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New Red Hat Multimedia Oriented Distribution
ezadro writes "I just spotted this article at LinuxToday about Redhat being directly involved in a new distribution that will be known as ReHMuDi, which stands for Red Hat Multimedia Distribution." The goal seems to be
a system for professional audio composers and engineers. Don't expect it
for awhile- they have 24 months scheduled to do it, although it looks like
releases will start by the end of 02.
this seems awful similar to the Debian Multimedia Distribution slashdot covered a awhile ago?
That's ok, Jesus likes me anyway.
Can't wait to see this, I hope that it is headless, and can be controlled by pedals and synths like a Roland box. If small linux boxes can duplicate the power and features of sage sound enquipment, it will make for some cool possibilities.
/., retinas burn...
Too much
Linux is a great server OS. It's even a great desktop OS, if you know what you're doing. But professional audio?
:)
It's nice to dream, but for now and for the forseeable future, the software just isn't there. There's barely enough professional audio software for Windows... Linux just doesn't compete.
Until the software's written, there's no point in making a distro to pretend that it is.
Besides, about 98% of professional audio tweaks use Macs. The other 2% use Amiga.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
I think this is a cool project, and I wish them the best of luck. However, the article failed to mention how Red Hat would be making money off of this. Selling support packages doesn't seem to work. And since the article says that the product will be distributed free of charge, they can't make money that way either. I suppose that they could sell boxed copies, but I don't know anyone who actually buys those (I just DL the ISOs).
Can someone who knows more than me explain how they hope to profit off this project?
Steve
Actually they work together with Debian guys. Here's some information from http://www.agnula.org/:
AGNULA's main task will be the development of two reference distributions for the GNU/Linux operating system completely based on Free Software (i.e. under a FSF approved Free Software license) and completely devoted to professional and consumer audio applications and multimedia development. One distribution will be Debian-based (DeMuDi) and the other will be Red Hat-based (ReHMuDi). Both will be available on the network for download and on CD.
expand the market by makeing a much cheaper solution that is useable by just about anyone. It's not unthinkable that they are trying to come up with a product that will be geared towards the ever growing number or DJ's and musicians. There would probably be a greater number of musicians if the tools were cheaper and easier to use. I'm just takeing this from the quote that you used, expanding music further and geard towards music professionals kinda gave me that impression.
I've been paying attention to AGNULA for a while now and used DeMuDi (the debian based audio distribution) for some time. While the project could definitely use some serious corporate funding, we really don't need Red Hat Making Life More Difficult
Ohh I get it. rehmudi... remedy.
Man, that's a bad acronym.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
No, the worst name still has to be "Gnu", as in "Gah-new". What moron decided on that name?
*Yes, I know which moron. It was a joke.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Redhat also announced its complex innerworkings of its business plan regarding their multimedia distribution. The general outline of the plan is as follows:
1. Make Redhat Multimedia Distribution.
2. ???
3. Profit
Hopefully this distro will encourage companies like
steinberg (cubase) emagic (protools) to make their software available for linux.
I doubt it though, but if it does I can imagine myself sitting behind a rocksolid computer in the studio with a cool desktop manager.
I won't be running redhat but gentoo, unless ofcourse the redhat people and the software manufacurors decide that the audiosoftware will only run under this distro.
As a Musician, if Redhat can manage to bring the right tools, such as fruityloop and reason like tools, something to edit stuff like protools, etc, and make it all open source.
This could really help linux, I know I'd love to be able to make my music in linux. I'll buy the redhat multimedia linux if its reasonable in price, meaning under 200 bucks. Redhat should also provide services geared towards the needs of musicians, maybe even create a peer to peer music sharing network to allow musicians to share their music in an open fashion.
Oh by the way, Redhat if you are reading this and Need a beta tester, please reply
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
We know the software is not there, if Redhat makes the software, it can work.
We need a fruityloop or reason like tool, We need a protools like tool, a cakewalk like tool, and a file sharing tool so we can create music and then upload it onto a network or even an extention of redhats site, and redhat can do something like Mp3.com to make profits.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
If they set it up so musicians who do create can create can upload music onto their site, or give music away for free, like mp3.com does.
I think Redhat could easily make money from this because music unlike art, everyone can appreciate.
An Open source music portal site could be created after enough musicians are using the open source software. It could really grow into a real community.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Red Hat is not trying to make anyone's life more difficult. They are just doing what they are required to do by law if they want to keep their trademark.
Considering that their trademark is just about the only thing they own (they give away everything else under the GPL) I'd say they have the right and duty to defend it. You can distribute copies of their distribution - just don't call it Red Hat.
On a more philosophical note - I wouldn't mind living in a world without copyright or patent laws. Neither of them protects my rights to be free from violence or fraud. On the contrary - patents and copyrights are a deal with the government to use the force of the courts underwritten by police violence to go after people who are doing something that doesn't harm anyone.
But trademark is different - it serves an important role in protecting me from fraud. How can trust in a vendor be built without a means of identifying his products that has some protection from fraud? It doesn't seem practical to put this burden on me as a customer. This tradeoff between two freedoms is therefore justified.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
The idea of a free OS that is completely optimized for audio/video is a neat idea, the problem will be getting professional quality audio software available. I wouldn't dream of switching from a Mac or Windows until you could get a version of Cakewalk, Logic, or Pro Tools on it. If the companies that make these tools (arguably the top 3 multi-track recording software packages) ported them to linux, that'd be nifty, but since most people who do audio recording via software use one of these three, it'll be tough to crack the market.
... more than audio authoring.
...and I'd definitely use it.
As long as it's being referred to as multimedia authoring, let's talk about video, graphics and 3D modelling too!
I think all of those things being tied together into a single distribution could work nicely especially if integration is made a large point of focus on this.
I have a camcorder with a 1394 port. I'd love to be able to download my video, edit the frames with GIMP changing my broom handles into lightsabers! Perhaps I could do some 3D modelling and rendering to create a droid or two and overlay them into the scene as well? Next thing you know I'm fighting an invisible "remote" with broom handle!
Sound is only PART of the project...
Hell, for that matter, I could at least be able to make commercials or something commercially viable like that.
All I'd want from the distribution is a relatively flexible range of supported hardware that doesn't compromise quality of output and performance... that way I know in advance what I'm buying and can build a tool that will serve my purposes best.
So anyway... yeah... why stop at music?
Never say "It can't happen" because I just glanced at the list of charter members and supporting companies for RealNetworks Helix development community effort... and RH is one of them. For those who don't recall, Helix platform is a client/server combination for producing and publishing streaming content of all types, not just Real files. Oh, and BTW they're going to "open source" it all thru their development community...
C|N>K
...because this eliminates one of the last reasons I have to still run Windows. Get software that can match ProTools, Sound Forge, Vegas and Acid (the latter three are from Sonic Foundry) and I will gladly take Windows 2K off of one of my machines. Gladly. One of my big complaints about Linux is that there is no decent pro-level audio tools for Linux. Hopefully ReHMuDi will fix that. One less Windozer==one less headache.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
The page is not anti-Red Hat, but pro-knowledge. I'm sure many people who stumbled on the site didn't know Red Hat's policy on copied CDs.
Red Hat has made our life a slightly more difficult. This is what they have done. We are not trying to slam them, or tell them they are wrong, or even had another choice, but this is how it is.
...and it never caught on with the intended audience. I hope that this project has better success, and/or that OpenBeOS is successful where the original failed.
libertarianswag.com
First off, let me say I'm glad they didn't blow a lot of money on a naming consultant. That ugly acronym they settled on must have saved them millions of dollars...
Soundtracks, film scoring, and even some album production is being done increasingly on DAWs, pronounced just like it's spelled. A typical configuration is a tricked-out PowerMac (Sun Ultras used to be the platform of choice) with maximum RAM and a fast RAID array (i.e RAID 0 -- don't laugh, I'm not kidding. RAID 0 is used to lower latency on the drives) and a MIDI adapter, for both driving sound modules and inputting music on a master keyboard. Add a copy of ProTools, some Mark of the Unicorn software, a DAT drive, a CD-burner, a mixer, some rack effects, and maybe a high-end audio PCI card for when you hit the limits of the Mac's decent but not that great on-board audio. This is not a sub-$1000 iMac rig were talking about here. If you want a good DAW, you go to the bank in your best suit and tie and apply for a loan.
Of course this makes no sense to an amatuer composer/musician. You might ask what's wrong with a stock PC with a good sound card, a quality microphone, UltraATA disks, a MOD Tracker with WAV/MP3 export, any old MIDI synth with velocity-sensitive keys, and CD-RW/DAT drive? Nothing really, if you want you music to sound like it was created on a computer. But that's not what a real DAW is for.
A DAW has to be _FAST_. The software used (like ProTools) is used to edit and master a gigantic audio file of CD-quality sound. Document sizes are often routinely in the gigabyte range, unless you're just editing small leadins for TV or commercials. You can use MIDI and samples to provide voices in the soundtrack, but the goal of a DAW is to have total control over the audio in the file, just like you have over a photo in Photoshop. It should be just as easy to work with a "real" audio recording (like a studio session recorded with a real orchestra) as it is to use sythentic music (samples from a microphone or synth, MIDI sequences, etc) and tweak the finished product to sound completely natural, as if real musicians had played it that way start to finish in the first place.
So any latency you have in the DAW can put skips or glitches in your recorded input. You need a workstation with enough RAM to avoid paging, fast disks that don't cause the CPU to have to wait (DMA/SCSI), and good all around performance to prevent bottlenecks: fast OS, fast graphics, fast CPU, fast audio chipset, etc.
Linux is perfect for this, because comparatively MacOS 9, MacOS X, and all versions of Windows except CE are complete pigs. Linux just lags in solid support for audio input, mixing, MIDI, and audio applications, etc. the way Macs and PCs do.
This distro isn't something you sell to end users (though they may) but to OEMs and VARs who want to sell Linux-based DAWs but want a vendor for the operating system beside Apple, Microsoft, or Sun. Other people have mentioned how poor musicians and DJs are. If you could make and market a Linux-based DAW out of PC parts with comparable performance to a ProTools rig and a substantially lower price, you could make a place for yourself in the market and do pretty well. Anything in the music equipment world that is both "really good" and "pretty cheap" and word gets out. Selling distro CDs just raises money and hopefully creates good PR for the concept of Linux as a good enough OS for a DAW.
Democracy. Whiskey. Sexy. Pick any two.
The first time I remember seeing this joke was when Eazel was going under, and it was something like:
1. Write a file manager and give it away for free
2. ???
3. Profit!
But I went searching for this post yesterday and I couldn't find it in any of the eazel-related stories. So can anyone clear this up? Who posted this joke the first time, and when?
What I would like to see is a implementation of ASIO and VST to linux. That yould help alot since the protocol is already tune for audio. And porting any original program like cubase or reaktor would be alot more easier. Same thing for VST which is already a standard plugin interface, and the IRIX part is already done...
Step 1: Steal Underpants
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Profit!
And now you know.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
I disagree. They were predisposed to working with the Atari ST and Amiga (check out some of the fine music around the net composed with these two machines) when those systems were popular. This will be no more difficult, and given the advances in GUI technology since then, probably even easier.
Well, actually Mac is pretty much THE system for professional audio. Most of the heavy pro audio applications such as Pro Tools from Digidesign have been released for PC/MS Windows and Mac. Real professionals seem to be counting on Mac audio workstations rather than PCs. For me the reasons seem obvious. As a Gnu/Linux user I wish Redhat good luck in this project. Linux-based systems make a good and stable platform for multimedia applications as well as anything else. Perhaps in the future the doors will be opened for heavy duty audio applications for Linux also.
Do we like it? No.
Is it right? Probably.
Businesses tend to get involved and complicate what it is we love to do.
Most of us loved to use napster, and the RIAA got involved.
Most of us loved to surf the internet, and the advertising agencies got involved.
All I am pointing out is that companies tend to complicate things. Whether any of us like it or not is nearly beside the point. I really enjoy DeMuDi as it stands, and I probably would have/will enjoy ReHMuDi, but with Red Hat involved, it has the potential to change things. Maybe I'll contribute thousands of lines of code, but when it comes time for me to sell a product based on it, I will be denied the ability to associate it with ReHMuDi, a project I personally (may have) helped to create and promote.
Actually, I tend to agree with you on that point... I'm sure there are terrific tools available. I am mostly familiar with Windows and Linux stuff... OSX wouldn't be a huge stretch ... at least I wouldn't think so. And I've been looking for a compelling reason to get involved into the world of Mac... that's as good as it gets I suppose.
I *hate* Windows 2000 for that sort of thing... it simply sucks and is incredibly useless. It works fine for "every-day" stuff, but for multimedia stuff it sucks. My IEEE1394 cards are both "functional" under Win2k, but my camcorder and the software doesn't work though everything claims to be Win2k compatible. (SP3 was recommended to fix this but I have to wait until the Japanese version os SP3 is out... sheesh)
Red Hat is not doing OSS a favour. I preffer to use any other distro that tries to keep directory structures as the should be, standard packaging systems (debian, slak tgz's), etc.
Anyone can choose what they like of course.
unfinished: (adj.)