Help Johan with Rompler expansion system

[Spogg]

Hi all

For some time now I’ve been helping Johan to make romplers in FS. I’ve come up with various solutions that have resulted in good plugins. These romplers are generally based around a single set of wavs external to the plugin and a preset bank baked into the plugin, with the possibility of loading more banks in the future.

But what he really wants now is way beyond my capabilities and I think would need a Ruby solution.

This is his text, in which I have tidied up the English, followed by my comments:

This is how the rompler is supposed to work:


When you first load the rompler, it should always load the Start Library expansion


And if it’s possible, if you change the expansion, then next time when you load the rompler plugin it should start with that expansion. Like you start your DAW, then load the rompler then it starts with the Start Library. And let’s say if I change the expansion from the Start Library expansion to let’s say “Bounce Expansion”, then next time you load the plugin it starts with the Bounce Expansion.


If that’s not possible, then it should always start with the Start Library expansion. Every time you load the plugin it should start with the Start Library, instead of being empty.


And it should work for collaboration as follows:
Let’s say I’m using FL Studio 9 and I have a friend who’s also on FL Studio 9. If I make a project with the same expansions as my friend has, then if he loads the project I made in FL Studio 9, it should work to open the project for him as well, if we have used the same rompler and same expansions.

By “Expansions” Johan means a folder containing a lot of samples in wav format. I believe an Expansion should also carry with it a bank of presets to accompany the wavs. Ideally this would be a single encrypted installable file with the presets and wavs embedded, like Kontakt can use for paid-for expansions.

2 examples of such a rompler would be Lethal:
https://www.lethalaudio.com/

or Nexus:
https://refx.com/nexus/

Clearly these pro synths write to the registry and probably create configuration files for telling the plugin what libraries/Expansions/Banks are installed at start up.

This is way beyond me, so if anyone can step up, Johan would be delighted.

Cheers


Spogg

[adamszabo]

I did the same thing with Viper and its easy. It saves the location of the external wav in a preset string. Upon opening a the synth, it reads the presets, which sends to saved file location to the wav loader primitive.

[Spogg]

Thanks Adam.
I already did that for him but it’s all the other stuff he’s asking for which has me stumped.

Cheers

Spogg

[adamszabo]

What I dont understand is what is an expansion supposed to be? Is it just a folder with individual wav files?

[Spogg]

Yes but it's wavs and presets. In Nexus and Lethal, for example, you add an "expansion" and it gets added to a "Library" along with additional presets.
So an expansion adds to the range of available wavs and presets available. You buy the rompler with a factory start library included, then you add expansions according to what you need.
Kontakt is similar but more complex, because it can run sophisticated scripts included with the new libraries. The script thing isn't needed beacuse a rompler is more simple.

It's beyond me to know how to make such a system.

Cheers

Spogg

[djbrynte]

Yep.

You should start with an start expansion. thats a folder with mybe 150 samples.

then you should be able to load 150 other samples. and then its these samples you will see.

And it should work with savings etc porojects.

ANd also for colab if some one wana open your porject.

[kortezzzz]

Using an additional PM can be the key for that. I use 2 preset managers in my plug-ins. One is the main and the second saves only the automation info to a separate file, so it's actually a single preset manager... (with different naming for the wireless "P" link). Never had an issue with that. In your case, you can create with the additional PM a kinda "internal registry system" that would register every step that is related to the sample packs that has been made by the user. This activity then would get registered behind the scenes and then get opened with the DAW's project's file.
Although It's sounds as a reasonable idea in theory, I have no idea how it gonna work in practice, but it worth trying.

[tulamide]

I don't see the need of a preset manager for managing expansions. With a carefully chosen layout on disk, it should be doable with green or Ruby.

1) There needs to be a central folder, right by the plugin's location.
2) In this folder, the expansion folders are placed
3) A small file is placed there too, storing the information, which expansion folder was last used
4) On startup, this file is read and the waves from the specified folder are loaded

The presets can just be loaded via preset manager. You can even automate it, because the bank loading you do manually from the preset manager gui is just a call to a file dialog that then sends the path to a text file prim (that sends to the P line). So, instead of a file dialog you can directly pass the path (that you know, it's in the expansion folder with a specific name, say, "bounce_prests.txt" or something) to the text file prim.

[kortezzzz]

Tula,
But the challenge here is to write the plugins data straight to the DAW's file format. Maybe I haven't understand you well, but how your solution would write the expansion's settings data to the DAW's saved file?

[tulamide]

There's no need to.
When the DAW saves the project, it asks each plugin for the current value of each exposed parameter (those that have a parameter linked to the plugin manager in Flowstone). The only thing that differs are the samples themselves, which are not part of the parameter management. They are loaded each time the plugin is loaded, so they are always correct. It's settings of, say, a filter, that's stored with the preset (and transmitted to the DAW when it asks for values prior to saving the project)