DP rebuild?

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 7:03 am

I could just imagine a Re-Write of DP and the crazy problems that would come with it. Hell, I'm concerned about the 64 bit issues. (Please don't post the 64 bit question here on this post. It will just take the whole post over)
Here's a link to the 64bit question, pietervd posted it
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 5361152922

well to be specifc...my latest question is why does having 3 or 4 instances of any instrument (mainly KONTAKT x3) in v-rack hog up way more CPU(like 80% more) than if loading each instrument into the sequence. This of course is a hassle as when i now change from chunk to chunk it has to reload EVERYTHING.

I didn't know that about a different cpu load in the V-rack, the chunks and Kontakt thing is a hassle. I just make a new seq nowadays.

The other problem I was having with more than one chunk is: My plugins won't show up in the fx inserts. The seq acts as if I'm inserting them in another chunk.

This has happened when opening old seqs that I was remixing.

I've separated the chucks into their own seqs. I had to be real careful not to erase the associated soundbites.

by the way DP runs pretty well on my I-Mac Intel Duo.
I don't expect it to be perfect, cuts down on the anguish.

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 7:26 am

Well, the 64 bit issues are precisely what will guarantee a complete rewrite. Apple pulled the rug out from under 64 bit Carbon support. To get past GO and collect their $200, MOTU will be required to rewrite DP in Cocoa. End of story. While the rewrite has been going on for some time, rumor has it that DP6 will be the first completely rewritten version. Whether that means Version 6.0 or 6.99, I have no idea. And besides that, it's rumor. Nobody ever knows for sure, yadda, yadda, yadda. But I've got my own reasons for believing it. I've been observing this process for some time, and I think the demos at NAMM showed us what we need to know. DP 6 will be Cocoa.

Shooshie

Timeline · Post by **Timeline** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 7:30 am

Shooshie wrote:To get past GO and collect their $200, MOTU will be required to rewrite DP in Cocoa. End of story. Shooshie

Well put Shooshie as the "collect $200" is exactly the upgrade costs.

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 7:57 am

Apple pulled the rug out from under 64 bit Carbon support

Do you mean they will no longer support anything less that 64 bit ?
or Carbon? or 64 bit Carbon? Man, what will that mean...I'll have to buy all new stuff, again?

I think I was the one to suggest not going into the 64 bit thing...
So... I ask a 64 bit question.

thanks for the info.

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 8:20 am

Well, no one HAS to buy anything new. I'm still on an "aging" PPC G5 Dual 2.3Ghz. Everything works fine at the moment and I'm making music.

I'd say that a working older system beats a new system with problems, any day of the week. I know a mastering engineer who is still on Mac OS9 and Sonic Solutions.

How much "better" would 64-bit apps sound? You can't qualify everything based on whether it's 64-bit. That's like saying that a convertor sounds great because the specs say it's 24bit/192khz. Specs alone don't determine whether the software sounds good.

Forget asking whether anyone on any forum has any "inside info" on rewrites or new products. Companies keep new product development tightly under wraps and if you're working on a "secret" project you have to sign legal agreements that guarantee you can't reveal any details of what you're working on. Violate one of those, you can be sued for everything you have, so anyone spilling the beans would have to be a complete idiot to do so.

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 8:44 am

How much "better" would 64-bit apps sound? You can't qualify everything based on whether it's 64-bit. That's like saying that a convertor sounds great because the specs say it's 24bit/192khz. Specs alone don't determine whether the software sounds good.

The link posted earlier is a good perspective on this.
Which I nabbed from the "summing"post.

Timeline · Post by **Timeline** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:12 am

Lets face it. We won't see much improvement with 64 but if we have choices for recording and reproducing verbs and any low level sounds which drop below 130db. it could be helpful. I for one think it will simply be DP written to work most efficiently in any of the new electroscapes.

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:47 am

Given the fact that DP6 now supports Cocoa plugins means they have changed quite a bit. However, the fact remains that in pure coding issues, Cocoa is NOT as efficient as Carbon. Objective-C has overhead associated with how it's message system works, and because of that, there can be *some* performance hits depending on how things are coded. Is this a big deal? No, as plenty of Cocoa applications SCREAM (and it's easier to code in) but let's be clear, Carbon is not causing slow down.

Will 64-bit require a complete rewrite? No. But it will take a lot of work going through and making it selectable between say 32-bit and 64-bit because I cannot imagine them make it fixed to one value for performance reasons alone. Not only that, if you've already finished a song in 32-bit, you might want to keep it there as you've already *mixed* with regard to any affect of using 32-bit to begin with.

I am not saying that DP doesn't need to be a bit more efficient, and it is clear Motu is trying to find ways to do this, but saying it needs to be rewritten is an absolute waste of time. Seriously. DP is based around a specific *environment* that people use and love. To change the basics of DP for speed purposes could and more likely will change the features that DP has. The reason DP works at the speed it does is more likely the freedom DP has in how it has been made. Compared to the likes of Logic, there are a LOT of things in DP that work better but clearly at the expense of speed.

Instead, I'd rather see Motu take the code they already have and figure out how to make it faster. Which, is what they are doing. Taking away features is just going to piss people off and that's what would happen with a complete rewrite because the architecture would be different more than likely and not behave exactly the same. I mean really, DP is VERY complex internally in terms of real time processing.

I look forward to see how DP6 works.

Timeline · Post by **Timeline** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 10:08 am

Nice perspective GP

I too hope a bit menu appears in 6 giving us 16-24-32-64 as choices.

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 1:25 pm

It's not about needing 64 bit, or whether 64 bit is better, etc. It's simply because Apple chose to reneg on their former promise to support 64 bit Carbon apps. We're not talking about merely 64 bit audio, but 64-bit apps and memory addressing. Therefore, all Mac developers who want to take advantage of 64 bit addressing will have to rewrite their code. DP had begun to feel kludgey over the years. It had nothing to do with the fact that it was written in Carbon, since "Carbon" wasn't around when it was begun. It had been through so many revisions and upgrades that it just felt unstable. And yes, it did feel slow, for whatever reason. Rewriting an app is always a chance to revise the code and make it more efficient. I'm hoping that's the case, as it is apparent that DP6 is quite different, and is using Cocoa type conventions.

Shooshie

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:02 pm

Just because the paint is a different color has no real connection to the engine under the hood

IAMLFO · Post by **IAMLFO** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:14 pm

Shooshie wrote:I'm hoping that's the case, as it is apparent that DP6 is quite different, and is using Cocoa type conventions.

Shooshie

Hey Shooshie,
You've mentioned Cocoa specific sides to DP6 before and I'm interested in knowing how things are changing (presumabely for the better

). Can you describe what some of them are and what benefit we should see from them? I've heard of Cocoa but I don't know anything about it outside of it being a new OSX framework for applications. Thanks!

-Kevin

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:27 pm

(I know you didn't ask me, but I thought I'd chime in)

Carbon is written in C++ whereas Cocoa is written in Objective-C. They are basically just two different languages both based on the concept of C. Apple stated long ago they were not meant to replace one another, but augment each other. However, their not porting carbon to 64-bit has to make on wonder.

The advantage of Cocoa is in development. Objective-C is a lot easier to read a lot easier to program in because of the way objects work. How messaging is handled. In the end, it means a lot less code can produce the same amount of what you see in an application for things specific to the operating system itself. These advantages come at a price because, as I've mentioned, Objective-C is not as efficient as C++, which even going further is not as efficient as C. Of course, moving backwards, in an operating system, the ease at which things are to program is just the reverse.

Programming in Cocoa, which I have done, and in Carbon, which I have also done, isn't going to change the CORE functionality. It will, however, change how the behavior between the different parts are going to operate. Also, it is no simple task. It's a major undertaking because the whole structure of the application changes.

The advantage of moving to Cocoa? Future ability at 64-bit OS level and also the ability to see Cocoa UIs for plugins which we do not have with DP5.

Shooshie · Post by **Shooshie** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:28 pm

IAMLFO wrote:
Shooshie wrote:I'm hoping that's the case, as it is apparent that DP6 is quite different, and is using Cocoa type conventions.

Shooshie
Hey Shooshie,
You've mentioned Cocoa specific sides to DP6 before and I'm interested in knowing how things are changing (presumabely for the better ). Can you describe what some of them are and what benefit we should see from them? I've heard of Cocoa but I don't know anything about it outside of it being a new OSX framework for applications. Thanks!

-Kevin

I don't think there's any intrinsic benefit to Cocoa. Just that DP gets rewritten, and it gives them a chance to clean out some cobwebs. The primary benefit of Cocoa these days is that Apple supports it. They're not supporting anything else at 64 bit, AFAIK.

I won't go into the telltale clues that tip me off that DP has been rewritten. It just invites disagreement. But so far everything I've heard supports my observations and vice-versa. I'm pretty confident that my observations are correct, but we'll never know for sure, will we?

Shooshie

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 2:43 pm

Well as I said, as a programmer I DOUBT they have rewritten the whole thing. They for sure rewrote parts of it, but the undertaking to rewrite every part of it would make no sense. Certain libraries they have developed can still be accessed depending on how they coded them. That's the beauty of using object oriented design.

Also, it's only the UI stuff that Carbon will not be 64-bit. Here is a response from apple:

Much of the Carbon API will still be available in 64-bit. The primary parts planned for removal are the UI portions of HIToolbox, which you likely don't use if you're using Cocoa for your UI.

This is why I believe they changed the UI stuff to Cocoa, but a lot of their *processing* code if you will can remain in Carbon AND will be supported if they go to 64-bit.