Knowing that you know the APIs of Mac OS X too, do you still see some things lacking in the current Linux APIs ?
I think that the low-latency work being done in the kernel, the latest LADSPA work, and Jack work by Paul D, pretty much levels the playing field technology-wise. Same with driver design, although OSX user-space driver support is pretty bitchin' when it comes to doing things like USB i/o and such. (I'm sure there's something similar for Linux, though...)
I will say this: it is possible to target both OSX and Linux platforms at the *same* time when doing audio app development as long as you're not doing any fancy OSX-specific GUI stuff. The API's for audio processing are compatible enough to where a decently organized source-code project could use CoreMIDI on OSX, or MidiShare under Linux (by way of example), and still have a lot of common code between them. Just look at Audacity for an example.
The ability to deliver both Linux and OSX versions of an audio app should not be underestimated, also...
Interestingly enough, I think both OSX and Linux are about at neck and neck in the apps department. The ability to port Carbon apps gives OSX an edge, but the fact is all the pieces are in place now in Linux for some seriously productive tools to be written. Same as OSX. If Paul Davis and crew can build Ardour out of the API's they've forged for Linux, then so too can Digi build a Pro Tools for Linux... not that they ever would, but the fact is: Linux can do it now.
I must say I really like the jack api and ladspa. One thing that is unfortunate (others would call it a strength), is the lack of a unified set of widgets we could use to build plugin guis from (or any application for that matter).
I don't know what you're talking about. It is very easy to write cross-platform GUI widgets which can be used in both Linux and OSX ... whats hard is implementing GUI widgets which work within the relative frameworks imposed by both environments if you stick to the "Developer Way in OSX", but what I'm finding is that its possible to maintain complete API compatability between Linux and OSX and still write powerful audio processing apps that work well in both environments.
One thing to be careful is the blindness that can occur when searching for GUI toolkits - the most obvious ways of doing it cross-platform will be hidden from you in your search for "complete GUI toolkit"... any "complete" GUI toolkit will probably end up enforcing its own architecture on you, and that's just the wrong way to look at it if you want to maintain Linux/OSX compatability.
When I look at OS X I see consistency all the way (besides the high price which is also hard to ignore ;).
Consistency in a user interface is one thing. A user interface which works very well and which becomes popular overnight is another thing entirely.
Whenever I think about GUI toolkits, I always try to learn the lessons which Kai's Power Tools taught us in the early 90's. Consistency in a GUI is no substitute for a well done task-designed GUI.
Yes. I was amazed with Stanton pioneering their Final Scratch on Linux, but coming to think of it, it is all about total control. Using some sort of live cd distro, you can avoid a tech support hell supporting operating system bugs, while you should only be giving support for your own bugs.
Linux is ideal for this sort of thing.
What I really crave for, is a affordable general purpose DSP card, with a decent driver for Linux, to experiment with.
They are out there. You can find DSP cards for Linux, quite easily, if you do a bit of searching. There's an Extended CSound DSP adapter which works quite well with Linux.
In summary, from a professional audio developers perspective, I'd say that Linux is nearing readiness for prime time, and all it will take is one or two pretty heavy apps to be released for folks to realize this ... I watch Ardour with baited breath, anyway!
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Jay Vaughan r&d>>music:technology:synthesizers - www.access-music.de/
