Studioware, is the project still active? Will there be a Slackware 15 version?
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Studioware, is the project still active? Will there be a Slackware 15 version?
I have been looking at the Studioware resources. The mailing list hasn’t had a message since 2020. I also read that the liveslak version of Studioware no longer will be developed. Worrying signs which make me wonder about the project and the packages they developed, along with the sepkg package app…
Or else can you find the software you want on slackbuilds.org?
Unfortunately, the liveslak variants are only current. I am a Slackware newbie that tried to get to grips with Slackware some years ago, but was unsuccessful, so current at this point isn't a match for me. Thanks for the URL, I have mainly been looking at https://alien.slackbook.org/blog/exp...ic-production/. I mainly use Reaper and Cakewalk for my DAWs. Reaper has a Linux version, but it doesn't appear to support Pipewire yet, as Slackware does, which would make things a lot easier than using jack, which I have always hated.
I have been experimenting with some minimalist stuff - fluidsynth + soundfont + sndio + midish on OpenBSD, but the BSDs unfortunately don't support MIDI over Web (I use it mainly for Flowkey and Fender Play), which is what led me back to Slackware...
Last edited by globetrotterdk; 12-13-2022 at 02:04 PM.
I don't have any special skills, but if Studioware needs help, I could probably find a couple of hours a week to volunteer... I wouldn't want them to close shop.
Maybe I've become blind to beginner issues from using Slackware so long but I don't see how Liveslak, current or otherwise, presents any specialized difficulties, and Liveslak DAW evern less so being a specified, narrow use case, all setup and readily available to even point and clickers. After all it defaults to runlevel 4 GUI. I recommend trying it.
BTW it is possible to supplement Linux DAW with some windows apps in WINE. I don't know about Cakewalk (I haven't used it in 20 years) but 32 bit Sequoia runs fine or at least gives me access and use of VST plugins I've paid for.
I did start making some changes in the repo structure so that sbopkg could be used instead of sepkg. This would involved having audio, video, and photo sections as completely separate, but whole, branches, which should save time and effort in the long-run.
If anyone wants to help update software to work on 15.0, please use this repo rather than github. Patches may be attached here or emailed to info@studioware.org
Maybe I've become blind to beginner issues from using Slackware so long but I don't see how Liveslak, current or otherwise, presents any specialized difficulties, and Liveslak DAW evern less so being a specified, narrow use case, all setup and readily available to even point and clickers. After all it defaults to runlevel 4 GUI. I recommend trying it.
BTW it is possible to supplement Linux DAW with some windows apps in WINE. I don't know about Cakewalk (I haven't used it in 20 years) but 32 bit Sequoia runs fine or at least gives me access and use of VST plugins I've paid for.
This one is less about the user's skill and more about the use case. For a multimedia workstation you really do want a set-it-and-forget-it system and doesn't slowly evolve the way -current does. The time it takes to read the changelog, pull updates, then make sure none of your apps broke as a result detracts from the time spent doing the thing you built the machine to do.
More importantly, what's stopping anyone from building the DAW variant of liveslack for 15.0?
More importantly, what's stopping anyone from building the DAW variant of liveslack for 15.0?
Nothing really. At the end of the "Explorations into the world of electronic music production" article that globetrotterdk linked is a section called "Easy Installation", explaining how to install all the DAW software with a template and slackpkg+. I do exactly that on 15.0, then a bit of additional setup for threadirqs and other priority & limits and it all works fine. Beats breaking it in -current on major library updates.
Sorry to detract from the studioware convo, I have nothing against it. I just saw Eric's DAW packages mentioned several times and wanted to add they work just fine on 15.0
This one is less about the user's skill and more about the use case. For a multimedia workstation you really do want a set-it-and-forget-it system and doesn't slowly evolve the way -current does. The time it takes to read the changelog, pull updates, then make sure none of your apps broke as a result detracts from the time spent doing the thing you built the machine to do.
More importantly, what's stopping anyone from building the DAW variant of liveslack for 15.0?
While all that is technically true there is no law one can't simply NOT run "slackpkg update-all" and use it as a snapshot appliance. Manual updates of the few specifics one might want, if any, should be trivial. In my experience out-of-the-box Liveslak, including and possible especially the DAW, just runs.
Maybe I've become blind to beginner issues from using Slackware so long but I don't see how Liveslak, current or otherwise, presents any specialized difficulties, and Liveslak DAW evern less so being a specified, narrow use case, all setup and readily available to even point and clickers. After all it defaults to runlevel 4 GUI. I recommend trying it.
BTW it is possible to supplement Linux DAW with some windows apps in WINE. I don't know about Cakewalk (I haven't used it in 20 years) but 32 bit Sequoia runs fine or at least gives me access and use of VST plugins I've paid for.
I took your advice to heart, downloaded and burned the liveslak DAW version onto a USB pen drive. My first comment is related in general terms to current versions of Slackware and new users. Current is basically a moving target in the same way that a Manjaro or other rolling release is. That is never something that a new user to a distro should be "recommended" to try. The effort in trying to maintain such an install for a new user far outweighs any usefulness that such a distro provides. Which leads me to my second comment. Having booted the liveslak USB, there were a long series of error messages from QjackCtl, which I won't post here, but returns to the first comment regarding maintaining a current version of Slackware. This is above and beyond normal maintenance but would (hopefully) be solved by going through the unique update process that is current - with the expectation that the user has some experience maintaining a Slackware system.
My third comment is perhaps the most interesting. To the best that I could ascertain, despite Slackware64 15 (including current) supporting pipewire, the liveslak DAW build appears not to have pipewire implemented at all. A cursory check showed jack (with errors), alsa and pulseaudio, but no pipewire. It is available, but the system does not appear to have been configured for pipewire, which should make configuration simpler - if there was a howto.
Sooo, I have to disagree with your statement that current (including liveslak) doesn't present any "specialized difficulties". Setup (at least in this case) does not work out of the box. Likewise, I believe that most people on this forum would also recognize that current requires some Slackware experience beyond being a "point and clicker".
Last edited by globetrotterdk; 12-16-2022 at 05:28 AM.
Nothing really. At the end of the "Explorations into the world of electronic music production" article that globetrotterdk linked is a section called "Easy Installation", explaining how to install all the DAW software with a template and slackpkg+. I do exactly that on 15.0, then a bit of additional setup for threadirqs and other priority & limits and it all works fine. Beats breaking it in -current on major library updates.
Sorry to detract from the studioware convo, I have nothing against it. I just saw Eric's DAW packages mentioned several times and wanted to add they work just fine on 15.0
The package list is of course useful, however it is pre-Pipewire. My thoughts were that Studioware would hopefully be developing a systematic documentation, configuration and use scenario for Pipewire, which doesn't appear to be the case at this time in the Slackware universe. However, I do recognize that it is relatively speaking still early days for Pipewire on Slackware... Which leads back to my concern about whether Studioware still existed.
Last edited by globetrotterdk; 12-16-2022 at 05:41 AM.
The package list is of course useful, however it is pre-Pipewire. My thoughts were that Studioware would hopefully be developing a systematic documentation, configuration and use scenario for Pipewire, which doesn't appear to be the case at this time in the Slackware universe. However, I do recognize that it is relatively speaking still early days for Pipewire on Slackware... Which leads back to my concern about whether Studioware still existed.
With that installed you can use the "pipewire-enable.sh" script that comes with Slackware and pipewire will cover both pulseaudio and jack clients.
I have used pipewire + pipewire_jack + AlienBob's DAW software compiled for 15.0 and have no issues at the sample rates I use. You are correct that it doesn't come on the Slackware-Live-DAW edition pre-configured with pipewire "out-of-the-box", but the methods for setting it up are there.
Current is not a moving target unless you move it, and that is especially true for the DAW version. I don't see why a new user would have a problem based on the rolling release issue when you don't have to roll it. Slackware Current works great as a snapshot, especially Live releases..
I have a specific, dedicated DAW install on hard drive so I haven't used the liveslak DAW in over a year. Because of your concerns I downloaded the September 2022 version of Current DAW from https://download.liveslak.org/latest/. I burned it with Unetbootin (oddly, BalenaEtcher failed). It booted fine and upon logging in to desktop, I did get some Jack errors but as far as I can tell 1) That's just because I need to configure Jack, not update Slack, and possibly 2) especially true since Slackware Live DAW detects numerous devices, several just from the damned nVidia HDMI device. I did launch "alsamixer" to see default settings and made sure Output was Line Out and Input was front panel mic jack for testing. I'd disable nvidia but my Asus Essence II uses Intel HDA so on my hard install I just disable Pulseaudio, edit "/etc/asound.conf" to declare the virtuoso card as default, use apulse where needed (rare) while ignoring HDMI. Thankfully LiveSlak DAW didn't balk at virtuoso not being default after I set nvidia to "Off" in System Settings > Audio.
Pipewire is certainly an improvement over pulseaudio but I don't require either one of them on a DAW and greatly prefer to just use ALSA. Despite the Jack errors and my curiosity to see what would and what would not work if I ignored Jack, I easily recorded and played back with both Audacity and Ardour. In short, I don't fret over the lack of Pipewire. It just worked for me with very minor checks and common setup.
Even though I prefaced my recommendation noting that I could easily be blind to the learning curve of beginning Slackers, I am sorry you didn't find it just working for you. That said, I doubt you will find Slackware 15 any easier. I think you are making a mistake thinking of Current as just another rolling release. It isn't.
Maybe forget about rolling releases that don't apply to Slackware and Jack errors you can fix later and just try to record/playback something.
I took your advice to heart, downloaded and burned the liveslak DAW version onto a USB pen drive. My first comment is related in general terms to current versions of Slackware and new users. Current is basically a moving target in the same way that a Manjaro or other rolling release is. That is never something that a new user to a distro should be "recommended" to try. The effort in trying to maintain such an install for a new user far outweighs any usefulness that such a distro provides. Which leads me to my second comment. Having booted the liveslak USB, there were a long series of error messages from QjackCtl, which I won't post here, but returns to the first comment regarding maintaining a current version of Slackware. This is above and beyond normal maintenance but would (hopefully) be solved by going through the unique update process that is current - with the expectation that the user has some experience maintaining a Slackware system.
My third comment is perhaps the most interesting. To the best that I could ascertain, despite Slackware64 15 (including current) supporting pipewire, the liveslak DAW build appears not to have pipewire implemented at all. A cursory check showed jack (with errors), alsa and pulseaudio, but no pipewire. It is available, but the system does not appear to have been configured for pipewire, which should make configuration simpler - if there was a howto.
Sooo, I have to disagree with your statement that current (including liveslak) doesn't present any "specialized difficulties". Setup (at least in this case) does not work out of the box. Likewise, I believe that most people on this forum would also recognize that current requires some Slackware experience beyond being a "point and clicker".
If you go the liveslack route, then you probably want to download the liveslack scripts and build the 15.0 DAW yourself. alienbob is very consistent in how he build his repos and everything is automated using shell scripts that are available to the public. Pre-built ISOs are simply whatever he is willing to provide bandwidth for. At the moment it looks like he is only hosting the generic 15.0 liveslack, not the DAW version.
But this doesn't mean it's not supported. You can download the liveslack scripts and build your own iso. It's mostly automated but can be somewhat time consuming. This also gives you a change to swap out any packages you need for pipewire support. Still, it sounds like we are in a state of limbo when it comes to some of this stuff so there isn't a point-and-click solution atm.
This is generally why I don't use alienbob's repos directly. I prefer to use his scripts to build and locally host a copy of whatever he has that I find useful. Gives me a chance to make changes as I see fit and lightens the load on his servers
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