Songs

Songs is a powerful audio recording and mixing software with a graphical interface. One of the key motivations behind the creation of Songs was to provide a recording tool for Linux that was not too complex and did not use up too many resources. While there are other audio recording and mixing tools available for Linux, most of them are too large and consume too much memory. Songs is specifically designed to run on smaller machines without compromising on features.

One of the standout features of Songs is its support for an unlimited number of audio tracks. It also supports WAV files (mono, stereo) and raw float files (mono, stereo), which are particularly useful for mixing and conserving resources. Songs offers various effects, although at the moment, the selection is limited. However, these limitations are expected to be addressed in future updates.

One key advantage that users will appreciate about Songs is its efficient use of memory. The audio files are mapped directly into memory, which allows the Linux kernel to swap them easily, making it much faster to record and mix audio files. The software uses gtk 2.0 for its graphical interface. While this has some advantages, the documentation for gtk is not perfect, and it may be subject to future changes that could affect Songs' functionality.

Songs' recording is done directly to disk, which means that even on small machines with limited memory, users can still record audio files. However, full duplex mode is not very well handled with OSS, and users may need to synchronize audio tracks manually.

In addition to its key features, the latest release of Songs includes a new compressor feature as well as bug fixes, addressing various issues that users have reported. Overall, Songs is a reliable and user-friendly software that offers users a wealth of useful features for recording and mixing audio files.