Hi,
This is a difficult post to make but it’s time…
As some may have noticed I hadn’t been on the AV Linux forum much since the April release of 2019.. There were many reasons for this but what it mostly boiled down to is prioritization of time. I wasn’t able to maintain the forum consistently on a daily basis, some days I had plenty of time and just as often it was difficult to be there more than once a week. On a personal level the last 2 years have brought a lot of major changes, some good and some bad… among them the end of a 27 year marriage and everything that accompanies a major life change like that. I am still processing priorities for myself, my kids and my business. This is in no way the sole cause or an excuse, but it is a factor in what is going on. I want to be crystal clear, nobody needs to feel sorry for me, I have my health, a comfortable living and supportive friends and family so this isn’t a scenario of “his life went down the toilet”. It’s more a situation of “if you’re going to do something, do it right” and the way the forum was serving the members wasn’t good enough for you (or me), so it was time for a change.
I’ve never been a “software guy”, I don’t write code and I can barely pull off a bash script without screwing it up 27 times before getting it to work. Music has always been my passion in life and when I discovered Linux and it’s Audio community back in 2006 or so I was very inspired to give back what had so generously been given to me by the hundreds of talented developers created the apps I was using so I learned how to make a tweaked Linux Audio system I could use and then I learned to duplicate it… That’s probably where this story should have ended because beyond that I probably have NONE of the skills, talents and educational prerequisites to properly and effectively administrate and support a Computer Operating System…lol
More than 10 years of time, hard work and the help and support of exceedingly kind and generous people have helped AV Linux become a “thing”… a thing that some people like, and a thing that some people dislike…lol. If something becomes a thing, then there is an implied need for accountability for and if people are using it and even donating to it a feeling of responsibility to provide some sort of support service. When I started including the User Manual with AV Linux I hoped that would stem much of the forum traffic since I’ve always felt somewhat inadequate and stupid as a forum administrator that could truthfully answer about 3 out of 10 user questions.. The Manual has received a lot of positive attention and I’m grateful for that but there was still need for a forum and I tried to do my best to juggle other priorities and be present on it. I will be eternally grateful for the AV Linux forum members that donated their time and expertise to the forum and greatly assisted both myself and other Users. The truth is we didn’t have a large enough and active enough community here for me to keep the forum up and personally be on it so inconsistently. The online world we participate in today is not a hospitable environment to projects that are not being vigilant about security issues so I made the difficult but necessary decision to pull the plug on the Forum.
Don’t stop reading yet!!
AV Linux itself will continue as long as I continue to create music with Linux Audio, however with the closure of the forum I am also divesting myself of any responsibility of timelines or hollow promises about WHEN new versions will come out… however NEW VERSIONS WILL CONTINUE when I have such time and need to release them and the User Manual will also continue to be improved and added to. The AVL Drumkits will also continue to be worked on and improved and I already have plans to expand the line with a vastly improved hand percussion set and new small TAMA Bop Kit. The AV Linux Kernel Repository will also continue as long as Trulan wants to do kernel work for AV Linux but he, like myself is busy with his life and family and has the freedom to retire whenever he feels the urge to do so.
I’m sure this will disappoint some people, good people that have hung on and hung out on the forum for many years already. How things had become was also disappointing… disappointing to new Users and people who don’t understand that a project like AV Linux is not a large Distro entity like Ubuntu or Fedora so they showed up expecting a vibrant community, a friendly hello and an answer to their questions only to be greeted with silence or even worse a single Administrator who may not have the answer. It didn’t serve the project, it’s Users or satisfy my personal sense of propriety to keep going like that.
I can not be more humbled that people have taken time to try, install and use AV Linux and then joined the forum community. As I’ve said before the members that have contributed ideas, code, suggested improvements (and most importantly answered those 7 out of 10 questions I failed on) have my sincerest gratitude, Thank you so much!!
The AV Linux forum was archived for information purposes and depending on future support needs other AV Linux support options that don’t require my daily presence are being looked into.
All the best and thanks very much for your attention and understanding..
Glen
Thank you very much for your passion in music that helped make av linux a reality. Using av linux left a very good impression on me that I could personally recommend it to just about anyone really serious about musical recordings and production.
Real-life circumstances really could not be helped at all and I’m grateful for your continued support in maintaining av linux. I hope to see myself supporting your project in the future either through funding or contributing in any way.
Thank you for the comment, I’m glad to hear you are finding it useful! In a month or so I will start testing new ISO’s made on Debian Buster.
Man that’s a real lifesaver! I was already starting to feel the pain of sticking with Debian Stretch (most prominently on my all-around desktop running on a distro that’s still stuck on using Debian Stretch as a base)
I have plans of making an audio recording studio somewhere in the future after finishing my studies and I really feel that avlinux will be a core part of this still *imaginary* project. Will definitely promote you and this project should I ever make it out big XD
Not gonna make promises though cause I know for sure that it’s largely 50:50 on making it out big hahaha
Very informative and humbling post by Glen. I’m in a similar boat skills wise and it is incredible that he started up this project of real quality and need for so long. It’s mind boggling. Well done Glen! You definitely deserve a well needed break. It is just a shame that more of the community to take on many if not all the tasks so that you could step back from all day-to-day running. Perhaps that can happen, who knows, in the future.
Personally I have only dabbled with Linux based music software but was thrilled with the possibilities yet disappointed with audio industry support for Linux with drivers or open source of their standards/apis/etc. After a few years out I’ve revived my music laptop and will reinstall the latest version of AV Linux.
All the best,
Kiat (bass player, England)
I’ve been paying close attention to avlinux for a long time, even it was first created if not wrong. it’s amazing since such a powerful tool make artistic creating so wowsome. thanks for the job ! I will keepin it on may laptop for a long time as long as it takes!
I have been using AV Linux for quite a sometime. Thanks for all the effort you put in.
Hi there.
I would love to help out with anything from beta-testing to whatever I can do. I got a few hours each day free to donate to this project. I have only been able to use this distro once so far,because my new laptop was just to new and addicted to windows 10 (obviously) and some of my “instruments-software” only native supported on Microsoft or Apple`s platforms. I have mostly been using Linux the last 15+ years and when I found interest in music making on computer I quick realize that in Linux this is a little further from being straight forward.
In my search for a Linux distro that was designed with audio creation in mind, I stumble across this great distro (based on Debian,which is a solid “+” in my book) and a few others based on Ubuntu. Even Fedora Jam was tried. The fact that my main new laptop could not be used with AVlinux was a let down,but at the same time I am so new with midi/audio/computer that even if I have to use windows I have a few things to learn,so its okay.. It was when Windows 10 behaving like Windows 10 does that I really started to miss the Linux Kernel.
So after some time had passed I tried the new updated AVlinux out and it did boot on my Asus laptop,but there was no mousepad and no wifi at default. So at that point I waited with installing it,not because I have`nt found solutions to problems like that before,but just because I could wait a bit since I wanted to upgrade to a new nvme-ssd first.
Since last time I was here I see the forum was discontinued (reading this part of blog), but I also see soon there might be a new version out as well. Well,I am not a coder,or super advanced user,but I am a Linux user for a long time,and I learn everything I need to learn.. So if there is any need for me, just contact me or give me a way to contact you.
But anyway,biggest thanks for this project. I have deep respect for the work done with this distro!
Best regards.
up
Norway
Oi Glen! We love you mate, thank you a lot for all you’ve been done. Used as my main OS for years in a row in a job, not related to audio/vdo at all, even today using gentoo for it it’s still om my user input grub iso boot line and i use it ‘on memory’ always a blast. Now the real talk, you’ve nailed what linux audio should be, i think your work is the standard base for what a linux should be for audio purposes to be windows or mac alternative. It’s hard even for someone “seasoned” on some other linux areas. Good work mate, i always talk about it as a one man project.
Thank You for all the years, and all stuff you did!! hope we stay in contact by music.
Nice! Can we expect a new AvLinux anytime soon? Can’t wait for it ??✌
Wow this AVlinux is the business! It’s exactly what I’ve been wanting/looking for. The ISO Live DVD ran perfectly “right out the box” so I got a USB stick and installed it on there (with help from the very helpful AVLinuxManual.pdf) – it runs perfectly. Just amazing. I have it running just fine on an “old” XP Pent D duo.
Good work Glen, this is the future as MS Windows fades away for most people along with Apple.
I’m impressed by your drum kits too, the do sound extremely “live”.
Glen, sorry for what you are going through. I hope it works out for you. I can’t help much with personal life, but I can help you with AV Linux ISO builds and development. Contact me and I can volunteer some time to help you out.
On many blogs, comment sections are used sort of like forums.
For a real, working example 😉
…
Would anyone know what the best budget laptop, say, from Amazon or Walmart (despite their dubiousnesses), might be for running a LAV electronic music production studio? I’m borrowing someone’s 2 year old (Dell Inspiron 15, 3000 series) laptop and it can’t even play (bad stuttering) some demo tunes from SunVox or LMMS, even though my old 2012 Dell XPS can (but its screen is slowly falling apart/off)?
As a follow-up to my previous comment, might anyone like to recommend a good optimized Linux distro, such as when/if AVL goes belly-up, for music production?
I recall this sort of thing back when I started to use pure:dyne Linux, only to have it go belly-up.
Ah well, I guess the only constant is change, ay?
Hi Glen,
Sad to hear that!
Thank you for all you’ve done so far, hopefully you’ll find more time for the other things you need.
Regards,
hawran
PS: Is there any possibility to search within the backuped forum? I’ve tried to find some topics – in vain.
If you have trouble booting from an nvme sad try this in the startup options nvme_core.default_ps_max_latency_us=5500
So glad I found that answer, just wish I could remember where…
Hi. I could not find any other way to contact you. I am facing an issue regarding avlinux with which i believe you can help me. Actually i noticed you have uploaded a RC iso in Jan 2020. I booted it live and went to install it. But the installer is not detecting my NVMe m.2 ssd. “fdisk -l” shows the nvme, gparted is also able to see it. Kindly look into this matter. Thank you 🙂
I tried to install avlinux in my nvme drive but the installer did not recognize it. Neither in gpt nor in mbr.
It turns out that systemback is hardcoded to detect /dev/hdd* or /dev/sd* or /dev/mmc and other similar codes for storage devices. This list doesn’t include nvme0p* codes.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/systemback/+bug/1649056
The above link actually holds the explanation and solution in detail. GMaq, I kindly suggest you to include nvme codes in respected files so that the changes comes pre-configured with the next release and users don’t have to manually do it in the live boot before installation. “How-to-do-it” part is written as a workaround in the comments at the bottom.
I thought AVLinux would not work on NVMe(s) but this will ensure installations in NVME SSDs also. Thank you for the amazing work you are doing. Please keep it up. We musicians and producers are very greatful to you for doing this.
This is a kind of selfish request but can you make a release with a kernel version >=5.3 as i have a ryzen 5 3550h laptop and there are many optimizations and fixes for this processor in that kernel version. Even better, use debian “bullseye”(even though it is in testing phase, i see sparky linux as an alternative to pure debian) as base as it by default comes with kernel version 5.4.19 (see distrowatch mention here – https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=debian ).
I know i’m being very selfish but it will be a big help. Thank you 🙂
Hi,
Yes the NVMe issue is an unfortunate missing feature in Systemback, I will not alter the source code of Systemback myself though, it’s not really something I would do lightly without completely understanding what I’m doing. Probably the best I can do is add those extra notes to the User Manual unless I can find another solution… There is a fork of Systemback here: https://github.com/fconidi/systemback-install_pack-1.9.3 that looks promising but there is virtually no information about what has been added to the source code and without some more detailed info I’m a little skeptical about upgrading the last official version of Systemback. As far as the Kernel, no promises there, there is a new release of AV Linux coming soon and it is possible that a new kernel may become available after its released as an upgrade..
Sorry to hear about all the troubles you have been through.
Nice.
One more thing.. Kindly add AVLinux kernel source link on the avlinux page. I found the github link on forum archive but i do not know if that source is being updated regularly. 🙂
I found this on a quick search regarding the fork you are talking about. It says it supports NVMe SSDs.
https://francoconidi.it/systemback-1-9-3-per-debian-9-ubuntu-17-10-18-04/
Please take a look 🙂
Hi Keshav,
Well thanks to your link… good news! I have updated Systemback to 1.9.3 and so far it seems to boot OK but I need to test an install. Also more good news if all goes right we may have an RT 5.4 Kernel, just waiting to hear from Trulan the Kernel maestro if we’re in business or not, there are some complications with getting aufs to work.. The kernel sources for each new Kernel are put up in the Releases in Trulan’s ‘musical chairs’ github. I will consider linking the sources and the repository information on the Website that is probably a good idea since the forum is gone..
Awesome. 😀
If our kernel maestro successfully conjures up the 5.4 RT kernel, kindly provide it in the release ISO(as an update if it is not possible) 🙂
5.0.7 kernel was not stable enough(crashes and freezes) on my new system(ryzen 2nd gen processor) so i am using ubuntu studio as my production system for now. 5.4 contains all the amazing new patches and fixes thus is very stable for production. I will gladly switch back to AVLinux just for the kernel (because everything i use is present on both OS) 🙂
A few things i have in my mind :-
1. AVLinux by default works on “performance” governor or we have to enable it ?
if it not enabled by default, kindly add this to the release https://github.com/vagnum08/cpupower-gui so that it becomes easy to do that(of course after some testing). 🙂
2. Do you have experience with snap packages operating in realtime audio environment ? while jack-server running ? i mean if they crashes, no audio, glitchy sound, run fine until this or that ?
i would like to know your thoughts about this.
3. So many laptops(mine included) are now coming with this new Realtek RTL8821CE WIFI Card installed in them. this is a link to the driver https://github.com/tomaspinho/rtl8821ce. It compiles just fine on 5.0.7 RT kernel AVLinux have right now and 5.4 in the ubuntu. Would it be possible to add this as a kernel module(dkms would be great) in the next release ? 🙂
4. Hydrogen has a new beta with a lot of fixes. Its on github.
Keshav,
Haha your grocery list is coming a bit late… but!
1. AVL has performance enabled by default, always has.. It also includes it’s own CPU governor utility ‘Set CPU Governor’ found in the Settings menu.
2. I know nothing about Snap or fixing JACK issues with either Snap or Flatpak and won’t touch either… BTW AVL 2020 will ship with both Flatpak and Docker for those who want extended platforms
3. Can’t say for sure about that WiFi driver at this point, almost ready to ship this out the door and I’m quickly running out of time to put into AV Linux right now.. BTW There is a 5.0.21RT Kernel in the Repo which is the current default kernel, still waiting to see what’s happening with 5.4..
4. That H2 beta is already on AVL 2020…
??
I just checked on distrowatch. Is it release news real ?
Realtime enabled kernel version 5.4.28 ? 😀
Hmmm,
I am uploading to a temp folder but there is no actual release yet… I have not contacted Distrowatch with a release announcement so they should definitely not have a torrent up and a news release yet! Whatever they are torrenting is not the official release… but yes it is Kernel 5.4.28.
Please wait until you see an announcement here and then use the download mirrors on the AV Linux website, the temp folder is to stage the release with the Bytemark mirror.