1.1.6 is good. The module development practice is much easier compared to the 0.x.x thing a few years ago. Excellent.
2.x.x? I’m not sure what beyond the published is problematic. The competition has grown, true, but it is all most all closed source, and will likely never get the open modules developed.
As a developer, the docs could do with some extra description but there are also many examples on the open-source sites.
If hardware is copied without extra menus and things I expect porting to 2.x.x to be very easy.
I was wondering about oversampling “cables” today. Like polyphony but monophonic oversampling?
People are anxiously waiting for Rack 2 because it has been announced the VST plugin version will also be released then. I am not sure if anything will drastically change for people who would keep on using the standalone application version of Rack. I am hoping some changes/enhancements are going to happen, but who knows.
I think of all those albums that have been “almost finished” and “due out soon” for years and years. The Wrens follow up “The Meadowlands,” Chromatics “Dear Tommy”, Ye’s “Donda” (ok, not really waiting for that)…at least The Beach Boys “Smile” eventually saw the light of day in some form. Just wishing that VCV Rack 2 isn’t going to be like those lost albums that are perpetually just about finished but never quite get over the line.
Last update in the Dev Blog seem to be from June 15th, and afaik was more or less written because I had pointed out that the community, without seeing progress, was being left in a weird state where we didn’t know if we wanted to continue investing in the platform without knowing if VST support, better external clocking, etc. would every actually materialize. He had told me that he would try try to update the dev blog more and host periodic voice chats in the discord, neither of which I’ve seen come to fruition.
I have started making my own modules that I very much so want to sell, yet I’m uneasy about the future of the platform. The number of new, exciting modules has plateaued (at no fault of devs- largely I think most everything that can be done has been done) and I think without the push of the update this will continue to get worse. It’s not as though we’ve explored every sound, or that the old modules are suddenly bad, but I think a lot of peeople do get inpspired by trying something new. For me at least, some of my best patches happen when focusing on a new module or idea
100% this. A lot of the API refrence is like “here’s a function name, have fun!” and that leaves the place of needing to read GPL’d code as documentation, which if making a commercial module is very problematic. There’s also the sorta-problem of using NanoVG for rendering, for which there’s a VCV fork because the library is unmaintained. I know I’m having issues on Linux with framerate limiting (rack wants to render at like 3,000 FPS) that I imagine is partially casused by this, yet I don’t know how 2.0 could possibly use anything else without sacrificing compatibility.
I’m mostly happy with Rack, but I think it would be nice if small improvements in places that matter like this one would be added to 1.x, especially if they are already achieved and are now needlessly waiting for a v2 release.
Better MIDI sync and maybe some small bugfixes and improvements and I can wait for v2 a few more years
A VST would be mighty nice of course, but… well… I don’t know how to put this without seeming demanding or preaching new age gospel… , so let’s just hope everything turns out fine for VCV and Rack, preferably sooner than later.
Until then the standalone version is still one of the greatest pieces of music software to see the light of screen.
Of the new modules - and this isn’t to say what I’m not listing is bad - The only ones that have really excited me or lead me to new sonic places are Chopping Kinky, Percall, Satanonaut, Oppressor, and ShapeMaster, and tbh I don’t think I got as much out of Shape master as some others did. Maybe that’s because I’m used to the more immediate inteface of the hardware Acid Rain Maestro, I’m not sure, but regardless, it’s been a hot minute since anything has made me think “Oh my god I need to try this RIGHT NOW”
I never expected to see a piece of sound software as cool and fun as Rack in the first place. If an even cooler and funner one shows up that’s a bonus, but I’m already having a pretty good time