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Old 08-21-2019, 06:50 AM   #10
DKDiveDude
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AHarker View Post
I advise you to give each of them a quick try to get a feel for how they work for you. Ultimately if you are writing your own C++ DSP code then the limitation for that is with you. iPlug 2 would certainly allow you to do that.

iPlug 2 is designed with a few things in mind - firstly so that you write minimal code to get your plugin up and running - and certainly to start with you can concentrate on DSP and parameters only (that is something that was the case also in iPlug 1). The second relevant item is iPlug2 is *very* different to iPlug 1 in terms of graphics - full vector graphics support and a concentration on speed (depending on what backend you choose).



I'd like to point out several things here. There is no need to spend most of your time on GUI - that will depend on your plugin -you can even use the host provided egg-slider GUI without writing any code. iPlug 2 also has quite a few provided vector controls - you no longer have to use bitmaps. Xenakios - it doesn't sound like you've tried out iPlug 2 but hopefully you'll find things are quite a bit different now.

Ultimately these three things are trying to provide different things. JUCE comes with a lot of stuff, but with that you get a lot of DSP libraries (and other kinds of libraries) that you might have no useful and a whole ecosystem to deal with - on the other hand you can build complex apps with it. I have no experience of RackAfx expect reading about it, but some differences have been pointed out here. iPlug 2 aims to be relatively lightweight, permissively licensed and deploys to a wide range of options (including WAMS or web audio modules).

It's impossible to say which one will fit you best. JUCE or iPlug will let you write all your own DSP code and that should run the same in either. If you need lots of DSP library bits JUCE has more. If you want something that just makes the plugin side of things easier then iPlug 2 is worth considering. You can just clone the GitHub repo and try compiling the examples.

Alex (full disclosure - one of the devs on iPlug 2)
Thank you very much for that answer. I have downloaded your framework files via github, and since I have your attention I want to offer a few comments that might lead to some inspiration from you developers.

1) TrackAFX comes with an application, Windows or Mac. When creating or opening a project it start your C++ coding program and loads the appropriate files. One can very easily insert a wealth of graphic elements and with a click of a button insert the associated code into your project files. With a click of another button, again from within this App, one can click "Build" to compile the project, then click "Load" to test the plugin right from within the App, click "Unload" to return back to development, and repeat. One day when you get a bit of time you might want to check it out for some inspiration. The developer was actually a DSP teacher for many years, and found his students spent most of the time with the GUI instead of coding, which is why he developed TrackAFX.
2) Also the developer has made many tutorial videos.
3) I was quite surprised the iplug2 documentation folder in my unzipped computer folder, did not contain groups, classes, and files documentation. Also that information seemed a bit hidden on github, as at first glance the documentation folder there looked identical to my local one, until near the bottom of the webpage I clicked the link with the text "doxygen version here."

As I understand it VirtualCZ was made with iPlug2, so it must be pretty good. Now if only it had the great Development App like TrackAFX, as that seems very tempting for a beginner in DSP coding like me, who also want to spent most my time coding rather that developing the GUI.
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