Add Support for VST2 Plugins about pedalboard HOT 2 CLOSED

Hi @0xdevalias!

Thanks for all of that research. As you quoted, VST2 is indeed discontinued. Steinberg no longer makes the VST2 SDK available for download, and they also require users of the SDK to receive a license. As of 2020, Steinberg seems to refuse to enter into any license agreements to use the VST2 SDK:

In 2013 Steinberg announced the end of the VST2 SDK release. Five years later, in October 2018, Steinberg no longer makes the VST2 SDK available and no longer enters into VST2 license agreements. Previously, maintenance and technical support for VST2 had already been discontinued. We regret to inform you that it is no longer possible to conclude a license agreement for VST2.

As such, Pedalboard can't load VST2 plugins as we can't legally obtain a license to use the VST2 SDK. We thus have no plans at this time to add VST2 support.

from pedalboard.

@psobot Thanks for clarifying. I figured that was likely to be the outcome, but wanted to officially capture it here in case (as I'm sure it will come up as a question for others in future as well)

To save anyone else's future time pondering on this, of the above resources, I think these 2 threads seem to touch on the potential 'legal loopholes' side of things (and potentially other methods for adding VST2 support to a new host/etc):

• https://forum.juce.com/t/how-to-offer-vst2-plugins-now/39195/22
• https://forum.juce.com/t/hosting-vst2-plugins-under-vst3-sdk-license/37079/76

While I didn't read them entirely/thoroughly, they didn't seem to come to any particularly concrete solutions, aside from suggesting using existing VST3/etc plugins that could act as a host for VST2 plugins; one of which that was mentioned being Element:

• https://kushview.net/element/

  • Multiplatform Plugin Hosting

  • This is Element, a modular AU/LV2/VST/VST3 audio plugin host. Create powerful effects, racks and instruments by connecting nodes to one another. Integrates with your existing hardware via standard protocols such as MIDI.

  • Features

    • Runs standalone or as a plugin in your DAW
    • ..snip..
    • Scripting

    • https://element.readthedocs.io/en/latest/scripting/overview.html
      • https://kushview.net/api/el/latest/
• https://github.com/kushview/element

One of those threads also mentioned the following project as a potential solution, but noted that it is GPLv3 licensed (which may or may not be an issue here, given this project is already open source):

• https://git.iem.at/zmoelnig/FST/

  • FST - Free Studio Technology: header files for building audio plugins

  • this is a simple header file to allow the compilation of audio plugins and audio plugin hosts following the industrial standard of Steinberg's VST(2).

  • FST is the attempt to create a bona-fide reverse-engineered header file, that is created without reference to the official VST SDK and without its developer(s) having agreed to the VST SDK license agreement.

  • https://git.iem.at/zmoelnig/FST/-/blob/master/docs/REVERSE_ENGINEERING.md

I didn't deeply look into this, or other similar approaches, and as I'm not a lawyer, I couldn't say for sure if this would be a legally viable solution to the "Steinberg no longer licensing VST2 SDK" problem.

from pedalboard.