[Ardour-Users] Ardour 2.8 released

[Paul Davis]

I am pleased to announce the release of Ardour 2.8. As has been
previously announced, the 2.X series is now in a state of "feature
freeze" so that we can try to concentrate on Ardour 3.0, but as a
gesture of thanks to the community for the support during February, I
wanted to release this mostly-bugfix version that also comes with a
couple of significant features. These include much more reliable VST
support on Linux, track/bus templates and, with some important
qualifications, AudioUnit state and preset handling. See the download
page (http://ardour.org/download) for actual download links.

New Features
=============

    * Track/Bus Templates (see below)
    * Distributable VST support (see below)
    * VST preset handling
    * VST chunk handling
    * AudioUnit state & preset handling
    * new playhead-to-{next,previous}-region-boundary variant commands
that ignores track selection (on Linux, Windows-LeftArrow or
Windows-RightArrow; on OS X, Ctrl-LeftArrow or Ctrl-RightArrow)
    * New, thoroughly edited Spanish translation
    * New "accurate" crossfade icons

Notes on new features
====================

Track/Bus Templates
-------------------------
Track/Bus Templates allow you to save the configuration of a track or
bus (input, output, plugins, edit/mixer groups and more). Then re-use
that same configuration in the same or other sessions to quickly setup
new tracks and busses. Got a preferred way to handle vocal tracks?
Click on the track/bus name in a mixer strip, and select "Save as
template" from the menu. Enter a name. Done. The next time you create
a new track/bus, you will have the option of using any existing
templates.

Distributable VST Support (most for packagers)
--------------------------------------------------------
Ardour now uses the Vestige header file to allow compilation with VST
support on Linux. We believe, given the reverse engineering of the
Vestige header, that there is no more need to fetch the VST SDK from
Steinberg in order to build Ardour with VST support, and it is
possible to distribute all source code associated with VST support.
This means that distributions are free to compile and release packages
of Ardour with VST support. Linux Packagers: please do not call such
packages "Ardour". They should always be named in a way to make it
clear that they contain VST support - Ardour with VST support is not
actually a Linux program at all (its a small Windows executable that
is linked against some Linux libraries, run by a shell script that
invokes Wine). It is critical that users have the choice to install 1
or the other (or both, if possible). To repeat, Ardour with VST
support should not be packaged as "Ardour". I suggest "ArdourVST" (or
ardourvst, for the case-insensitive). Please note: VST is a trademark
of Steinberg Soft- und Hardware GmbH.
AudioUnit state & preset handling

Ardour now saves and restores AudioUnit plugin parameters, and can
save/load AU Presets, and share these with other software on OS X. We
will get new OS X binaries online very soon, but please note that this
functionality will not be available without either being or becoming
an existing Ardour financial supporter. An upgrade that includes all
other fixes and features mentioned here will be available for free if
you insist on not supporting the software. This will all take shape
once we switch to the new website which I hope will take place next
week (March 30th-April 3rd).

Fixes
=====

    * Correct handling of Shift- shortcuts on OS X
    * Fix confusion with Ctrl/Cmd/Option on OS X
    * Cmd-, now shows Preferences window on OS X
    * Removing a track/bus that was visible in the editor mixer strip
causes the editor mixer strip to move to the next track/bus
    * Default click output is dual mono (2 outs), not mono (1 out)
    * Fix ordering of editor & mixer displays when order in the other
window is changed and sync-editor-mixer-order is enabled.
    * If we attempt to move beyond the current limit of the horizontal
scrollbar, change its upper limit so that we keep scrolling (fixes a
bug with playhead tracking beyond the current session end)
    * Standardize sizing of ComboBoxSelectors throughout the GUI
    * Fix crash when renaming a track after deleting a plugin that had
a visible GUI/editor window
    * Make "consolidate range" and "bounce range to region list" not
apply processing to the original audio.
    * Added variants of "consolidate range" and "bounce range" which
do apply processing.
    * Fix potential for clipping when use Transpose or TimeFX
    * Standardize some menu actions across CD and loop/punch rulers.
also allow right-click drag to create ranges, which may be more
discoverable than ctrl-click drag because the other rulers already use
right-click for creating markers
    * "Mute region" shortcut operates on all selected regions
    * Fixes for crossfade clicks
    * Fixes for gcc 4.4
    * Fix crash when sending MIDI feedback with MTC enabled
    * Allow dragging of automation lines
    * Preserve sufficient significant digits when saving automation
events to disk
    * Quantize shuttle speed changes to whole semitones when shuttle
in semitone mode
    * Use region sync points correctly for grid and playhead motion
    * Fix subtle bug when playing plugin automation that could
sometimes lead to crashes and memory corruption
    * Use Vamp 2.0 and Rubberband 1.3 (includes an important fix for a
potential audible issue when stretching)
    * Fix freeze progress bar display
    * Fix potential crash caused by multithreaded execution of plugins
while "freezing" a track
    * Make name-click to toggle plugin active state show up via the
bypass button state in the GUI
    * be willing to load some additional types of AU plugins,
including AUNetSend and AUNetReceive
    * Context menu-driven operations on ruler bars now cause things to
be added in the right place (e.g. new markers)
    * Fix a crash that occured while dragging a region after a split
    * Do not cache JACK port buffer addresses, to permit operation
with experimental versions of Jack2.

Contributors
==========

Carl Hetherington, Colin Fletcher, Sampo Savoleinen, Lincoln Spiteri,
Dave Robillard, David Taht, Markus Schwarzenberg, Ben Loftis, Martin
Profittlich, Stephane Letz, and Head Grunt Paul Davis