Ableton Acquires Cycling '74

[ivarin]

oops, the last hope Live would become a stable environment. aaand it's gone!

they seem to be going to rebuild the whole Live application on Max/Msp. the only thing that never worked properly in Live now becomes the main trend there. what a pity.

skip that, go Flash!

[LOFA]

No sorry, if M4L hadn't been used so much to excuse not giving new (essential!) native devices...

Could you please give me an example of an essential native device that's missing? I must know!

Are you for real?!

I even mentioned the LFO in my post

And if you are now planning to go on a tired rant about how a LFO is not essential, I'll simply point out that neither M4L nor Live itself is "essential"

Anyway thanks, good talk...

It was a good talk. I'm gonna try to elevate it further. There's an infinite # of ways to create LFO's in mfl. There's also probably a hundred available mfl devices online. Without saying you are right or wrong, the implementation of max in live is sort of like the best LFO you could ask for. Without assuming anything about their priority list, I would bet that the best case situation for more possible LFO options is by breaking down walls between the company and supporting / making these features available to the user-base / developers.

FWIW, an LFO is probably the easiest type of mfl device to reverse engineer. If it's something that you care deeply about, I imagine it would be the most effective way to acquire what you are looking for.

https://www.google.com/search?q=lfo+in+ ... e&ie=UTF-8

[lowshelf]

I even mentioned the LFO in my post

Just out of curiosity, aren't short-length unlinked automation clips (better than) the device-independent native LFOs you seek?

/ducks /fastens seatbelt /raises blast doors

[TomKern]

Could you please give me an example of an essential native device that's missing? I must know!

Are you for real?!

I even mentioned the LFO in my post

And if you are now planning to go on a tired rant about how a LFO is not essential, I'll simply point out that neither M4L nor Live itself is "essential"

Anyway thanks, good talk...

It was a good talk. I'm gonna try to elevate it further. There's an infinite # of ways to create LFO's in mfl. There's also probably a hundred available mfl devices online. Without saying you are right or wrong, the implementation of max in live is sort of like the best LFO you could ask for. Without assuming anything about their priority list, I would bet that the best case situation for more possible LFO options is by breaking down walls between the company and supporting / making these features available to the user-base / developers.

FWIW, an LFO is probably the easiest type of mfl device to reverse engineer. If it's something that you care deeply about, I imagine it would be the most effective way to acquire what you are looking for.

https://www.google.com/search?q=lfo+in+ ... e&ie=UTF-8

This thinking is exactly why I'm afraid of this buy out, because I fear many at Ableton share it.

No a M4L LFO is not a good substitute for a native one at least until:
1.) Assigning the LFO to a parameter in Live does not limit me from modulating it via other means like with a controller or automation.
2.) Assigning a LFO to one parameter does not block me from assigning the same LFO to another parameter
3.) There is no more guess work if the next time I load my set, the settings of the LFO are preserved.
4.) Using the LFO does not spam the undo history anymore.

These are all limitations of the LFO delivered with M4L that exist, because it is a M4L device.

Besides the LFO is barely adequate. If Ableton wanted to design a good LFO they should have looked at the Fabfilter effects or Cableguys' MIDI Shaper. Those are great LFOs.

[TomKern]

I even mentioned the LFO in my post

Just out of curiosity, aren't short-length unlinked automation clips (better than) the device-independent native LFOs you seek?

/ducks /fastens seatbelt /raises blast doors

And how would you interact with the rate or the amplitude of the oscillation in a live situation?!

[ivarin]

wow i'm impressed one can defend m4l's LFO so hard))

LOFA, have you seen the LFO implementation in Bitwig, or Reaktor? within one click you adjust direction, depth and offset. and which is a pain in the ass when doing that in Live. and yes, i'm still able to tweak that parameter after it's been set under modulation

[LOFA]

This thinking is exactly why I'm afraid of this buy out, because I fear many at Ableton share it.

No a M4L LFO is not a good substitute for a native one at least until:
1.) Assigning the LFO to a parameter in Live does not limit me from modulating it via other means like with a controller or automation.
2.) Assigning a LFO to one parameter does not block me from assigning the same LFO to another parameter
3.) There is no more guess work if the next time I load my set, the settings of the LFO are preserved.
4.) Using the LFO does not spam the undo history anymore.

These are all limitations of the LFO delivered with M4L that exist, because it is a M4L device.

Besides the LFO is barely adequate. If Ableton wanted to design a good LFO they should have looked at the Fabfilter effects or Cableguys' MIDI Shaper. Those are great LFOs.

You make some good points, even if I disagree with some.

From what I can tell, what you are describing is something that can be done within mfl, but it's a case of quality control and implementation (which is put upon the developer, hobbyist or pro). In the long-run, creating a platform that affords the users to attain exactly what they want is far more efficient (imo) than having to dedicate a small company's development team to make tools and decisions, based on subjective / aesthetic assumptions about their customers and their needs.

I wonder where things stand with the undo history. There were limitations and workarounds but I don't know where things ultimately went.

I have my concerns too, because I rely on max professionally, and Live secondarily. It has the potential of being a very good thing for me, but should something bad happen it could suck a lot. On the plus-side, it's got me practicing OOP again, just in case.

[LOFA]

wow i'm impressed one can defend m4l's LFO so hard))

LOFA, have you seen the LFO implementation in Bitwig, or Reaktor? within one click you adjust direction, depth and offset. and which is a pain in the ass when doing that in Live. and yes, i'm still able to tweak that parameter after it's been set under modulation

I put some time into learning mfl. It's been helping me with my bills my since beta. I was fortunate enough at times to be put in a place where clients asked me for features that seemed impossible, but still somehow came together. It gives me confidence that all the things you described are achievable. Also, with some scripting, it really seems like the sky is the limit. So, I'm going back to practicing a bit of that right now.

Bitwig seems pretty cool. I commend them for optimizing features to account for things not offered in other DAWs. I might come around to it sometime down the road. Looks like Live is going to be exactly what I need for even longer than expected. Fingers-crossed.

[lowshelf]

And how would you interact with the rate or the amplitude of the oscillation in a live situation?!

Oh yeah live manipulation would deaden that approach. Unless, of course, you resigned yourself to live (life) largely consisting of a limited number of predeterministic events and possible moves; and so planned your set accordingly.

Reading the other posts I guess your native LFO isn't really some widget, it's the app-wide modulation matrix which some folks here dream about or reminisce about. A matrix with multiple LFOs, triggers, envelopes, step sequences, each routable to multiple destinations, with multiple inputs and scaling factors. Curiously, that reminds me of some other software, oh what was it now...

[TomKern]

This thinking is exactly why I'm afraid of this buy out, because I fear many at Ableton share it.

No a M4L LFO is not a good substitute for a native one at least until:
1.) Assigning the LFO to a parameter in Live does not limit me from modulating it via other means like with a controller or automation.
2.) Assigning a LFO to one parameter does not block me from assigning the same LFO to another parameter
3.) There is no more guess work if the next time I load my set, the settings of the LFO are preserved.
4.) Using the LFO does not spam the undo history anymore.

These are all limitations of the LFO delivered with M4L that exist, because it is a M4L device.

Besides the LFO is barely adequate. If Ableton wanted to design a good LFO they should have looked at the Fabfilter effects or Cableguys' MIDI Shaper. Those are great LFOs.

You make some good points, even if I disagree with some.

From what I can tell, what you are describing is something that can be done within mfl, but it's a case of quality control and implementation (which is put upon the developer, hobbyist or pro). In the long-run, creating a platform that affords the users to attain exactly what they want is far more efficient (imo) than having to dedicate a small company's development team to make tools and decisions, based on subjective / aesthetic assumptions about their customers and their needs.

Now you are just making excuses.
The LFO is a device made by Ableton and was advertised by them at the release of Live 9 (while forgetting to mention it won't be native ). This is not some free device by some small time hobbyist.
I gave you four huge issues that make the LFO barely usable. Issues that are the result of it being a M4L device, since these are limitations all M4L devices have.
Honestly I have a hard time even imagining that Ableton thought before the release of the LFO that those limitations will be acceptable to most of its user base. Yet here we are.

I don't have a problem with the M4L integration in general. More power to the people, like you, who profit from it.
What I do have a problem with, is it being used as a substitute in place of further development of Live proper.
A trend that will continue and now with this acquisition probably get worse.

That's why I'm less than excited about it.

[TomKern]

And how would you interact with the rate or the amplitude of the oscillation in a live situation?!

Oh yeah live manipulation would deaden that approach. Unless, of course, you resigned yourself to live (life) largely consisting of a limited number of predeterministic events and possible moves; and so planned your set accordingly.

Reading the other posts I guess your native LFO isn't really some widget, it's the app-wide modulation matrix which some folks here dream about or reminisce about. A matrix with multiple LFOs, triggers, envelopes, step sequences, each routable to multiple destinations, with multiple inputs and scaling factors. Curiously, that reminds me of some other software, oh what was it now...

Lol no, I'm not that greedy

I want a general LFO device on par with the ones in Sampler (for example) that I can assign to anything on the same track without any of the drawbacks mentioned above. This is bare bones, but it would make me happy enough.
What you describe would be a dream of course. Unfortunately that other software (not to be mentioned here ) has other drawbacks, some of them much more important to my workflow than a missing LFO.

[ivarin]

It gives me confidence that all the things you described are achievable. Also, with some scripting, it really seems like the sky is the limit.

sure, there's nothing impossible. one can take C++ and write another DAW from ground up. but since Live is a DAW, not an IDE, i'd like make sounds rather than exploring the limits of m4l or whatever.

what i tried to say is that i'm disappointed that Ableton seem to count on MAX more and more, given that it's a total inconvenience even in such basic things as LFO.

[Machinesworking]

wow i'm impressed one can defend m4l's LFO so hard))

LOFA, have you seen the LFO implementation in Bitwig, or Reaktor? within one click you adjust direction, depth and offset. and which is a pain in the ass when doing that in Live. and yes, i'm still able to tweak that parameter after it's been set under modulation

I don't think anyone is defending the current state of LFOs vs other programs, its more like all of you are bringing up how M4L isn't well integrated into Live, which IMO has a lot to do with it being a separate code base. Now that Ableton own Cycling 74, effectively owning the code, the implementation of Max in Live can be done on a much deeper level. All of you naysayers are completely missing that point.

Face it, Max 4 Live is now never going away, which after 5 years all of you should have come to accept as a fact. Now, it's entirely possible it truly delivers on its original promise, and Live becomes a truly impressive modular DAW.

In reality my guess is the implementation gets better, Cycling go deep into iOS and Android devices, Live gets semi modular, and the M4L integration gets much more stable. It should all be pretty cool, but if you're still hoping that Max 4 Live goes away and you never have to learn it or use it at times to do things then you're never going to be happy using Live.

[TomKern]

Well, we can obviously only comment on what we experienced in the past and that is neglect of Live for the benefit of the not so smooth integration of M4L.

Maybe the future will bring all of what you wrote, you seem to be very sure of it. I guess you must have special insider knowledge since your view is not supported by past experience.
Since we are already dreaming, maybe I finally get a pony too, yay

[ivarin]

Face it, Max 4 Live is now never going away, which after 5 years all of you should have come to accept as a fact. Now, it's entirely possible it truly delivers on its original promise, and Live becomes a truly impressive modular DAW.

that's the case. all these 5 years m4l's been proving it's instability and unreliability.

... and the M4L integration gets much more stable

what makes you think so? i see quite the opposite here. they hardly handle this level of integration, why on earth they're supposed to be more stable in deeper integration? on the contrary, instability of m4l will affect Live harder to my mind.
that is sad