Requirements

Platform

Jamba is currently working on the following platforms:

  • macOS Mojave 10.14.6+ with Xcode 11.3.1 installed
  • macOS Big Sur 11.1 with Xcode 12.3 installed and Apple Silicon (universal build)
  • Windows 10 64 bits and Visual Studio Build tools (Visual Studio 16 2019)

Other requirements:

  • CMake (minimum version 3.17) must be properly installed (cmake executable must be in your PATH)
  • C++ 17 (available with the platforms/toolchains described above)
  • python 3.7+ (used by the convenient/wrapper scripts provided by Jamba)
Tip

New since 5.1.2, Jamba supports building universal plugins on macOS with XCode and Apple Silicon chipset!

Info

On macOS, it is likely possible to use an earlier version (of the OS and Xcode) but it has not been tested

Note

Linux is currently not supported (could be added if there is demand).

VST3 SDK

Tip

Jamba can automatically download the SDK for you but it is strongly recommended to install the SDK as the cloned repository is quite large (over 100MB) and would have to be downloaded again if you delete the build folder.

Download or clone the SDK

You can clone the SDK from Github

git clone --recursive https://github.com/steinbergmedia/vst3sdk.git
cd vst3sdk 
git checkout 79750cb3e56f3988f33bc178884962cc3f4c3eb9
Note

Jamba currently uses 3.7.1 which corresponds to the tag v3.7.1_build_50 (79750cb3e56f3988f33bc178884962cc3f4c3eb9 commit hash).

Warning

The Steinberg website only lets you download the “latest” version so make sure you use the link in the table below.

Jamba VST VST SDK Git Hash VST SDK Download
5.1.0+ 3.7.1 79750cb3e56f3988f33bc178884962cc3f4c3eb9 vst-sdk_3.7.1_build-50_2020-11-17.zip
5.0.0 3.7.0 3e651943d4747f8af43d10b21227020bc8b7f438 vst-sdk_3.7.0_build-116_2020-07-31.zip
1.0.0 - 4.5.0 3.6.9 985d945639f5a2f7498d9483e8b5e6d921bcb580 vstsdk369_01_03_2018_build_132.zip

Install the SDK

Jamba lets you configure the location of the SDK via the VST3_SDK_ROOT CMake cache variable which can be set via any means available to CMake or set via the --vst3 option when running the configure.py script. If you do not want to have to worry about it you can also install it (or create a link) to a default location:

  • /Users/Shared/Steinberg/VST_SDK.3.7.1 for macOS
  • C:\Users\Public\Documents\Steinberg\VST_SDK.3.7.1 for windows.
Info
  • If you are downloading the zip file, please note that /Users/Shared/Steinberg/VST_SDK.3.7.1 (resp. C:\Users\Public\Documents\Steinberg\VST_SDK.3.7.1) or the path provided via --vst3, corresponds to the folder called VST3_SDK in the zip file.
  • If you are cloning the repository, then it corresponds to the root of the repository.

VST2 SDK

If you want to wrap your VST3 plugin into a VST2 plugin you will need the VST2 SDK. Unfortunately Steinberg is no longer distributing it officially and you need to get access to it. Once you get access to it, Jamba lets you configure the location of the SDK via the VST2_SDK_ROOT CMake cache variable which can be set via any means available to CMake or set via the --vst2 option when running the configure.py script.

Tip

If you download an old version of the VST3 SDK (like 3.6.9 (shasum 256 => 7c6c2a5f0bcbf8a7a0d6a42b782f0d3c00ec8eafa4226bbf2f5554e8cd764964)) it contains the VST2 SDK at the root and this is what you need to copy or link to.

Warning

If you donwload the latest VST3 SDK zip file it does contain a VST2_SDK folder at the root but it is an incomplete VST2 SDK distribution. Only older versions of the VST3 SDK (like 3.6.9) contains a valid VST2 SDK distribution.