jerrypettit
What a great idea, and I hope more DAW manufacturers will do this.  I worry about backup issues.

DAW manufacturers have at least several reasons not to do this:
1) $$$
2) if they provide a converter FROM own DAW, they kind of invite customers to leave
3) if they provide a converter TO own DAW, they can be legally accused. Since they are concurrents and can "steal" customers doing that.
 
Some common interchange standards like OMF are not a problem and many DAWs support more complicated export than just rendered WAV and MIDI. But without project/DAW specific details.
 

Retired lawyer here, and I can't imagine ever getting in trouble over any "illegality" of it.  Who would gripe besides Gibson?  I'll bet if you asked nicely, their lawyers would send you a letter saying "Go for it!" in any event.

Thanks for the opinion. Especially valuable since you was a lawyer. Unfortunately, even in general kind Cakewalk representative has written (in another thread on this forum) that is not welcome.
 
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For testers (but can be interesting to know for other...).
 
Till now, I had no crash reports. Pre-alpha test without crashes is boring 
So its time for the first "crash festival"! No, I do not expect the converter crash, but at least some plug-in probably will.
 
Its time for FXbin and Synth rack, b10 is uploaded. DX(i), VST2(i) (also bridged), VST3(i) should be converted, with saved presets. I have (shortly) tested what I have in Splat.
RapturePro does NOT restore preset. I need more statistic (with other failing plug-ins) to decide how I should workaround that.
 
Note: some plug-ins do not work well in Reaper. VST3 compatibility is going to be improved in the next version, f.e. at the moment ST3 does not work right as VST3. Some Sonitus effects are known for crashing in Reaper, f.e. Compressor. FXChain is not a plug-in, it can not be loaded in Reaper. Sonar locked plug-ins will load, but display warning and refuse to work correctly. All that is outside of my influence...
 
Since I do not have real routing yet, the synth rack is converted as a set of separate tracks, one per synth. Real synth tracks (from the project) are also visible but not yet connected. I have enabled all tracks, even without clips. So you will get much more tracks then before (including some "system" tracks you do not see in Sonar). But you still will not see buses. That mess will be cleaned once routing is converted (the very next task).
 
Also note updated instructions for alpha testers on my forum (how to report problems with plug-ins).
 
Happy testing! 

Rocky,
 
There is a donate page to support Alexy.
 

Some Sonitus effects are known for crashing in Reaper, f.e. Compressor
 
The compressor issue may due to it's sidechainng features. This was discussed a while back by Craig Anderton and others.
 
 

VST3 compatibility is going to be improved in the next version, f.e. at the moment ST3 does not work right as VST3
 
Might this be because vst3 support was not fully implemented with SONAR until X3? I think you said you're developing this on X2.
 
Just Another Bloke....you can bet I'll be on it tonight! If it wasn't for this little annoyance I have here called a day job I'd be testing it now 

bluzdog
I've been following this thread, this is brilliant. I'll be purchasing Reaper shortly. AZ, you are one very talented and generous person. Thank you.
Rocky

Thanks
 
Small quiz for programmers: yesterday I was puzzled by the way Reaper encodes VST3 id into presets. 2 hours I was looking at these numbers. VST3 is identified by 16bytes GUID. The field is 4bytes long. What can it be? 
Please do not cheat looking in my post on Reaper forum...

emwhy
Latest update. It will load MIDI projects but splits the synth track and the MIDI data into 2 seperate tracks. 

Which is exactly how I work in SONAR, so I like that.
 
Any synth I have in SONAR is created using Instert->Soft Synth and so I get a folder, a MIDI track and at least one synth audio track (more if I select multiple outs).

emwhy
Latest update. It will load MIDI projects but splits the synth track and the MIDI data into 2 seperate tracks. I had to go to the track outputs and reroute them to the various soft synths.
It did load a track with some vst effects but they were also seperated into what Reaper called a Matrix track.

Effects has to be one the (audio) track the originally was. Synth are in fact 3(!) tracks, one with synth, one with MIDI and one with FXes (after synth).
What I have asked to test is which effects are transferred correctly and which not. The project structure is not yet converted and in general the subject of a separate discussion...

Just Another Bloke
I hope Alexy will eventually get to maintaining folder structures.

At the moment, I see no reason to ever convert Sonar folders. That sounds almost useless for me.
Current (not fixed) plans, the subject of correction by someone good in Reaper (to apply "best practice"):
* tracks are grouped using its original outputs. So if you have GTX1...GTX10 with output to GTX Bus, the bus becomes a folder with these tracks included. The hierarchy can have several levels (for buses and AUX tracks). But routing is done with Master disabled, completely by sends. So the project can be easily reorganized, down to "flat" level, by (group) dragging tracks.
* In general, Synthes will be in a separate "folder" called "Synth Rack". All incoming MIDI tracks are sub-tracks of corresponding synths. "Instrument" tracks are in the normal project structure. That is guided by the Sonar specific approach for Synth. In Reaper, they are always FXes. In Sonar they are special.
In future version, that structure can be "optimized" in some particular cases. F.e. if a Synth was connected to one (and only one) "Simple Instrument Track" in sonar, only one track is created for it (with MIDI, synth itself and following FXes).
But I propose we wait with the discussion at least till you see how that works in practice (with a bit of luck, not so long). The implementation (I mean the code) is well prepared to modify the "rules of Reaperafication".
 
 

azslow3
 
At the moment, I see no reason to ever convert Sonar folders. That sounds almost useless for me.
 

Folders are a huge part of my project organization and workflow. I totally dig how Reaper can collapse/expand a folder right in the mixer completely independent of the "track view" folder expand/collapse.

Dear testers,
I have just uploaded b12. Not updated comments yet.
 
Note that many basic things are internally still not there.
In particular: everything is stereo, no side chains, no multi-out synth (all outputs are routed as the first stereo), no levels/pans for anything.
 
But... Buses, sends, synthrack, MIDI and routing between all that is in place. So from now on, it looks like it will be in the first alpha.
 
From that point we can discuss folders. If you was not working seriously in Reaper before (I was not), the way my converter represent your projects now can be irritating at first, up to the level "what you have done with MY project dude??? please give me back the thing I have created!"
But I think we all should learn Reaper way to do things. And from my knowledge (experts can correct), I have tried to "recreate" your projects the way you likely do them in Reaper.
Please, give it a try before complain.
 
F.e. synth rack. Yes, an artificial "Synth Rack", and an artificial "Synth" tracks (in addition to MIDI and output).
As I wrote before, I can optimize some particular cases later. But in general, imagine a synth with 16 input MIDI tracks and several outputs. How you express it in Reaper other way?
 

Good job Alexi, I had to learn things the Reaper way with folders vs. busses (submixes) a few weeks back and I'm glad I did. For those of you who aren't familiar enough with Reaper, unlike Sonar you can set-up effects on the track folder that effect all the tracks in that folder, you can even have sub folders in those folders and use effects on them. Can't do that in Sonar. It's a good way to work once you learn it and can save screen real estate especially in the mixer view.
Give this a view if you're not familiar:
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dejEW5YjxbQ
 
EDIT:
Just tested on my work PC and I see totally what and how you're doing things Alexi. Using a track folder for the entire project and calling it Master and then any subgroups/busses/submixes are also in track folders....brilliant...takes full advantage of the reaper way. Only downside is my work projects are very simplistic vs. music projects and we use the 32 bit version of Sonar whereas they are allowing us to test only the 64 bit version of Reaper, so it doesn't find my 32 bit dx stuff like Sonitus and it won't load my Nomad stuff because those are locked to Sonar. Will test at home more tonight
 
 
 
 
 

Oh yeah, a SONAR bus can either be a sub-mix of tracks, or it could be a sub-mix of other buses , or it could be a combination of both of those things.
 
Just my $.02USD.

Glad to see that there is good progress being made.  And also that the copyright / intellectual property lawyers have dropped off 
 
I am pretty sure that we now fall under international maritime salvage laws.

I'm less likely to add new tracks to a converted RPP from SONAR. For me this about moving all old projects in SONAR to my new DAW of choice (as it stands Reaper is that choice today) in the event that SONAR simply will not work any more. The beauty of this plugin for Reaper is that SONAR could stop working completely but I can still "extract" my old projects to resurrect for a remix if necessary.
 
As far as new projects I intend to do it the Reaper way.
 

azslow3
 

Just Another Bloke
For me this about moving all old projects in SONAR to my new DAW of choice (as it stands Reaper is that choice today) in the event that SONAR simply will not work any more.

 
As I repeat several times, that was the origin for the project: cover "in the event" case for long term Sonar users.
 

Yes, it would be foolish to think that after conversion I could just export the project and the Reaper .wav would null to the SONAR .wav.
 
However, it would/will be nice to have a fairly stable/level starting point, which you are getting closer to with each version Alexy. 

b14 is uploaded
The routing should be complete (till possible bugs):
 
- sidechain plug-ins support (DX will not work, but VST, f.e. CA-2A, theoretically should)
- multiple outputs from Synth, including mono/stereo (I must admit I have not tested all cases yet)
- Synth in FXBin / FX in Synth Rack (technologically the same case, so a plug-in with MIDI input enabled) should be handled correctly (no longer duplicated in the Synth Rack).
 
But still no levels/pans for anything. Sorry, I am a bit slow
 

emwhy
vst 3s will load but won't remember presets, that I expected anyway per Alexi

should work better with vst3. At least it does on my dev. system (not many VST3 there).
 

however Sonitus compressor causes hang/crash, that was also expected per Alexi so no big deal.

Once we release the converter, and in case that get some "resonance" on Cockos forum, we can write Reaper developers to have a look at DXes with side-chains (and DXi with multi-outputs, like TTS-1).
 

Big projects with either frozen tracks, or track folders still don't load properly, but the one I tested was quite big over 63 tracks.

Frozen is not yet processed. As explained early, folders are not going to be converted. But I have mentioned, we can discuss that.