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Old 02-06-2015, 12:42 PM   #1
Lannister
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Default What's the deal with keeping the download so small?

Seen some discussion here and there where download-size pops up, and the need to keep it small.

My question is, why?

In this day and age of broadband, does it matter if the download/install is 20MB or 200MB (with Python bundled for example).
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Old 02-06-2015, 01:08 PM   #2
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I dont use Python, so its pretty safe to say that i, for one, wouldn't be too keen on downloading an extra 190Mb of stuff i won't use.

Plugins, Themes, Extensions, Runtimes/Libaries, etc etc are what would be considered "user optional".
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Old 02-06-2015, 01:16 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lannister View Post
Seen some discussion here and there where download-size pops up, and the need to keep it small.

My question is, why?

In this day and age of broadband, does it matter if the download/install is 20MB or 200MB (with Python bundled for example).
It certainly matters for Cockos themselves, as they offer the full product for download for anyone without paying. It's not free to offer downloads at the scale Cockos must be experiencing...(That said, I personally find the issue of download size a bit annoying since I could very well download much more without too much issues, if it meant I'd get the best possible product. At the moment, I often wonder if Cockos's mission to keep the download size small means the product remains suboptimal.)
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Old 02-06-2015, 01:32 PM   #4
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The actual program (compiled code) generally takes up very little space. It's actually somewhat mysterious how other DAW manage to make the downloads so big. (Graphics and sound files of various descriptions make up the bulk of it I imagine. Loop libs and what not. The so called value added stuff that reaper doesn't have much.)
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Old 02-06-2015, 01:43 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lannister View Post
Seen some discussion here and there where download-size pops up, and the need to keep it small.

My question is, why?

In this day and age of broadband, does it matter if the download/install is 20MB or 200MB (with Python bundled for example).
Because it lets users install ONLY that which matters to them. It's one of my favorite Reaper 'features'!
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Old 02-06-2015, 02:19 PM   #6
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Why encourage software 'bloat'?

There are enough programs out there (ahem, Microsoft) that have grown to unreasonable size without any real added value to the users.
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Old 02-06-2015, 02:19 PM   #7
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FWIW, the download size has almost tripled since v3.

Anyway, since REAPER is only available as a download, size does matter to some degree. That's not so much about bandwidth-to-pay by Cockos, it's more about the rather frequent updates, the non-incremental update scheme and keeping that a feasible thing outside of Scandinavia, metropolitan areas and other places that have a better-than-average bandwidth supply. Many people in rural areas, in particular in developing countries (like Germany ) still don't have appropriate broadband coverage, or only at excessive costs via mobile networks, with plans between 300 and 30000 MB, or they are stuck with old phone lines giving them hardly more than dial-up speed. If I interpreted the numbers on WP right, this is still the majority of the world population.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenakios View Post
(That said, I personally find the issue of download size a bit annoying since I could very well download much more without too much issues, if it meant I'd get the best possible product. At the moment, I often wonder if Cockos's mission to keep the download size small means the product remains suboptimal.)
I think there are countless examples proving that size and quality of a software are completely unrelated to each other, and other examples that imply their relation is just the other way around. REAPER is as big as it needs to be, functionality is not proportional to size, you should know that.

I don't know if you can call that a "mission", but there is both some necessity and some...how can I put that...engineering pride to make the code efficient. This in turn does not imply that there's an impact on whatever you mean by "suboptimal" at all - if anything this helps having the option to "up-optimize" the software because its core is small and therefore there's room to fit in whatever you mean by that.
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Old 02-06-2015, 02:23 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lannister View Post
In this day and age of broadband [...].
That may be true for you and me, but it certainly isn't true for everyone. And even where broadband is available, it isn't necessarily affordable to everyone.

Also, many REAPER users simply hate bloatware, and I guess Cockos does so as well.
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Old 02-06-2015, 02:52 PM   #9
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Also remember that many software's come with extra copy protection schemes, which can be double the code of the program itself.
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Old 02-06-2015, 02:54 PM   #10
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I use a dish data plan for my internet. I greatly appreciate the small size.
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Old 02-06-2015, 04:40 PM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baltasar Gracian (1601-1658) in The Art of Worldly Wisdom
Good things, when short, are twice as good.
I like this idea applied to software.
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Old 02-06-2015, 05:28 PM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lannister View Post
In this day and age of broadband ...
Not everyone had access to fast broadband. Try living in regional Australia, for example (or, in many cases, suburban Australia for that matter).
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Old 02-06-2015, 05:53 PM   #13
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Originally Posted by nicholas View Post
Not everyone had access to fast broadband. Try living in regional Australia, for example (or, in many cases, suburban Australia for that matter).
Exactly. I live in the Adelaide Hills and rely on my phone for Internet access. I have 2.5 GB per month. That is one of the reasons I don't jump in and review everyone's songs and watch the youtubes people post. I simply don't have the data allowance.
I greatly appreciate the small download size of REAPER.
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Old 02-06-2015, 07:56 PM   #14
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Originally Posted by ReaDave View Post
Exactly. I live in the Adelaide Hills and rely on my phone for Internet access. I have 2.5 GB per month. That is one of the reasons I don't jump in and review everyone's songs and watch the youtubes people post. I simply don't have the data allowance.
I greatly appreciate the small download size of REAPER.
Japers thats rough!

I have fiber optic cable and I'm in the middle(ish) of nowhere.They're gonna be rolling out 1gb/s broadband in Dublin soon.
MIne is a paltry 100mb/s

On topic..I can totally see why it would be a matter of great pride to the lads that the download is so small.
Thats some slick coding..when you think of what reaper does.
No wonder I have 1ms latency..its a programming work of art.Ultra efficiant
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Old 02-07-2015, 04:20 AM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ReaDave View Post
Exactly. I live in the Adelaide Hills and rely on my phone for Internet access. I have 2.5 GB per month. That is one of the reasons I don't jump in and review everyone's songs and watch the youtubes people post. I simply don't have the data allowance.
I greatly appreciate the small download size of REAPER.
Sad but true. NBN alas is an acronym for "No Broadband Network." If you want decent broadband, hop across to New Zealand ... or Indonesia, or Cambodia, or ... well anywhere really.
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Old 02-07-2015, 06:03 PM   #16
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Sad but true. NBN alas is an acronym for "No Broadband Network." If you want decent broadband, hop across to New Zealand ... or Indonesia, or Cambodia, or ... well anywhere really.
Yup. Don't even need to be rural in Australia to be 'out of reach' I'm 10 minutes drive from Perth city with no adsl or fibre of any variety.
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Old 02-07-2015, 06:46 PM   #17
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BTW: as a matter of policy, on performance sensitive code, we always choose speed over size. Usually smaller code is faster code, though.
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Old 02-09-2015, 01:10 AM   #18
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Originally Posted by Lannister View Post
In this day and age of broadband, does it matter if the download/install is 20MB or 200MB
In this day and age with so many men out there with 10+ inch penises why would a woman want a guy with an average 6 or 7 incher?

Remember it's not the size of the code that matters.., it's what you can do with it.
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Old 02-09-2015, 01:01 PM   #19
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I love this thread! Someone complaining that the Reaper package is TOO SMALL! Thought I'd never hear this one in a million years. It's usually just the opposite in most forums -- all about bloat and huge unneeded extras, all that ...


Reaper: a zillion teeny weeny text files!
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Old 02-09-2015, 01:11 PM   #20
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I know very little if anything about coding in any practical way but I am always impressed, if not dumbstruck, by how small the download is and how fast I can install a new version; not to mention that I can blindly upgrade without having to worry about bugs that may interrupt workflow.

Good gracious, what a world of difference with, for example, Pro Tools. PT users know what I'm talking about.

For me personally size doesn't really matter (downloading and installing Sibelius Sounds now, a whopping 23 GB; download took an hour, unzipping another hour) but not everyone has super high speed internet.
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Old 02-09-2015, 01:34 PM   #21
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Originally Posted by peter5992 View Post
I know very little if anything about coding in any practical way but I am always impressed, if not dumbstruck, by how small the download is and how fast I can install a new version; not to mention that I can blindly upgrade without having to worry about bugs that may interrupt workflow.

Good gracious, what a world of difference with, for example, Pro Tools. PT users know what I'm talking about.

For me personally size doesn't really matter (downloading and installing Sibelius Sounds now, a whopping 23 GB; download took an hour, unzipping another hour) but not everyone has super high speed internet.
Good point. Yes, I actually think my jaw dropped when I saw my very first Reaper Install download. ([edit] I had just come from having Cubase 5.)
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Old 02-09-2015, 08:54 PM   #22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by peter5992 View Post
I know very little if anything about coding in any practical way but I am always impressed, if not dumbstruck, by how small the download is and how fast I can install a new version; not to mention that I can blindly upgrade without having to worry about bugs that may interrupt workflow.

Good gracious, what a world of difference with, for example, Pro Tools. PT users know what I'm talking about.

For me personally size doesn't really matter (downloading and installing Sibelius Sounds now, a whopping 23 GB; download took an hour, unzipping another hour) but not everyone has super high speed internet.
Yes, all you need to do is to try and update some other major DAW, and you'll instantly realize why they only do version updates once a year! It's like an all-day (or all-weekend) project to update PT etc.
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Old 02-09-2015, 09:27 PM   #23
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Yes, all you need to do is to try and update some other major DAW, and you'll instantly realize why they only do version updates once a year! It's like an all-day (or all-weekend) project to update PT etc.
I assume you have a fairly slow connection... It only takes me around ~30 minutes to update PT usually.
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Old 02-09-2015, 09:59 PM   #24
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+1 for keeping the downloads small.
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