Notes on using yabridge to run Windows VST plugins in Linux

gistfile1.txt

This is basically a list of things I wish had been clearer to me when I first sat down to try to figure out how to use
yabridge.  Some of these may not have been clear because I did a bad job of skimming the documentation.  Others may be
because the documentation is actually lacking.

(1) yabridge expects the wine binary to be at /usr/bin/wine.  If your wine is installed somewhere else you should symlink it to /usr/bin/wine.  Here are some other places where your Wine might be installed -
- WineHQ's PPA installs wine-staging at /opt/wine-staging/bin/wine
- Lutris installs wine under ~/.local/share/lutris/runners/wine
- Heroic Launcher installs wine under ~/.config/heroic/tools/wine

(2) yabridge does not have any GUI elements.  It is a command line utility that looks for Windows VST plugins that have
already been installed in your wine prefix and creates Linux VST plugins that are actually just wrappers for the Windows
VST plugins.

(3) "yabridgectl sync" is the command that tells yabridge to scan for new Windows VST plugins in your wine prefix and
create wrappers for them.

(4) yabridgectl add/rm/list are used to maintain the list of folders under the wine prefix where yabridge will look for
Windows VST plugins.

(5) yabridgectl set is used to control where yabridge will output the Linux "wrappers" plugins.

(6) The Windows versions of the plugins do need to stay installed in your wine prefix.  yabridgectl doesn't make copies
of them in creating their wrappers - the wrappers just call the copies you've already installed in wine.

(7) After you do "yabridgectl sync" you do still need to have your host program / DAW / whatever you're using the VST plugins
in check for new (Linux) VST plugins so it can find the wrapped plugins yabridgectl created.  Some DAW programs automatically
scan for new plugins when you start them up.  In Ardour, you can scan for new plugins by going to Window -> Plugin Manaager
and clicking "Discover New/Updated."