Native Linux Support (maybe it is time)

[operator]

Dear Vojtech, dear Melda Team,

I would love to see native Linux support of your amazing suite.

As microsoft and apple are more and more reaching deeper and deeper into the privacy of their userbase I felt the need to finally start the process of shifting towards other options. As the new (still not 100% clear) policy of Microsoft left me in awe - I FELT the need to make a step towards a more trustworthy environment. I just feel violated by those companies scanning the content of my PC and THEN ALSO ranking/judging it/train A.i. with it - and also have the abbiltiy to shut down/lock down my PC remotly IF they feel it may violates their policy -> those terms are quite losly defined and are more than open for interpretation.

IF my PC ever gets locked down - who pays me the missed time my company was on lockdown... OR who can i speak to, to get back my companies data/content - i am the owner of it after all! With such (dystopian) terms I feel I have no other choise THAN standing up to this violation and showing my disgust BY not keep supporting them gutting my privacy with such an orwellian intend.

I need 100% control/ownership over my computer(operating system) and my+customers data. As a company I want to assure my customer that their data stays on my computer and is not scanned/stolen/spyed on BY other companies/competitors. It is crucial to me to have an operating system which main focus is to run my apps and buisness NOT an overarching A.I. spy who let me do work as THEY see as fit.

At the beginning of the year I started the process of shifting which will end in december with the purchase of a new studio-PC -> 100% Linux (hopefully). Funny enough 90%+ of my software in use for my company + hobbies are already Linux compatible. VS Code, Firefox, Thunderbird, Figma (webapp), Blender, Reaper, Bitwig, Davinci Resolve, OBS, Darktable, ToDoist, u-he, Vital, Bitwarden - are all long supported by Linux.

Unfortunatly two major players which are at the core of my buisness and hobby are not supported:
- Serif: Affinity Photo (which may seem to change soon as more and more are asking for it)
- Melda: Suite

and shifting operating system without them seem to be not a great idea .

Please Vojtech, please rethink the possibility of supporting Linux nativly - this would bring so much richness to the Linux-creative-sector. Maybe with recent A.I. Copilots etc. it could be managable to support it WHILE still being economicly viable - not sure how advanced the copilots are in this area .

With Microsoft and Apple who knows which A.I. is scanning our creative work and content on our machine... they say we will keep the copyright of our creations BUT do you really trust those words AFTER e.g. seeing Apple manuvering around the recent EU laws... their lawyers and influence are just too strong to try to control them. They need to train their A.I. and I guess the new microsoft policy was set in place so they can use us and our content to train their neural networks without the need to compensate us -> i feel taken advantage of... OR lets be honest: I feel gutted like a fish.

LINUX please

[Hexspa]

Yep. I'm waiting on Melda, Serif, and RME then I'm probably switching. There are a couple softwares that I might run a dual boot for but yeah Apple and Microsoft have more power than I'd prefer.

Might be a good time to hop on CLAP too. Non destructive modulation from the host is enough of a selling point.

[operator]

BTW -> there is a rumor that Windows 12 will change to subscription model - if you want the full experience (OneDrive, Wordpad, recorder, etc.)

[mevla]

I run all Melda plugins for years on Linux. I do not see the problem. Why would Vojtech spend time for prodicing Linux .so files ?

[operator]

I run all Melda plugins for years on Linux. I do not see the problem. Why would Vojtech spend time for prodicing Linux .so files ?

My main concern is reliability thanks to official support (or the lack of) and performance?

I saw videos of benchmarks where the plugin inside the bridge uses 4 x the CPU compared to running nativly on Linux.

As being financially dependent from my computer and the tools I use through them - I feel the need for native support from my tools. -> it would be a nightmare with a "five figure job" if suddenly your setup becomes unreliable -> even the fear from this is too much to bare. And i think native support has a much more reliable platform to build someting on than through some universal bridge.

What bridge/distro do you use?
How often do you have crashes with that bridge in use?


I know, whats the big deal you ask... --> I agree, I also installed Linux in a heartbeat on my private Laptop and seemingly all went very well - it is more than a pleasant experience -> Linux came a long way. I can only suggest people to use the new very stable and reliable Debian12.
BUT if you talk about professional use (which is ALWAYS intertwined with financial pressure) I become much more thoughtfull of my moves -> stability is ALL IMPORTANT. Therefore I take my time - a whole year- WITH an open end and the possbility to still stay with windows (at least on a partician inside my Linux machine)
Maybe the shift will take two years WHO knows... I only know it will happen and there is no turing back - every "ground" I a can conquer I won´t give back. I already made such a move/shift with Adobe->Affinity VERY succesfully years ago. At first I felt nudered with Affinity compared to Adobe BUT becoming an Affinity-ProUser (+ Affinity getting better and better) I EVEN prefer it now over Adobe. Thanks to my leap of faith I took I am now at a MUCH more pleasant place than before - much more independent and free -> and feedom is the best (self soothing) feeling there is.

[mevla]

My main concern is reliability thanks to official support (or the lack of) and performance?

When you talk about professional uses, are you actually earning your living creating music ? This has to be clear. Most people here, including myself, don't. Moreover, many are at the consumer stage, always buying plugins. It makes a significant difference when you earn your living relying on your music production tools.

I saw videos of benchmarks where the plugin inside the bridge uses 4 x the CPU compared to running nativly on Linux.

I have no idea about that as I look at the CPU performance of the tools I have in the setup I have.

What bridge/distro do you use? How often do you have crashes with that bridge in use?

I use Xubuntu 22.04 with yabridge and the wine version recommended by yabridge. However I'm not that much pleased with Xubuntu, although not for anything related to music creation. I think this is the last time I install Xubuntu. For next time it looks like MX Linux is more open.

In some 7 years I think now I haven't experience a single crash using Melda plugins on Linux, through many Linux distros and linvst before yabridge. I can say however that sometimes there might be a Windows synth failing, but that's still rare and thanks to Bitwig Linux, each runs in its own sandbox, so it's rare that a full system freeze happens.

Maybe the shift will take two years WHO knows... I only know it will happen and there is no turing back - every "ground" I a can conquer I won´t give back.

Yes and no. It's always possible to save all your tracks as wav files and load them in another DAW in another OS. For years I created with Bitwig Linux and mixed using Mixbus32C (also Linux native), mainly because it allowed me to change hats, from creator to mixer. The switch was made by exporting all tracks as wav files and loading them in another DAW. I did some collaboration like this where the DAW one uses does not matter at all.

I haven't used Windows in 26 years now and wasn't making music on Windows before that. So I do like Linux native VST and especially u-he synths and effects, which I own almost all. And it's nice to see from time to time newer VST sporting a Linux version although I'm not looking much at the market anymore. Too busy learning to use fully what I already got.

[operator]

[...]

I am a media-designer and provide small to medium buisnesses with support for their digital representation (website, social media, radio, TV, print). Mainly I am a web-designer BUT my customers know about my broad talents/hobbies and often are glad they don´t have to look for someone else JUST to handle their radio spot, create motion-graphics for displays in the showroom or as commercial clips, restorate audio from the video-shoot of the "other" agency who wasn´t capable enough, etc..

So yes, I use all those (earlier mentioned) software products in different professional scenarious. BUT I never could reach this kind of professionalism with music itself. -> But I see myself as very capable audio-engineer, sound-designer and music producer. Nowadays music is just a hobby for me -> BUT now and then it turns into a professional job just because of my knowledge about audio processing.


I am VERY glad to hear about your positive experience with Linux and Melda. Thanks for the detailed answer btw . Damn 26 years - that is quite some history -> you´re the man! I am going the debian route... I am not a big fan of Ubuntu because of their try to push "snaps" despite all other distros using "flatpak". I really like flatpak because it opens up edbian to install newest software... -> this was the only downside of Debian in the past. And "Debian12 stable" with GNOME just looks like all I´ve ever wanted.

During my research the last days I also found out about Adobe`s "Photoshop on the web" and "Illustrator on the web" which are getting better and better by the day. This could be a ("nasty") solution to bridge the gap until Affinity is running on Linux nativly (or stable through wine). Therefore making Melda the only real missing piece in my Linux-native-puzzle...

I also found out about the recent Microsoft Edge data collection scandal (which affects you even if you only use Chrome on Windows)... seems there is no month without apple or microsoft news about their practice of gutting the privacy of their customers.

--> HOW as a company CAN I write a GDPR data-policy or even assure data-privacy IF such data-collection is done withouth my knowledge... of course I wouldn´t be held acountable IF such a case would ever surface BUT damn - I MUST have the possbility to keep my company safe without having bad actors on the "inside"!!!

[mevla]

I am a media-designer and provide small to medium buisnesses with support for their digital representation (website, social media, radio, TV, print).

In that case you always have the fallback to dual boot Windows when you see something cannot be done on the Linux side. So, ... no stress ...

I am VERY glad to hear about your positive experience with Linux and Melda.

Don't tell anyone, Vojtech actually helped me at the beginning with a problem concerning MDrummer running in Bitwig Linux by sending me MDrummer debug versions that were generating log files. Log files that I sent back to Vojtech for troubleshooting. Anyhow, the problem was with a Bitwig optional feature, and was resolved since quite some time. I have the MComplete bundle, which is by far the best audio investment I've made.

Thanks for the detailed answer btw . Damn 26 years - that is quite some history -> you´re the man! I am going the debian route... I am not a big fan of Ubuntu because of their try to push "snaps" despite all other distros using "flatpak". I really like flatpak because it opens up edbian to install newest software... -> this was the only downside of Debian in the past. And "Debian12 stable" with GNOME just looks like all I´ve ever wanted.

Indeed about the snaps, mostly because of the 'security' crippling of features, eg. the snap version of firefox that can't even read the local Bitwig programming interface documentation html files. Since sometime I'm using librewolf instead.

As for the desktop manager I clearly prefer a scaled-down approach and although I haven't ran any tests, I have a hunch it also helps in having more resources available for Bitwig, yabridge, wine and VSTs. I use Xfce, hence Xubuntu since quite a long time, no matter which OS is underneath.

I've built Linux systems from scratch for (security) embedded products used daily around the world. And everything revolving around that, system functionality design, software design and implementation, doing various presentations for techies, handling security concerns with third parties, etc. Today I'm looking more at Golang which I find very nice for multitasking, and also at Raspberyy Pi and Pico devices.

I do not know about Adobe nor Microsoft, lately at least, so I can't comment on that. The best thing you can do is to work with the Melda VSTs and see how they perform for you, of course, but also, a desktop manager that doesn't take too much resources could help. I use a i5-3570 CPU @ 3.40GHz for audio creation, with 16 GB RAM. I do not have a latest CPU/Mobo and it runs fine. Note that Bitwig Linux running VST in sandboxes might be of some help. This can vary with other DAWs. If you use any synths, apart from MSF which is exceptional, you can take a look at u-he synths (Zebra2 being used by film composer Hans Zimmer) which are running natively in Linux and are great, especially for the warmth of their filters.

--> HOW as a company CAN I write a GDPR data-policy or even assure data-privacy IF such data-collection is done withouth my knowledge... of course I wouldn´t be held acountable IF such a case would ever surface BUT damn - I MUST have the possbility to keep my company safe without having bad actors on the "inside"!!!

Exactly. Not many people are addressing this aspect.

Cheers.

[operator]

If you use any synths, apart from MSF which is exceptional, you can take a look at u-he synths (Zebra2 being used by film composer Hans Zimmer) which are running natively in Linux and are great, especially for the warmth of their filters.

I am a big fan of U-he products... luckily, they provide a Linux version.
Also Vital (which is also Linux native) is a huge factor in my productions... it is such a great tool for a fast workflow. --> those two companies cover my synth needs for quite some time now and with Zebra3 will cover it for the next 10 years . Also, I am looking forward to Matt Tytel`s next product(s) (which most likely will be Linux native aswell).

Bitwig is such a great tool and is the most complete DAW for me personally... I worked with it from the day they released it until I changed to Reaper 3 years ago (which also have Linux version). Nowadays I bounce from one to another every few sessions... BUT mostly use Reaper.

MSF I use mainly as THE ultimate creative Sampler also for Physical Modeling stuff... and sometimes I use the FM Generator when I want to be nostalgic about FM8...

So Melda is really the only one missing in my Linux setup.

Don't tell anyone,

No worries... I don´t tell nobody.

[operator]

I can not understand any sane person who would support stuff like this:

New Windows Outlook-App shares users data with 772 external companies!!!

Also if you don´t pay subscription for Outlook (after paying 150,- for the OS itself) you will see adds in the UI -> which also can be disguised as regular emails in the Inbox. Really?! They will bomb users/employees with adds while checking buisness e-mails - WTF -> productivity killer.

In Germany there are already companies who forbid their employees to use the new outlook mail-app. But Microsoft is forcing their users into the new app - no matter if they like or not. I always hoped Microsoft will learn from Apple how to make a decent Laptop BUT they learned shady business tactics instead.

This is just a fraction of what is happening since quite a while now - windows is cracking down on their user´s privacy more and more...

[mevla]

In Germany there are already companies who forbid their employees to use the new outlook mail-app.

The years I worked in Germany, some 20 years ago, I was pleasantly surprised that there were Linux magazines sold in magazine stands in supermarkets. That was quite a good change from Canada, where Linux was unknown for all practical purposes to the general public.

It so happens that I actually learned a good deal about work planning while working in Germany. Not every German software company can be termed as ideal, but there's a basic level of quality that's assumed. While in Canada/USA, companies are hurrying up to customers, shuffling work items here and there to please as much as possible, with whatever side effects that has on quality and work/project distribution