[PaulDavisThe1st]

> skeumorphic interface to things like music and synthesis

There's a lot in Rack that isn't skeuomorphic. Really, a very big lot. In fact, even the patching process is only barely skeuomorphic - it doesn't obey the laws of physics in several different ways.

Reaper has no modular environment at all, so "connecting VSTs" is not really a thing in that context - the data flow is almost always linear.

[Blackthorn]

Skeumorphic doesn't mean 1:1, it just means very much like it from a design perspective. Obviously, patch cables in real life aren't polyphonic.

> Reaper has no modular environment at all, so "connecting VSTs" is not really a thing in that context - the data flow is almost always linear.

It most certainly does. The VSTs that sit in the fx chains are the modules. Parallel fx chains in the same track are handled by a (quite terrible) pin based system. Then beyond that there's the usual sends and side chains.

[PaulDavisThe1st]

From my perspective (as a Rack user and developer of Ardour, another DAW), you're somewhat stretching the definition of a modular environment there.

[Blackthorn]

That's fair. I also think people would be more eager to do wacky vst routing in Reaper if the interface supported it somewhat better.

[PaulDavisThe1st]

I've considered merging all of Cardinal or Rack into Ardour as something similar to Logic's "Environment" or Bitwig's "grid"

We could do that because we're all GPL'ed projects, and can thus share code easily.