Ship mscore / fluid-soundfont in Hardy?

[Muzak Mos]

Including fluid-soundfont would make setup easier and faster. I personally
think that size is not so big issue because Ubuntu studio wont fit in cd
anyhow.


> Toby Smithe wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> Recently fluid-soundfont hit the archives (and since then, Debian).
>> This is the first Free GM SoundFont, and is thus pretty damn useful.
>> If you don't know what GM is, then this question probably isn't for
>> you.
>>
>> fluid-soundfont enables synthesis that requires, you guessed it, a
>> SoundFont. There are a number of packages in the archive which could
>> potentially benefit: timidity, fluidsynth, mscore. I'm concentrating
>> on mscore, because currently it links against the fluidsynth library
>> (rather than use the ALSA sequencer), using that to synthesise audio.
>> FluidSynth (as far as I am aware, and certainly in the way that mscore
>> uses it) does not support the smaller freepats patches to do
>> synthesis, and requires a soundfont.
>>
>> This direct linking makes it very easy, provided there is access to a
>> SoundFont, to just get up and go: open mscore, and there's no other
>> faffing about required before you can make noises. Naturally, the
>> problem lies in that caveat: "provided there is access to a
>> SoundFont". By default, there isn't, and so mscore doesn't make any
>> sound.
>>
>> The last upload of mscore (-0ubuntu2) contained a patch to default it
>> to look for the fluid-soundfont-gm file. This means that, if
>> fluid-soundfont-gm is installed, mscore will Just Work. Because of
>> this huge boost in functionality, the mscore package Recommends the
>> fluid-soundfont-gm package. I would have set it to Depends, but there
>> are two factors against this:
>>
>> 1. It does not fundamentally require the SoundFont, and can just as
>> well (though with a little more effort), use a user-supplied font, as
>> the package's install notification advised in the original -0ubuntu1
>> version. Or, it can just work silently.
>> 2. fluid-soundfont is *huge* at about 130MiB. If mscore depended on
>> fluid-soundfont-gm, it would force the user to download an excessive
>> amount over the three meg required to get the program to run.
>>
>> Now, the question is: do we ship mscore on the DVD for Hardy? I think
>> that this would be an excellent move: get a relatively new package a
>> plentitude of airtime to get bugs shown up and ironed out, and improve
>> awareness of a massively potential Sibelius alternative. Plus, it
>> would fill the niche that Sibelius does on Windows, but on Ubuntu
>> Studio.
>>
>> Should we decide to ship mscore, we then have to decide whether to
>> ship fluid-soundfont. As the DVD is already 877MiB, which is a lot to
>> download, users are clearly prepared to download that much. Why would
>> an extra 130MiB be too much pain? It would enable a lot of
>> functionality (and during the Intrepid cycle, I'll be further
>> integrating fluid-soundfont to allow it to replace freepats wherever
>> possible).
>>
>> If we do ship mscore, but not fluid-soundfont, users are purely going
>> to have to download the soundfont separately (thereby increasing the
>> effects of waiting for download: rather than wait once in one long
>> chunk, perhaps overnight, users would have to wait twice, which feels
>> exaggerated), or find an alternative, or work silently.
>>
>> Personally, I do not have absolute pitch, and would prefer nice, crisp
>> synthesis to silence. If this means adding an extra 130MiB, then so be
>> it: the advantages brought certainly outweigh that singular negative,
>> especially considering that the free software environment is rather
>> biased towards broadband users.
>>
>> To sign off, I'll just ask again the question asked in the subject: do
>> we ship mscore and/or fluid-soundfont in Ubuntu Studio 8.04?
>>
>> -- Toby Smithe
>>
>
> The size of the package has always been my concern in talking about this
> to Toby.
>
> I, as lead of Ubuntu Studio, have had mixed feelings on the size of our
> disk and wanting to keep things as streamlined as possible. Getting rid
> of OO.o Writer is still a thorn in my side.
>
> So I must admit that the thought of including this package made me
> uncomfortable. But the more I thought about it, I realized that I am not
> embracing the decision to not worry so much about disk size and just try
> to provide the best production apps we have to offer. This is not to say
> I won't still try to get rid if OO.o Writer or will be adding tons of
> new apps, just that this package really adds value to what we do.
>
> So, still slightly apprehensive, (just a bit) I'll give this a +1.
>
> I would like to hear from AU people or our dial-up'ers.
>
> But if the majority of people want this we'll add it to the seeds at the
> end of the week. No later than Friday if the freeze doesn't effect us.
>
> -Cory \m/
>
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