KODA is in early access - anyone tried it?

[dannytaurus]

Looks pretty cool, but I'm not sure I understand what the whole thing is.

https://kodasampler.com

Definitely a sample-based plugin builder, but looks like it's also a marketplace too?

You build libraries for the KODA player, rather than building your own VST3/AU plugins.

Looks pretty nice though!

[Lindon]

@dannytaurus its an attempt to offer an alternative to Kontakt from Mike Greene and friends...

[David Healey]

@Lindon said in KODA is in early access - anyone tried it?:

its an attempt to offer an alternative to Kontakt

I think it's good to have competition here but being another proprietary sample player it just shifts the problems of Kontakt to a new system.

[dannytaurus]

@David-Healey Agreed about competition.

Not competition to HISE though, because with KODA you build libraries for someone else's player, not your own VST3/AU plugins.

But competition in terms of UI, features, ease of use, etc. definitely.

Regarding Kontakt, some would say at least it's a newer, less encumbered system.

[David Healey]

@dannytaurus said in KODA is in early access - anyone tried it?:

Regarding Kontakt, some would say at least it's a newer, less encumbered system.

What does Koda do that Kontakt doesn't?

[pgroslou]

With the current state of NI what is the future of Kontakt?

[David Healey]

@pgroslou NI seems fine at the moment. But nobody knows the future.

[dannytaurus]

@David-Healey

What does Koda do that Kontakt doesn't?

No idea, but at least it won't have a load of legacy cruft in there.

I don't use Kontakt libraries at all if I can help it. Never liked the platform, as either a developer or end user.

[David Healey]

@dannytaurus said in KODA is in early access - anyone tried it?:

it won't have a load of legacy cruft in there

Maybe Koda will contain a load of vibe coded voodoo instead :)

The legacy code in Kontakt isn't really a problem for users or developers - it probably is for the developers of Kontakt though, but a black box is a black box and Kontakt is a reliable one.

The problem with Kontakt was never really the software. It was the ecosystem (native access), NI's licensing, ads in the home screen, and the proprietary source code meaning developers had no control over the software.

Koda might solve some of those issues, but it seems to me that the main one - control - is why most of the big developers left Kontakt to create their own samplers, and Koda won't solve that. Others have tried, Gorilla engine, Decent Sampler, Falcon, etc. Developers want control and you either use an open system like HISE or you build your own proprietary system.

[dannytaurus]

@David-Healey I'd probably take vibe coded voodoo over 20+ years of legacy code and technical debt

Like you say, a black box is a black box, so as long as what comes out of KODA works properly, it doesn't really matter what the code is like.

Totally agree of the ecosystem stuff. That's why I never developed for Kontakt (too much licensing overhead) nor used many, if any, Kontakt libraries.

I've looked into all the other systems you mentioned and they all have similar tradeoffs.

The only move I would make from here is likely to pure JUCE. With AI tooling even as good as it is right now, let alone what it will become, that's the realistic and practical direction.