I understand that LADSPA and friends specifically exclude any functionality around how to find and load plugins, but it seems that a lot can be gained by introducing some standards in this area.
As a package of audio apps/plugins for a Linux distro, here are two of the problems I see: 1. Applications are often hard-coded to look in /usr/lib/ladspa (for instance), when many systems may require that libraries live somewhere else (like /usr/lib64/ladspa for x86-64, or /usr/lib32/ladspa for n32-ABI MIPS Linux). I've had to patch a lot of apps for x86-64 Fedora. 2. We build binaries for the lowest common denominator, so the plugins you'll find in Fedora, for instance, don't take advantage of SSE hardware or instruction scheduling for different processors. This can make a huge difference. What would be nice is if we could distribute an RPM containing a plurality of plugin builds, and then have the application load the plugin matching the capabilities the execution platform. Has there been any discussion around creating a plugin locator/loader library? It would be nice if one could be written and then widely adopted by app writers. (I'm not volunteering!) AG
