[Vm-dev] re: Mac OS Cocoa MIDI Plugin

[Craig Latta]

Hi Eliot--

> recently the Cog VM on Mac OS X moved to Cocoa, the Objective-C API
> for the platform, leaving behind the old Carbon C API.  There is some
> backward compatibility support but it is gradually being deprecated by
> Apple.  One victim is the MIDIPlugin which was written against a
> ComponentManager API that, while Apple docs say is only deprecated,
> has actually disappeared.  Consequently the MIDIPlugin support
> (see http://www.squeakvm.org/svn/squeak/branches/Cog/platforms
> /iOS/plugins/MIDIPlugin) needs completely rewriting to use Cocoa
> APIs.  I've recently changed the build so that the MIDIPlgin is built
> externally, which will make it easier to work on; one doesn't need to
> build the entire VM, only the plugin.  I'm looking for volunteers who
> a) love music/know MIDI
> b) are happy programming at the Objective-C level using command-line
> builds and perhaps Xcode, but more immediately lldb for debugging.
>
> If interested, reply to vm-dev and we can continue discussions there;
> there are folks that can help with Mac OS support, but no one I know
> of that has time to write this rather important plugin for multi-
> media.  It would be a great shame to lose MIDI on Mac.

     Perhaps this is an opportunity to reduce the platform code fanout a
bit. I've had good results with Squeak MIDI before on Mac, Windows, and
Linux, by making a VM plugin from the platform-independent PortMedia
libraries (PortAudio and PortMidi), at [1]. Perhaps it would make sense
to use PortMedia in combination with FFI/Alien these days.


-C

[1] http://portmedia.sourceforge.net

--
Craig Latta
Black Page Digital
Amsterdam
craig at blackpagedigital.com
+31   6 2757 7177 (SMS ok)
+ 1 415  287 3547 (no SMS)