Finding a Missing Plugin Used within a Project

[Ripple Point]

I recently migrated to mac and so some plugins I have dropped in the process and am no longer using. When I open one of the projects I was working on it tells me that a vst plugin couldn't be found (which is correct since I didn't install it on the new machine) however I can't where the plugin is anywhere within the project. I have meticulously looked through each track/return/master with no luck. I am wondering if there is any way to do a search to find the plugin in question and delete it so I stop getting this error message.

This wouldn't normally bother me but this project only opens 10% of my attempts to open it without crashing and I am thinking that it could be because of this missing plugin issue.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

[Tarekith]

Usually they still show as a blank device on a track, sometimes folded so maybe that's how you're missing it.

[Stromkraft]

I can't where the plugin is anywhere within the project. I have meticulously looked through each track/return/master with no luck.…
Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

It might be easier to find with the ShowDeviceSlots setting. I don't recommend keeping this on as it has been known to cause severe issues and is in fact an unsupported feature that hasn't been fully implemented, but for a quick overview need like yours it may be useful. There's a limit on how many devices will show in each strip.

[jestermgee]

Though you are on Mac this may be of use to PC users

PlugView

I use it often especially on old projects. Lists all the plugins used in a project and also details missing ones, name, version etc. Hasn't been updated in a while but still works.

[tintala]

Its a real PIA to find missing plugins especially if you have a ton in the set. Youll need to scour every track , really well, they are blank....its there. find it.

[Ecleverse]

Hello,
I found that .als file (verified for Live 9.7) is gzipped xml.
So on linux, I'm using the command:

Code: Select all

cat myfile.als | gunzip | egrep "<.*Track |EffectiveName|PlugName" | sed -e 's/^[ \t]*//g' | less

Example part of the output:

Code: Select all

<AudioTrack Id="81">
<EffectiveName Value="VOID" />
<GroupTrack Id="26">
<EffectiveName Value="Drums" />
<EffectiveName Value="Chain" />
<PlugName Value="ValhallaRoom" />
<PlugName Value="SPAN" />

So you can roughly see where plugins are used (first search for the plugin name, then upwards for some *Track* and EffectiveName tags).

I haven't tried in Windows, but probably you can use 7Zip or similar to unpack the .als file (do it on the copy)
and then free Notepad++ or just Internet browser to open the resulting xml and search for interesting data.
This xml can be quite big, but it's possible to find what is required.

As it's just XML, should be possible to write simple tool that will show the results some nice way,
it could even be some html + javascript that will show tracks layout visually with plugins listed.

[twobob]

Hello,
I found that .als file (verified for Live 9.7) is gzipped xml.
<SNIPPED>
So you can roughly see where plugins are used (first search for the plugin name, then upwards for some *Track* and EffectiveName tags).

I haven't tried in Windows, but probably you can use 7Zip or similar to unpack the .als file (do it on the copy)
and then free Notepad++ or just Internet browser to open the resulting xml and search for interesting data.
This xml can be quite big, but it's possible to find what is required.

As it's just XML, should be possible to write simple tool that will show the results some nice way,
it could even be some html + javascript that will show tracks layout visually with plugins listed.

On a windows box using gnu win builds http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/coreutils.htm

Code: Select all

gunzip 1.2.4 (18 Aug 93)
grep (GNU grep) 2.4.2
cat (GNU textutils) 2.0

So we can do the following to get a similar result to above.

Code: Select all

cat test\test.als | gunzip | grep "<.*PlugName\|EffectiveName" | sed -e 's/^[\t]*//g'

some poking through the structure armed with this info would likely reveal the culprit as previously indicated by Ecleverse

Thanks Ecleverse!

[Valery_Kondakoff]

I created M4L device with populates the list of VST/AU plugins and M4L devices used in specific liveset: Plugview
https://youtu.be/wdl3eepiWCA

[Sean Cusson]

I bought PlugView which is great at listing the plugins. The issue though is that you can't do anything with the info other than scroll through a (at times) very long list using a very small device window. This would be a project management powerhouse if the text could be copied and/or exported to a doc file.