editor/instrument.
6) Dry/Wet knob for plugin would better be at a default of 0 instead of 1. Just my humble opinion, what’s your?
7) Save/restore all the settings of the song editor. Lke auto-scrolling or horizontal zoom, which currently is not.
8) Would be nice having the possibility to change the display height of each track in the song editor and pattern editor. In particular for automation tracks, where currently it’s difficult to see what the curve looks like just from the song editor. Open it in the automation editor does not permit to see how it fit relatively to the other tracks.
9) This point is linked to the previous one. I’d be nice to have the possibility to fold/unfold a track or pattern in the editors.
10) The Space key should start and stop playing the song whatever widget has focus (except in the pattern editor and piano-roll editor for witch it should play the aforementioned editor). It would be useful particularly from the mixer widget.
11) The knife tool should be able to split repeated pattern clips too.
12) Save and restore any plugin settings. Possibility to set a default setting for any given plugin. And why not, a save/restore functionality for plugins, as it exists for instruments.
13) Restore all widgets visibility and position (and “stay on top” toggle) when loading a project. Would be so nice!
14) I noticed that the star that appears right to the filename in the main windows title, which is, I guess, supposed to show that the project has been modified since last saved, desn’t appear for some modifications.
15) Some functionalities for the mixer:
- A stereo/mono switch (I know there is a plugin that can achieve that, but still).
- A “set all fader to zero” button (something I like to do when I want to start the whole mixing from ground).
- A save/restore functionality for the mixer. But it would not be very useful, as saving multiple versions of the whole project for different mixes is not a problem.
- Possibility to stretch it vertically.
16) Magnetic windows.
And those are the questions I have about LMMS:
1) I recently built LMMS with the Carla plugin for the first time. I can see it’s a possible solution to run VST and LV2 plugins. I’ve always struggle to build the native VST support in LMMS. I think I managed to build it only one or twice. But I understand that in building LMMS on Debian Sid, aka unstable, I don’t give myself the best chance to succeed… In addition, I’m happy using LMMS without any VST support, so I didn’t try so hard anyway… I wonder if using a VST instrument via Carla results in a CPU overhead ? Comparing to using the same instrument with the proper VST support ? Is Carla an overhead in general? I wonder about LV2 plugins too. I’ve been able to build LV2 support a few days ago, with SUIL, but after an upgrade of my system I wasn‘t anymore (missing file, didn’t investigate). As I said, this is not a problem for me anyway.
2) Does the spectrum analyzer consumes CPU when it’s not displayed?
3) What’s the greatest challenges LMMS development is facing nowadays, if any?
4) Does the CPU meter in LMMS show the CPU usage of LMMS only? Or the CPU usage of the whole OS?
Thanks for reading so far. Don’t hesitate to ask me anything. I’ve certainly been unclear some times. English is not my native language.
Have a nice and loud day!
Would be nice having the possibility to change the display height of each track in the song editor and pattern editor. In particular for automation tracks, where currently it’s difficult to see what the curve looks like just from the song editor. Open it in the automation editor does not permit to see how it fit relatively to the other tracks.