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- CLAP (“CLever Audio Plug-in API”)
- Developed in collaboration with experts from diverse fields in the music
- software industry, CLAP is a cutting-edge plug-in standard, designed
- for modern computers, software, and paradigms. CLAP caters to novel DAW
- concepts, and opens up new horizons for what a plug-in can do or be.
- Here are some immediately useful advantages of CLAP:
- Better Performance From Modern CPUs
- Developed with modern CPUs in mind, CLAP takes multi-thread management
- to a new level, with a clear and efficient allocation of roles between
- plug-in and host. Specifically, CLAP allows collaborative multicore
- support between plug-in and host through a so-called “thread-pool”,
- also allowing hosts to manage CPU-threading for plug-ins that provide
- their own multicore support. Preliminary tests show significant
- performance gains compared with current solutions.
- CLAP hosts can read plug-in metadata and help organize your plug-ins.
- As CLAP hosts can retrieve information from plug-ins without having to
- wait for them to initialize, plug-in scans can be much faster.
- Furthermore, we’re currently finalizing an extension which
- lets plug-ins tell the host which files they need
- (e.g. samples or wavetables), and the host can consolidate those in
- the project file. That means you’ll never lose a sample while
- transferring a project between systems!
- Better Modulation
- The CLAP standard promotes new ways to create music with automation,
- modulation, and expressions. Here are a few examples:
- CLAP supports per-note automation and modulation
- (in accordance with the recent MIDI 2.0 specifications).
- Going one step further, CLAP’s parameter modulation concept allows for
- temporary parameter offsets. Parameter modulation is non-destructive,
- so as soon as the modulation has finished, the target parameter will
- return to its original state.
- CLAP makes it possible for polyphonic plug-ins to have their per-voice
- parameters modulated for individual notes (“MPE on steroids”).
- The KISS (keep it simple, silly) mantra belongs to CLAP.
- From the C-only ABI, which allows binding to any programming language,
- to the transparent client-server model between host and plug-in,
- the robustness and clarity of the threading model,
- and the single event queue for all kinds of parameter changes,
- timing and MIDI. Despite being so comprehensive, everything in CLAP is
- easy to find and easy to implement.
- A single cpp/hpp glue layer for C++ offers a quick start into the ABI,
- and its built-in “proxy layer” finds common threading bugs in an
- instant. Apropos C-only ABI: There are no platform specific
- dependencies: In theory CLAP should also run well on embedded platforms,
- game consoles or specialized supercomputers.
- Open Source & Liberal License
- CLAP is open source, released under the MIT license:
- No fees, memberships or proprietary license agreements are required
- before developing or distributing a CLAP capable host or plug-in, and
- the license never expires. In a nutshell, there are no entry hurdles for
- developers, and plenty of open source projects already benefit from
- CLAP.
- MIDI Just Works!
- Inspired by MPE and MIDI 2.0, CLAP can adapt to any future MIDI
- standard. Wherever a solid standard exists, we allow developers to
- freely decide how to apply it. Plug-ins can receive and send any MIDI
- event on multiple ports.
- Extensibility & Governance
- A simple system for extensions makes CLAP future-proof. Companies can
- offer proprietary extensions if required for specific features.
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