Welcome to the Linux Audio Users Guide

Audio software on the Linux platform is becoming very stable and advanced. Many of the coolest projects have been in development for more than 5 years and there are several installation and setup options for new users to choose from which smooth out the rough edges and ease you through the process.

You can run all your VST plugins easily and using the JACK audio server it's possible to connect multiple applications to each other with total ease. The ALSA drivers provide support for hundreds of consumer grade soundcards and many of the top brand multi channel professional devices too.

In short there are literally hundreds of tools, plugins, and wierd and wonderful choices you can make with Linux Audio. With so much to choose from there is no exuse for not having tried it out at least once.

Distributions

64 Studio - Native free software for digital content creation on x86_64 hardware
Agnula - A Complete Music Distribution and Operating System
Debian Multimedia project - Aimed at Audio, video and graphic enthusiast as well as professional
dyne:bolic - The instant Bootable Audio CD Distribution
Planet CCRMA - Precompiled Audio Software for Redhat Systems
Studio to Go - Everything you need to make music on a Bootable CD
Ubuntu Studio - Aimed at Audio, video and graphic enthusiast as well as professional

Don't forget to subscribe to the Linux-audio-users
mailing list or view online here

The Realtime Low Latency Wiki is essential reading for Professional Audio on Linux

For Professional Audio interests checkout
The Consortium for Commercial Linux Audio

The quicktoots are a community initiative documenting ways we have found to use various Linux Audio Applications.

The Linux VST Compatibility List

A list of known Free audio plugins

A TiMidity config file & soundfonts

The following documents and howtos are provided for convenience. They are specific to sound drivers, recording, MIDI and music production techniques for a GNU/Linux environment. If you read and understand all of these you will find your overall understanding of Linux Audio is greatly advanced.

Installation/Setup

Useful Information

Introduction for newbies

Before you start
A bit of Linux history
Some basic tips for using Linux
Some of the more useful Linux commands are:
Netiquette

Before you start

If you are new to Linux we recommend doing a basic tutorial. If you need to know more the Linux howtos are the place to look.

The best place to start is The Linux users guide
Also check out the kernel docs - /usr/src/Linux/Documentation
The Linux Documentation project and the The Howto index

A bit of Linux history

"Linux. Designed for hackers by hackers." - Anon

Linux is the kernel of operating systems that look like and perform as well or better than the famous operating system from AT&T Bell Labs. Linus Torvalds and a loosely knit team of volunteer hackers from across the Internet wrote (and still are writing) Linux from scratch using tools developed by the GNU project. It has all of the features of a modern, fully fledged operating system: true multitasking, threads, virtual memory, shared libraries, demand loading, shared, copy-on-write executables, proper memory management, loadable device driver modules, video frame buffering, and TCP/IP networking.

Most people, however, refer to the operating system kernel, system software, and application software, collectively, as "Linux", some even refer to it as GNU/Linux. Linux was written originally for 386/486/586-based PC's, using the hardware facilities of the 80386 processor family to implement its features. There are now many ports to other hardware platforms.

The Linux kernel is distributed under the GNU General Public License.

Some basic tips for using Linux

The Linux environment is very flexible. All programs can be accessed via a text terminal/console. Many of the programs can also be started with a mouse click. Depending on your level of expertise you may prefer point and click. The terminal is very similar to dos in the Windows operating system only much more powerful. As you become more comfortable using Linux the terminal will become your most powerful friend. From here you can do anything with the computer. Provided you have the right passwords.

There are many commands that can be typed into the terminal which can save a lot of time. To see the full list available open a terminal and press the Tab button. This will give you an option type y and a full list will appear before your eyes.

Some of the more useful commands are:

	cd - this changes directories (dir) 
	eg. cd /usr 
	
	will put you into the directory called usr

	ls - this prints a list in the terminal of the files and directories in the
	current dir.

 	man - this prints a manual for the program if it has been installed in the
	/usr/man directory   
	eg. man ls 

	prints a manual in the terminal for the ls command. Just press q to close it.

	mkdir - this creates a directory.
	eg. mkdir /home/newbie/music

	creates a dir called music in the ~/newbie directory.

	cp - this copies a file from one place to another on your system. 
	eg. cp /home/newbie/music/song.mp3 /home/newbie/music/album/ 
	
	copies the file named song.mp3 into the dir called album.	

	ln - this creates a link from one file to another. 
	eg. ln -s /mnt/DOS_hda2/music /home/newbie/album 

	creates a symbollic link between the ~/music dir on your Windows partition and the
	~/album dir on your Linux partition. In laymans terms this means all the files you
	write to the ~/album dir will actually be written to the ~/music dir on your windows
	partition. Now you can read them from both operating systems. Be careful though.
	Due to a bug in the older Linux kernels, reading and writing to Windows partitions
	too much could result in a corrupted harddrive. This is now fixed but only in kernel
	2.4.x. 
	
* flags are very useful additions to a text command. eg. ln --help or ln -h will
  print a help message for the link command. This will give you all the commonly
  used flags available for the command too.

Netiquette

Firstly. If you want to learn how to use Linux like a guru you need to be willing to do 2 things. One is read every bit of information you think may be relevant. The other is be prepared to invest a lot of time. At first this may seem like a big task but the more you learn the better the results. With Linux you are the one in control. You have to be prepared to get your hands dirty and in the process you will learn why so many people invest long hours of their spare time working for free to contribute to the Linux community.

Once you have done that the next thing you will probably do is join a mailing list or newsgroup. The main thing to remember is that Linux is a community. The people who contribute to Linux projects are often very busy. They contribute because they want to. Many people do so simply because they enjoy the kick from getting something to work. No one is under any obligations. If you do join a list or group allow a little time to get a feel for the people you will be communicating with. Often reading the archives will give you a good idea. Don't spam (repeat messages) Don't expect instant answers and be prepared to be the only person with a "My x won't...". However, if you are willing to put in the effort to solve your problem, then more often than not there will be someone who can help. After a while it might even be you. Before you send in questions make sure that you have read all the documentation that came with x program. If you still can't figure it out then the list or group is your next best bet.

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