I don’t see a lot of action in the official plug-in store.
Not interested in downloading custom plug-ins. Or installing plug-ins via other custom means.
Is the plug-in store done?
There was a plan to cleanup the Beta store to make testing more focused and get things moving into the official store.
This however hasn’t really progressed.
1 Like
That’s unfortunate. A lot of musicians would see that as a sign of the ecosystem languishing. I know there is a lot of excitement around other methods of adding plug-ins, and custom development, which is great that this ecosystem allows for, and has, that audience. But if the primary audience is developers, it will become an even more niche product, with an even more niche market.
How about bringing more software houses into the MOD ecosystem?
Today I found https://stomptones.gumroad.com/ , which provides LV2 plugins in addition to VST3 and AU.
I purchased Loveless Reverse Reverb VST3 | AU | LV2 and really love the sound.
It works well with MOD Desktop on Linux, although it doesn’t include modgui.
2 Likes
The problem is that the Beta section has been overfull for a long time already. Bringing even more beta plugins is not going to make the work any easier.
The plan was to minimize the amount of plugins to test so that we could move things into the main store faster.
There has however not been any capacity to initiate this cleanup.
3 Likes
Quantity has clearly been covered (speaking as someone who is adding yet another plugin to the mix! oops!) as the selection is substantial.
The main problem seems to be more the optics of what looks like two years of dormancy. People will hesitate to invest time and money into a product that looks abandoned even if there is plenty of activity going on behind the scenes.
Maybe they could drop the dates and highlight whatever is going on with the MOD Dwarf or whatever developments that might be going on. Signs of life in any way might go a long way.
1 Like
I would think some members of the MOD user base have the skills to vet beta plugins. Perhaps some members would volunteer to look at the plugins (at least for a first pass) if supplied with the criteria for the process. I definitely don’t have these skills, but I have always been impressed by the skill sets of folks on the MOD forum. I know that part of the vision of MOD is to empower its user base to help shape its future. This could be another step in that direction.
4 Likes
I think that expanding ‘who’ can vet plug-ins is a great idea. Is the vetting process now documented in a way that others could volunteer to do that work?
Only the plug-in developers can say if particular parameter settings are working as intended. But is there not some automated process that can vet the basics, that a plug-in doesn’t have code that breaks, or crashes?
My suggestion years ago was to move the current Beta selection to “Alpha” and only select like 5-10 plugins for Beta that actually need testing/vetting.
Right now the Beta is a minefield with some plugins being really bad/broken and no way to track what is worthwhile to test.
In searching the forum, I can see at least one thread in which you suggested having an alpha category at "Abandoned/Dead" Beta plugins should really be removed from the STORE - #16 by QuestionMarc . I’m guessing there is reticence to enact this because some people have placed these on their pedalboards and nobody wants to break anybody’s virtual rig. As long as the alpha section was still usable by anybody grandfathered access to those plugins, I would think it could work. If the missing element is bandwidth to do it, selecting folks from the user base that volunteer and have the skills to do it would increase bandwidth. Otherwise, beta stays the scary closet that never gets organized and which might contain a bowling ball that falls on someone’s head.
1 Like
To be honest nobody should rely on beta/alpha plugins. If you did then that’s pretty much your problem.
It’s not like any plugins would be removed from the device, just not installable from the store.
2 Likes
It’s all done, when was the last firmware update?
Best to just take things as they are now/were then, this is a dead platform.
I fully agree. Having said that, I believe there are some plug-ins in beta which have been updated, altered, and improved over time. I would love to see those get the final thumbs up and added to the store.
I would never judge a platform by firmware updates, and I disagree that this is a dead platform.
The tool works, new plug-ins are being developed, and people are using these to do cool things.
There is a backlog of cool things getting from beta to the store is all.
2 Likes
Well that was the whole point of the cleanup: reduce the giant list to just plugins that are truly ready for final beta-testing.
I certainly hope that MOD is able to organize this, because I agree that the whole beta-plugin situation has been stale for way too long.
1 Like
I can totally get where AndyCap is coming from, but I would argue that there have been a lot of hopeful signs of life in the platform lately.
Things like:
- The Starless Image Starless unofficial Dwarf image - ALABS - #260 by AndreasL with perhaps some future version incorporating AndCap’s work for bidirectional midi communication Changes for bidirectional midi and NRPN support by AndrewCapon · Pull Request #1 · sejerpz/mod-host · GitHub
- A polyphonic guitar synth plugin in development New plugin GuitarMidi-LV2 - #151 by jimsondrift
- New plugins that expand the potential of the platform like DaveM’s sequencer
- People building their first plugins like the * Echomatica or the * Megalo
- Access to Slimmable NAM files NAM A2 and Slimmable - #8 by MikeOliphant
- More people interested in the platform because of MOD desktop
But clearly, most of the activity has come from the user base, and the original developers have had their hands full with the Anagram (which is where they most definitely should be putting their energies).
Given these new glimmers of hope, a viable beta process would be a welcome step in the right direction and a more user friendly way to get new plugins on machines.
The next step would be to have plugins licenses tied to user accounts rather than individual devices so that movement between the hardware devices and MOD desktop would encourage further development of plugins and/or the ecosystem. That step is likely a challenge to implement and would have to be undertaken by falkTX at whatever pace is possible given his other commitments
I know that AndyCap and Dreamer are aware of this given their posts in the MOD Reboot Phase 2 thread MOD Reboot - Phase 2 - #89 by AndyCap . I’d encourage guarded optimism for the future, appreciation for all the great things the platform does today, and trying to figure out a viable beta process given available resources (if those resources can be mustered) to help bring these new ideas to more users.
4 Likes
I should rephrase what I meant by Dead : “Not being actively developed or maintained by Mod Audio” and this includes the plugin store as far as I can see?
I understand why: they didn’t make enough money out of all this stuff and needed to move on to new things to keep the wolf from the door. I also appreciate that this stuff works at all anymore, they didn’t leave everyone in the lurch.
One day the plugin store will disapear though, one day the web based interface will stop working. The only way to keep this stuff going for a “long” time is from maintenance from the community.
2 Likes
Is the Anagram a MOD product? Or Mod under a new name? Or the Mod devs are working with that other company?
The later. It’s been widely discussed elsewhere.
It does use the same (but slightly modified) mod-host as MOD products do.
1 Like
Nice list, but none of that is available for Mod Duo X…