Rack development blog

The source code of VCV Rack 2 is now available to the public! :tada::partying_face::confetti_ball:

VCV Rack Community Edition is free (GPLv3+) software that anyone can review, modify, and share. Our intention is to allow plugin developers to test and migrate their plugins for 6 weeks or more before Rack 2.0 is released, while we collect feedback about the API and finish up its features.

Development builds

Until Rack’s ABI is declared stable, you must only load plugins compiled against your exact Rack version. We will offer occasional builds here.

The default user folder is named Rack2 on all OS’s, so installing Rack 2 will not interfere with your Rack 1 installation.

Bug reports and feature requests are welcome by contacting VCV support. Although we read and appreciate all of your emails about Rack Community Edition, we cannot guarantee responses except for Rack Studio Edition customers when released. Since the issue tracker on the Rack GitHub repository has not been an easy, straightforward, or organized solution for users and customers to open tickets, we have disabled this GitHub feature but will be keeping issue trackers open for open-source VCV plugins (such as Fundamental).

Release schedule

To give sufficient time to plugin developers to migrate their plugins, we guarantee the following minimum dates.

  • Oct 9 at earliest: Rack 2 Studio Edition pre-release licenses available to plugin developers and media.
  • Oct 23 at earliest: Declare Rack 2 API and ABI stable.
  • Nov 6 at earliest: Release Rack 2.0 Community Edition for download and Studio Edition for sale.

Please offer your API feedback before it is declared stable, to ensure that the Rack 2 API is suitable for your purposes.

Plugins not yet updated by plugin developers by the release date will be automatically updated if possible by changing their version to 2.migrated.X.Y.Z and attempting to build against the Rack 2 SDK.

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