Big fan of this very very addictive software, I’d like to share all my Ardour Sessions between a laptop and a desktop, both UbuntuStudio same version. In order to do that, I managed to put all the samples on my desktop, the drumkits (DrumGizmo), the recorded audio clips, the Midi imported clips, in the /home/mylogin/music directory.
If I synchronize this music repository with a command like rsync -avz, so it is identical on the laptop, would it allow me to work on both computers? Let’s imagine I do an rsync everytime I change computer, without working on two computers at the same time?
Are there some other directories/locations I should rsync? Like ~/.config/? for example? The two soundcards are totally different, one with 10 inputs, the other with 2.
I guess let me ask, why wouldn’t you keep Ardour copying files on import and then just sync the Ardour directory? As you make changes really all that would sync is the Ardour file itself and that would be really quick.
I believe your basic thought process would work, but it does have several possible issues you will need to address and keep in mind. Either you will need to define the search locations for files for each computer in your session, or the file locations will need to be identical (Down to the username if in your home folder).
Ok, so I finally decided to try it on after backup.
If I modify a project, on both laptop and desktop, and then do rsync -avz desktop/ardour laptop/ardour and then rsync -avz laptop/ardour desktop/ardour, I loose the modifications on laptop, so I guess I’ll have to do modifications on only one computer and then rsync, not both, but it’s not really a problem
I found a very useful tool, called apt-clone, it almost clone all my packages from desktop to laptop and saved me a lot of time getting identical systems
Of course I have to make identical sessions parameters (at least samplerates) but it’s not a problem
Still I found no solution for software installed from sources, as I don’t want to clone lv2 files that would not be in my home folder, but it’s not a problem
So I guess this solution works almost perfectly and I will try to improve it
Install identical systems on both computers
Configure identical settings for soundcards in Jack, at least samplerates
install everything in deb packages on the source and use apt-clone to replicate on the dest
Put all your music and sources in the least number of folders (~/Music is a good choice) on source computer
Do a rsync -avz everytime you modify a project on one computer
Make sh scripts for non packaged software installation (github for example) so the scripts will run identically on both