Thanks, John and Ross for pointing out the legal difficulties with the
-vst2plugin option.
Shall we settle for a -plugin option generating code for sa.dll, a non-vst2
shared library plugin then ?
If so, we'll have to define sa.dll's interface. Since it will be purely a
fixed i/o MIDI-controlled processing engine, it's interface needs not be more
complicated than the two following functions imho (the SFrontPlug prefix in
the name of the functions will help hosts determine if a dll has the SFront
plugin interface or not, and will distinguish these functions from other
functions in the case of a dll featuring multiple interfaces) :
- SFrontPlugInit() to initialize the plug (preferably with a sample rate
argument overriding the saol sample rate, do you think that's possible John
?), returning a pointer to an SFrontPlugInfo structure telling the host how
many audio inputs and outputs the plug has (and maybe other properties ?).
- SFrontPlugProcessNextNFrames() to have the plug compute a time slice of N
frames. Arguments to this function should comprise N (may be different from
one call to the next), a pointer to a MidiInputEvents structure (compatible
with VST's, pointing to events falling into the time slice, frame-accurately
timestamped relative to the beginning of the time slice), and pointers to the
audio input and output float buffers.
I probably am forgetting/overlooking things in this very first humble vague
attempt at a specification, interested people please contribute :-)
John Lazzaro wrote:
>
> > Ideas, anybody ? The final word will be John's of course.
>
> Legally, this may be worse than you think -- the code in the
> driver is going to become a part of sfront itself, since
> all driver code gets wrapped into strings that get bundled
> with sfront source code and thus the executable. So, the
> actual code in your driver needs to be under a license
> compatible with the GPL. And from the Stienberg side, anyone
> who downloads sfront -- regardless of whether they ever
> invoke the -vst2plugin option -- is running a program that
> includes their code.
>
> I'm not really following the thread close enough to understand
> the issues completely, but basically drivers shipped with
> sfront need to be compatible with the GPL (note that compatibilty
> means that looser, LGPL licenses are fine).
>
> --jl
-- Greetings, Michel ......................................................................... Michel Jullian Directeur General email mj@exbang.com Exbang Industries S.A. Mas Chauvain route de Villeneuve tel +33(0) 499 529 878 Maurin 34970 Lattes France fax +33(0) 499 529 879 .........................................................................
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