PluginUpdate 1.0.3 for Windows & Mac Released

[Kazrog]

Kazrog LLC is proud to announce the release of PluginUpdate 1.0.3. This version adds support for Windows, removes the “Store” tab, and adds a few other enhancements.

Please note: On Windows, only VST plugins are supported at this time. We are still working on support for Pro Tools AAX, RTAS, and TDM plugins in Windows.

In case you aren't familiar: PluginUpdate is a free app that helps you keep your audio plugins up to date.

 

[abaga129]

Awesome thanks! I'm interested to see how many of the free plugins I picked up years ago are updated

 

[TRUIE]

Thanks a lot Kazrog !
I tried it, and even though it picked a couple plugins that needed to be updated, when I display the "Installed" tab, I see it missed a LOT of my plugins during scan (Waves, Sonnox, 2C-Audio, Brainworx, Flux, Melodyne, Ohm Force, Overloud, Soundtoys, SPL, Two Notes, Voxengo, Slate Digital...).

Of course I selected the correct path where all of my plugins are installed.
Am I doing something wrong ?

EDIT
OK I just saw this on your website

Some Windows VST plugins may not contain any metadata, so PluginUpdate has no way to know what version the plugin is, or even who makes the plugin. Such plugins will be listed by path in a text file in C:Users{username}AppDataRoamingPluginUpdate{machine_name}_UnknownPlugins.txt . If you recognize plugins you use regularly in this list, be sure to contact the corresponding manufacturer and let them know that they need to supply a DLL version information resource if they want their plugins to show up in PluginUpdate. It’s not just a PluginUpdate thing – it’s the right thing to do, and what Microsoft recommends for all DLL files.

But still, I'm stocked on the number of plugins that doesn't show up (almost all of my plugins).
Do you want me to post the full list displayed on the Studio MAIN_UnknownPlugins.txt file ?

 

[Kazrog]

Looks like there may be an issue with some plugins' version information not being parsed properly on Windows. Some of them are legitimately missing metadata, some are not. Hold off on emailing anyone for now. Thanks!

 

[Kazrog]

PluginUpdate 1.0.4 for Windows is out now, and fixes the "missing plugins" bug. Hit the website or just run PluginUpdate, it will prompt you to download the update.

 

[TRUIE]

Wow that was quick !
I'll try it out later today and I'll let you know how it's running now.
Thank you

 

[TRUIE]

OK just tried it, now it recognise :
- Brainworx
- Waves (only the Waveshells though, don't know if that's normal ?)
- Soundtoys
- Sonic Charge VSTis (but they are labeled as "NuEdge Development" instead of "Sonic Charge", and it don't tell me to update even though I have an old version).
- a few other freewares (MDA...etc)

Still missing a lot (Sonnox, 2C-Audio, Flux, Melodyne, Ohm Force, Overloud, SPL, Two Notes, Voxengo - only Voxformer appear but not the other ones I own -, Slate Digital, Toontrack, IK, CamelAudio...etc).

I will be glad to help, just tell me what you need me to do !

 

[Kazrog]

Firstly, check and make sure you have the latest versions of the plugins that make it into your Unknown Plugins list file. Some companies that didn't supply DLL metadata once upon a time (Voxengo, Slate Digital, to name a couple) have been supplying metadata more recently.

 

[TRUIE]

Just checked,
From Slate Digital, I only own Trigger and I have the latest version (1.66).
From Voxengo, I own a few more (a blend of freewares and commercial ones, 15 total) but they are all up to date or very close, as they send an email when a new update is available.
Only Voxformer appears.

Am I the only one with this issue, or is it the same with some other users ?

EDIT : about this metadata thing, maybe it's a stupid question/suggestion but can't you do something like the Cubase "Plugins information" which list correctly all of the installed plugins by name, manufacturer, version...etc ?

 

[Kazrog]

Just checked,
From Slate Digital, I only own Trigger and I have the latest version (1.66).
From Voxengo, I own a few more (a blend of freewares and commercial ones, 15 total) but they are all up to date or very close, as they send an email when a new update is available.
Only Voxformer appears.

Am I the only one with this issue, or is it the same with some other users ?

It's possible that some plugins from these vendors have added DLL metadata, where others haven't.

EDIT : about this metadata thing, maybe it's a stupid question/suggestion but can't you do something like the Cubase "Plugins information" which list correctly all of the installed plugins by name, manufacturer, version...etc ?

Not a stupid question at all. The way Cubase is able to produce that list is by instantiating each of your VST plugins one by one on first launch (a lengthy and potentially unstable process), and then storing a cached list of the VST metadata (which can only be accessed at runtime, as opposed to the DLL metadata, which can be readily accessed by the file system.) Cubase makes note whenever files in the plugin directory are changed, and then selectively re-scans only the changed/added plugins. That's a great approach for a DAW that actually needs to run the VST plugins, but it does introduce speed and stability problems, particularly for the use case of PluginUpdate (which implies you'd be updating plugins more often than you may have been previously.)

For PluginUpdate to adopt this approach, it would have to be a VST host itself, which would mean you would have to configure audio settings upon first launch, and then deal with the aforementioned slowness and instability during the initial scan.

Rather than take that approach, PluginUpdate for Windows takes the same approach as the Mac version - relying on the metadata supplied for the plugin files themselves. On the Mac, the compliance rate for file level metadata with plugins is over 99%. On Windows, it appears that far more plugins are not DLL metadata compliant, even some popular and highly regarded ones.

So, if you've noticed, the plugin scan in PluginUpdate is incredibly fast and stable. We'd like to keep it that way, but if it proves an uphill battle to get plugin developers to provide DLL metadata, then we may have to employ the VST host method, which ideally should be avoided if at all possible.

EDIT - of course, we could employ a hybrid approach, scanning ONLY the plugins in the "unknown" list as VSTs, which would mean roughly 70% of plugins could be scanned quickly still. Hmmmmm....

 

[updog]

Thanks! I'm going to give this a whirl, see if i can find use for it.

A few questions though; why exactly do I have to sign up, and I trust my details are safe? If yes, you'd do well to write it in there somewhere.

Also, why does it have to be so anal about the password? I was going to put in the easiest possible one because I can't see why it would matter, even if someone actually did crack my PluginUpdate password they'd never get to the plugins though, right?

 

[Kazrog]

Thanks! I'm going to give this a whirl, see if i can find use for it.

A few questions though; why exactly do I have to sign up, and I trust my details are safe? If yes, you'd do well to write it in there somewhere.

Also, why does it have to be so anal about the password? I was going to put in the easiest possible one because I can't see why it would matter, even if someone actually did crack my PluginUpdate password they'd never get to the plugins though, right?

It's pretty standard fare these days for free online services to require you to sign up. The password security standards are high because this is 2013, and services that use lower password security standards have been compromised as of late (Evernote, to name one example.) By contrast, PluginUpdate has security standards in place that are probably better than your bank (not just in terms of password requirements, but also in terms of technology aspects under the hood.)

There's no way that a hacker could get to your plugin authorizations if PluginUpdate were compromised (since we don't store or even look at that information), but why not take people's data security and privacy seriously? We do have some cool cloud-enabled feature ideas for the future, and having high standards in place now means that no retrofitting would be necessary later.

 

[TRUIE]

It's possible that some plugins from these vendors have added DLL metadata, where others haven't.



Not a stupid question at all. The way Cubase is able to produce that list is by instantiating each of your VST plugins one by one on first launch (a lengthy and potentially unstable process), and then storing a cached list of the VST metadata (which can only be accessed at runtime, as opposed to the DLL metadata, which can be readily accessed by the file system.) Cubase makes note whenever files in the plugin directory are changed, and then selectively re-scans only the changed/added plugins. That's a great approach for a DAW that actually needs to run the VST plugins, but it does introduce speed and stability problems, particularly for the use case of PluginUpdate (which implies you'd be updating plugins more often than you may have been previously.)

For PluginUpdate to adopt this approach, it would have to be a VST host itself, which would mean you would have to configure audio settings upon first launch, and then deal with the aforementioned slowness and instability during the initial scan.

Rather than take that approach, PluginUpdate for Windows takes the same approach as the Mac version - relying on the metadata supplied for the plugin files themselves. On the Mac, the compliance rate for file level metadata with plugins is over 99%. On Windows, it appears that far more plugins are not DLL metadata compliant, even some popular and highly regarded ones.

So, if you've noticed, the plugin scan in PluginUpdate is incredibly fast and stable. We'd like to keep it that way, but if it proves an uphill battle to get plugin developers to provide DLL metadata, then we may have to employ the VST host method, which ideally should be avoided if at all possible.

EDIT - of course, we could employ a hybrid approach, scanning ONLY the plugins in the "unknown" list as VSTs, which would mean roughly 70% of plugins could be scanned quickly still. Hmmmmm....

Thank you for this explanation, I understand it better now !
The scanning is indeed really fast, but it won't bother me that much to wait a bit more (if it take equal time as a Cubase launch, it will be all good, at least for me, as it won't be a software I'll launch everyday - maybe just 2-3 time in a month just to check everything is up to date).

Also, it's a shame that the PC dll metadata don't show up as well as on MAC.
Unfortunately I don't think big companies will update all their plugin line JUST for that.
Or maybe if YOU, as a plugin maker too, do a list all the plugins / companies and ask them about that issue, but it may be too much work for a thing you give for free.

 

[updog]

It's pretty standard fare these days for free online services to require you to sign up. The password security standards are high because this is 2013, and services that use lower password security standards have been compromised as of late (Evernote, to name one example.) By contrast, PluginUpdate has security standards in place that are probably better than your bank (not just in terms of password requirements, but also in terms of technology aspects under the hood.)

There's no way that a hacker could get to your plugin authorizations if PluginUpdate were compromised (since we don't store or even look at that information), but why not take people's data security and privacy seriously? We do have some cool cloud-enabled feature ideas for the future, and having high standards in place now means that no retrofitting would be necessary later.

Fair enough.

Having used it now, I have some remarks/questions regarding the program though; there were a few plugins that were incorrectly detected - for example, all the Sknote plugins I have seemed to be marked as 1.0 in PluginUpdate, however most of which I have are well beyond version 2. Also, I updated Greenoak Crystal as per PluginUpdate's suggestions, but after updating it still says that there's a newer version available even when there isn't.

On that note, I also have TailoredNoise's Sausagefattener, which I have the version 1.03 of. PU says the 1.04 is the newest, but I'm wondering how you have acquired this information? I never received any info about an update from them and there's no way to download an updated version, so I'm just wondering if an update for it really exists.

All that aside, I'd like to thank you for the software, I was surprised to see some 20+ outdated plugins on my computer! I spent quite some time updating them but I'm glad I did

 

[Kazrog]

The plugin version information database is based off of the plugin metadata, which is crowdsourced across the community much like CDDB. If the metadata itself is inaccurate, or if somebody is running a non-public beta version of a plugin, the database will reflect these anomalies until they are manually overridden on our end.

Thanks for the info about those specific plugins!

 

[MatrixClaw]

Won't let me even sign up for an account. Keeps saying:

"Invalid Entry

Password must contain at least one of each: upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols (such as #,$,&,*)."

Every single password I try has all of these, and exceeds 8 letters. I even tried typing it in notepad and then pasting it in, to make sure I wasn't typing something wrong. Same error.

Now it won't even show me the new user setup screen and I can't figure out how you even get back to it, and as far as I can tell, there's no way to sign up on your website...

 

[Kazrog]

That's really odd. You'll need to delete any files at the following path (or just throw out the PluginUpdate folder there entirely):

C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Roaming\PluginUpdate

Then, relaunch PluginUpdate and try again. If you need any further assistance, use our beta form here.