jsg

Competition in business is a good thing when it spurs innovation and creative ingenuity.  But when competition becomes unhealthy, everyone is rushed, very rushed, so no one really has the time to make things on a high level of non-fragility and robustness.   When human beings look back at the industrialized world in the 21st century, I imagine the first thing they'll wonder about is why the f**k was everyone is such a G**Damn** hurry?   Didn't they understand the laws of nature? 

There's another side to that. If every DAW manufacturer is involved in some stupid "feature war" and releasing rushed, buggy DAW's as a result, it just means there's a potential opening in the market for a thoroughly solid, stable DAW that isn't rushed and which doesn't worry about adding groundbreaking New Featurez every year. The trouble is, such a market depends on there being enough people who actually want such a product. So we're all at fault for being sucked into the Shiny New Things trap and waving our money at manufacturers who churn out such crap. Maybe if we all threw our money at Reaper instead, things would be different. But no....we want a ProChannel and console emulation and a Matrix and other such things that at the end of the day don't really add much to our musical output.  


Maybe the future of DAW's is in a totally new product that isn't clumsily built upon 25 years of code. Or maybe someone will develop an operating system that is 100% tailored to audio production, and we'll all be dual booting in 10 years time. 


The thing about technological progress is that it's a movie, not a snapshot. At any one time, you are not guaranteed to be experiencing the "pinnacle" of anything. It's always on the move. It doesn't matter if it's driven by a profit motive or a bunch of crazy hippies who want to push the envelope for the sake of it - the "new stuff" is never going to be 100% solid.  

I have Roland's Ten tracks for the atrai 1040st fm..and I still have that computer too..works too, for the late 80`s.....Don't make em like that anymore..and it can be fixed at home with a soldering iron and parts...But yah..paying for Cubase 1.0, 2.0..etc.. from that point in time till vst hit, and the pc was under win95-89se..I bought in with echo gina and vst 3.5 up until 3.5.r7.1997...I just lost hope and that computer caught on fire!!..probably the printer  dongle taking a irq and sharing it..to cause all sorts of mishaps they would not address..and usb being new...one could not turn that off either..so another limited IRQ lost to shared ville...causing more mishaps...oh they finally got the message and rewrote the badly ported Gem code...and whala ver 6.5 and still updating!...seems to be a theme for most DAWS these days...and I have to say, we should all take up A class or two on hacking windows..or writing code. cause there is ...money money money in it....cause this is now 2013...and it is still going on..and on and on...eh?
Well I guess for some it works...and they get somethng done with it...
But...what a learning curve...I think I had enough tasting of em..now it is time to spin the wheel for misfortune, and see which one the pointer lands on....lay your bets...lol

Paul P


JG : "Everything we do, no matter how deep our talent and skill-set, can be done better when people have the optimal amount of time to get it done right. A flower takes a specific amount of time to grow, a baby takes nine months to be born, these things cannot be rushed. We should emulate nature a bit more and follow the same advice with the things we create with our minds. Everyone will be happier, both seller and buyer. I'd rather see Cakewalk put out a new version every 2 or 3 years and do it well and right. There are software companies that don't try and release a new version every year and the end-user is probably better off because of it. "

The usual problem, and I don't know if it's Cakewalk's case but it probably is, is that those financing most companies today care more about the profit they'll make than how it will be generated. I long for the days whan an Amercian company was proud that their refrigerator lasted longer than anybody elses. Today's MBAs must think they were insane. What kind of business plan was that ! A customer buys one product and you never hear from him again.

I believe it's possible to build software like that if you structure it properly and spend more time designing it on paper than coding it. I wonder if the younger generation would care for a product that lasted forever. Might be kind of boring.

PS. as for the staff view, I don't see how they can promote something that doesn't work.

Listen, the staff view works, at least in version 7.  It works so well I've produced 7, soon to be 8 symphonies and 12 albums with it.   As a midi input tool and midi editor, it works, that is if you read music, know how to orchestrate, know counterpoint, know harmony, know how to create artistic and expressive form, etc.  I've gotten used to its imperfections, the tied/dotted triplet issue, being the most annoying.  But they actually have the basis for a great notation editor if the programmers were actually allowed to improve it. 
 
I think part of the problem, not all, but a part, is that many people think that "notation editor" means you press a button and a polished, publishable, professional-level score magically appears.   I got news for everyone, even with Sibelius, if you don't know notation well, you might get good-looking scores, but they will not necessarily be detailed, accurate or rich in musical thought and idea.  Sonar's staff view was not ever meant to evolve to the level of a full-fledged score program such as Sibelius.  Why should it?  A DAW does a lot of things:  record, edit and playback midi and audio, control soft synths and work in conjuction with signal processing plugins, synchronize with SMPTE, MIDI Time Code, Machine Control, video, etc., a very complex tool.  Maybe if Cakewalk could be proud of their notation editor, they'd see that it can and should be improved.  I think we (us staff view users) have probably scared them away, metaphorically speaking of course, and they're losing interest in it.  Or maybe Roland told them not to put anymore effort into it.   
 
I don't really care any more.  I will use Sonar 7 till I can't use it anymore due to blindness, death, deafness, OS incompatibility, brain desease or whatever.   I can stop giving Cakewalk money anytime I think I am not getting something more valuable than what I use now, and so can everyone else with most non-essential products for survival. 
 
 
JG
www.jerrygerber.com

@jsg - I never had Sonar 7 PE, I went from MC3 to HS6XL to 8PE to 8.5(.3) PE to X1d.

Is there anything in Sonar 8.5 PE's Staff View which doesn't work as well as that in 7 PE? 

pbognar


@jsg - I never had Sonar 7 PE, I went from MC3 to HS6XL to 8PE to 8.5(.3) PE to X1d.

Is there anything in Sonar 8.5 PE's Staff View which doesn't work as well as that in 7 PE? 

I don't know, never installed or even have seen 8.5.  Seven became very stable in 7.0.2 and haven't been able to justify upgrading.  I have heard from CW that 8.5 was the first version in which the staff view track pane lost its connection to the active track.  I look at the triplets now as a minor display issue, it doesn't affect midi performance, which is the essential thing.  Yeah, it can be improved, but so can music, and that's more important to focus on.  Learning a new DAW?  Big time commitment.  Big loss of composition time.  Big sense of thrill and triumph if you get it all working consistently. But, understanding the real risks and options of upgrading is essential otherwise the temptation is to focus too much, or too little, on the instruments themselves and not the music to be made with same.
 
 
 

ampfixer


Maybe Cakewalk isn't putting resources into staff view. They are now a spoke in a much bigger wheel. Roland may want to develop a notation program under another company or as a Roland product. Who knows. The fact that this thread and a number of spammers seem to be rolling along without issue is something new. Cakewalk seems to taking a hands off approach. 

I bought my Reaper license this week along with a new DAW, just in case Sonar is the next VS700. I want to be ready if the wheels fall off and there doesn't seem to be a plan for getting away from the continuous change cycle. The idea of adding free bugs with a paid update has lost its charm. It never gets better, it only gets different.

Pretty much what I've done here. X2 has not failed me....yet...but I am expecting something to go poof at any moment. It would be nice if the program would just be fixed...and not just...different.

pbognar

guitardood

DCMonkey


Something I'm curious about is what happens when VST plugins and the Host app (ie: Sonar) are compiled against different runtime versions.

Exactly!  I'm sure that a lot of system flakiness could be traced back this, hence my argument for sandboxing apps.  At the very least, it would protect the O/S from getting hosed.




Best,
guitardood

Sorry for the late post, but I just started following this MS VC++ discussion...
 
Why is it then that there are some users who had X1d installed on their computer, installed X2, which seemed to be working ok, then patch up to X2a, and run into issues, so the go back to working in X1d because it is more stable / bug free.
 
If the MS VC++ libraries are the cause of the issues and affect Windows globally, why would X1d continue to function as it did initially?
 
Also Cakewalk themselves have said time and time again that there is no reason to uninstall a previous version prior to installing a new one.  You would think that they would be aware of the potential issues which could arise from if new libraries are deployed as part of each install.

I was not necessarily saying that the VC libraries were "the cause", just that they could be a potential cause.


As for Cakewalk knowing or not knowing of these types of problems, I have no idea.  I don't know any of them personally nor do I have even the slightest knowledge as to their qualifications.  I do know that writing an app of the caliber and complexity of a DAW like Sonar requires more than just Visual Studio experience.


It has been my experience, though, that a vast majority of programmers who utilize Visual Studio and MS' foundation classes couldn't program their way out of a paper bag without those tools and in many cases know next to nothing about the underlying architecture of the OS.  Not to insult anybody, as I don't know "every" programmer, but this has just been my experience.


If you want to read a bit about the problems of MS foundation, MS libraries and the type of code that can be created with a command line compiler and text editor, visit http://www.grc.com/news.htm.  Steve Gibson has been a long time critic of the unnecessary bloat and trouble most of Windows has brought to our lives as well as the dumbing down of the programmer community and also wrote some pretty nifty proof-of-concept apps just to show what could be done in the Windows environment with a few lines of assembly code.


Best,
guitardood

VariousArtist

guitardood


Just to add a little "why" to this:  Say Cakewalk is using version 1.3.0231 of the C++ libraries to develop Sonar and distribute that version's redistributable with Sonar.   Next you install VSampler (just a name I picked out of thin air) which hasn't been updated in a while and was written to version 1.2.812 of the C++ libraries and installs that version of the redistributable with VSampler, could potentially cause a problem.  Also, say you install SlickerThanSlicedBread Compressor which uses version 1.3.4821 of the C++ libs and redistributes that with their product, it will overwrite the versions used to create sonar and potentially create a problem.  This is not Cake's fault, VSampler's fault or STSB Compressor's fault. 

This is Microsoft's fault.  This problem has been plaguing windows systems since Windows95 with MSVCP versions being downgraded by installing older software or upgraded by installing newer software to the point that it sometimes breaks Windows as well as some previously installed application. 

They have sort of resolved this, somewhat, by at least providing different libraries for their major releases (i.e. MSVCP5 for version 5, MSVCP6 for 6,etc)  but unfortunately with bug fixes and windows updates, even a supposed sideways move from MSVCP7.231 to MSVCP7.243 could potentially break software if either a bug that was counted on is now "fixed" or a new bug was introduced. 

And to the doubters that say "it is not possible that installing sonar (or any other application which updates system-wide libraries for that matter) broke windows", think again.   This particular scenario makes it completely possible if a driver manufacturer wrote their driver software with MSVCP7.231 and now after sonar, it is MSVCP7.243 or any other possible disparity between the lib used to develop vs the currently installed runtime lib version, could potentially break their driver and/or service which could potentially end up in a BSOD and prevent booting. 

Again, not Cake's fault, not the hardware or manufacturer's fault, but good ole Microsoft.  But don't believe me.  Just do a quick google search for "msvcrt version resolved" or "msvcp version resolved" and read through some of the 1.2 million results regarding this particular issue.  I've been complaining about this for quite a while that sandboxing apps to have their required libs in their own space and leave the \windows\system32 versions alone, would probably resolve at least 25% of the BSOD's of the Windows world.  As would differentiating between drivers required for windows to boot (a la safe-mode) and drivers for other pieces of hardware which should loaded in a separate memory space and not be allowed to crash the entire operating system.  If I need my files, I don't care if the bluetooth driver has a problem, just get me to my files.  Unfortunately, instead of concentrating on these difficult to solve problems, MS presents us with Metro. 

Sorry for another rant in the same thread.  Just a real hot button issue for me.  Hopefully somebody appreciated the little bit of enlightenment. 

There are many evils lurking in the concept of "shared libraries" and I'd throw the registry in there as one of those "seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time" scenarios that went badly wrong.  

I agree with sandboxing an app around versions of libraries that app has been tested to work with.  I also think that too much of the Windows OS is overly complicated around the notion of supporting multiple users, when in fact the majority of us are the one and only user at our machine.  

Really, in order to install an app should be pretty much a copy of a folder/directory, and it shouldn't matter where you copy it too when running the app.  That would make installation and uninstallation a snap.  I know there are grey areas around settings and configuration etc., but I believe if we return to that basic paradigm of a folder copy and sandboxing as much as possible then we'd all be better off (developers, testers, users, ...), and start with the assumption that this is one machine with one user.

Btw, I worked at a company where they insisted on writing all their own C++ libraries and steadfastly refused to include any off-the-shelf DLLs or SharedObjects.  It created a lot of extra work, at times it seemed unnecessary and redundant,  but I have to say we had exceptional control over our environment.  No longer were we, or our testers or users subject to being blind-sided by some updates to external libraries beyond our control, many of which contained updates that were of no use to us.

These days the pace of development is so fast, and the nature of open-source coding providing such a wide array of shared input and testing, that it's just a fact of life that you live with those code dependences.  But I wonder if DAW software is ultimately better off trying to do everything from scratch with no other libraries.  My programming expertise doesn't go into those areas, so I wouldn't know the level of effort or practicalities involved.  I wonder what development paradigm the other DAW software vendors follow?  It might explain why some feel more snappy and responsive at times ...?

I'm very anti-library myself.  You have no idea what it took for me to break down and use a few "boost" libraries because I needed a solid serialization library and lacked some of the knowledge to build my own.


I've just been involved doing a little development in XBMC.  I'm having a real hard time understanding the mentality of some of the folks involved who seem to feel it necessary to debate about adding functionality to code that is at RC level and they have a show stopping bug that someone has provided a patch which only needs to be committed to the git.  If this is what programmers are being taught now days, we're sure in trouble.


Best,
guitardood

jamesyoyo


If anyone is interested in the final product of the song that caused all this heartburn, here it is:
Our Black Regalia

Nice track James.  Glad you were able to keep working despite the problems.  And again, sorry for turning your thread into a quilted mess.


Best,
guitardood

Hope some of this helps. :)

Right on, Danny. Perhaps I should start thinking Reaper for now if it's as stable as you say it is and save myself some cash. I like the idea of Reaper but I guess I have somehow adopted the silly attitude of "you get what you pay for" even though I of all people, being the stingy bleepstard I am, should know better. I had the demo installed breifly before I picked up Sonar but I couldn't for the life of me figure it out... however that before I had even built my system and hadn't started learning all about the way modern DAWs do stuff. I'm sure it would be much easier now that I've cut my teeth a bit with Sonar. I would very much like to go back to Nuendo but the price tag on that program is just WAY too much at this point so I figured Cubase would be a happy medium.

Anyway, don't let the more... erm... cranky folks around here get you down. I'm sure things will swing back to a sane place once we get a proper patch going. The hilarious part is during the initial X2 release through the Quickfix it seemed most people were reasonably calm and happy with the program. It was only after the a patch came out things exploded. Not sure whether that's because people were just accepting the flaws because it was new but unleashing when the patch didn't bring things up to speed or if the patch itself screwed everything up. I haven't even installed it because of all the weirdness since it's release and am currently plunking away at build 308 (quickfix) until the next patch. It's got it's quirks and there are lots of things that are broken in it but it's been getting me through and I find it easier than X1 to work with. I also find that when it DOES actually crash or hiccup it's not quite as severe as when X1 would crap the bed. Like when X2 crashes it closes easily and I can open it back up within seconds. With X1 a crash would quite often mean the program would freeze and not close for a couple minutes and I'd have to wait even longer to open it back up again or sometimes even have to reboot. I understand people's frustration but I'm not sure why it's gotta get so heated and personal around here. It took 3 full patches for X1 to sort itself out. I'm sure we'll have reasonably smooth operating DAW soon enough. Just a matter of applying some patience. Of course we also have sock puppet trolls throwing gas on the fire. Why people don't just mock or ignore those types of posts is beyond me.

Oh well. What do I know, eh? I'm just newbly n00b.

Take care, man and thanks for taking the time to respond.

;-)