LinuxMusicians

I had the opportunity to try Sonic-Pi on a Raspberry-Pi and want to delve deeper into livecoding but, this time, on my main computer, currently using Debian Jessie.

I'd like to test a bunch of different environments/languages before settling in: extempore, sonic-pi, overnote, ixi-lang, music-as-data, fluxus, tidal … But on Debian Jessie, only Chuck and SuperCollider are readily available. And I cannot seem to be able to compile/install/use any other without crashes rendering them useless.

So I'd like to know if changing to another distribution will help me easily install, try and enjoy most/all of these (because these softwares or their dependencies are available as packages, without mismatch in version, or they exist specific help/communities about them…) And if so, which one?

Thanks in advance!

I use Debian Testing and never experienced problems with audio stuff. Just add KXStudio repos.

Hi! I am on Arch and after a quick search seems to me that only the following languages are ready to install (you might want to do your search as well):

sonic-pi (AUR)
fluxus (AUR)
chuck (Both Repos and AUR)
supercollider (both Repos and AUR)

Also, if you are interested, there are PureData and Faust as well, with related packages both in Repos and AUR. Audio works like a charm in this moment on my machine, but sometimes after an update the system becomes a little more "xrunny"... nothing too bad ever happened.

Maybe on Arch, as the software base is up to date, it could be easier to build software from source. It is not too hard to create Arch packages as well, if you fancy it.

My advice for you is to search for the distro on which installing the software you want is easiest. Then tune that installation for audio performances. Every distro is a Pro Audio distro: proper tuning is all you need. If you want, skim through my blog posts in the signature (the pond). I have few posts about Pro Audio distros and Pro Audio documentation.

Thanks for your replies!

In the meantime, I migrated my Debian from Jessie to Sid/Unstable. It allows to readily install Chuck and SuperCollider but also PureData and SonicPi.

Installing Overtone was pretty straightforward but I struggled a lot to make Tidal work [see below for tips, if anyone cares]

Now, I'll try to install Fluxus, Extempore and Music-as-Data.

@FaTony: Could you please elaborate about the KXStudio repos? Why use them?

@CrocoDuck: I thought about Arch but I had recurring problem configuring Xorg under Arch on my netbook, never understood why. And I'm looking for a one-distro-fits-all-my-computers solution.

@CrocoDuck: I didn't know about Faust. I'll have a go, as it's in the Debian repos, too. Any other language/environment I should try?

Notes for self about Tidal
Tidal needs that the SuperCollider plugins are installed. This is a bit tricky at first sight but this forum thread solves the problems. It also depends on libfftw3-dev.

Tidal needs the Dirt-Samples quark. From within SuperCollider, it installs incompletely, so just in You can use vimtidal but don't forget to start the Jack dæmon (with qJackCtl), SuperCollider and SuperDirt before launching it.

rotindo wrote:@FaTony: Could you please elaborate about the KXStudio repos? Why use them?

They provide more packages and newer versions of packages than vanilla Debian.

Thanks, I'll try them!