How to install VST on Linux ? (helm)

Hi everyone,

I would like to use Helm as a plugin in Renoise, I can do that easily on a Mac, but I can’t find how on Linux.

I hope someone can help me.

Thank you in advance.

What have you tried so far? Which distribution/version of linux are you using (like “ubuntu 16.04”, “Fedora 25”, Debian xyz, Arch…, 64 or 32 bit)? I think the helm website spreads debian packages for the plugin? Don’t know if there is the vst inside, because of license issues with the steinberg dev kit the scene is notorious to be very paranoid and tell people to grab the dev kit themselves and compile the plugins on their own.

I once tried it via the kxstudio repos on ubuntu with no problems, if you use ubuntu, look into these, they ignore the vst license nitpicking. You could also download a single deb with the vst in it from their repos if you don’t want the whole deep in system upgrades brainfuck but just the helm vst, I could check this out for you if you’re on ubuntu.

In the linux world many projects are open source, so 3rd party packagers (independant or the os distributors) can or even have to get involved to make the software available and/or easily installable for end users.

Hi, thank you very much for your answer. I’m using Xubuntu 16.04. The package I downloaded from the website is a .deb. I read some things about it, and there is a github for loading it as a VST, but I don’t understand how to do it, my linux level is not good enough to understand the instructions :https://github.com/mtytel/helm

Kxstudio is a distribution, right ?

Thank you again for your help :slight_smile:

Kxstudio is mainly a repo, have a look on the website, there are easy instructions.

Doing this should be enough.

Make sure you “cd” to the directory where the .deb is.

sudo dpkg -i helm_0.8.6-1039~ubuntu14.04.1_amd64.deb

Hi!

It could be the devs from helm hesitated including the vst version because of the license fuckery, I vaguely remember something like this, could even have been helm or another project. Have you checked where it installed stuff with “dpkg -L”, maybe the vst is in there but at a place you have to tell renoise to find it.

Kxstudio is a distribution mod based on ubuntu, configuring it in a certain way and offering additional or more recent software. But it is also a repository offering all the packages as additional updates to a standard ubuntu system. Well, let’s say, if you install it - it will dig deeply into your system upgrading some audio relevan system components to new versions. Don’t know if you would want this now or not, to get rid of it you better know what you’re doing. There’s a lot of tools and plugins in there from the opensource world.

But it you just want helm for now, you could download single .deb packages from their online repo, and install them with “dpkg -i xyz.deb” or whatever.

Helm 32bit: https://launchpad.net/~kxstudio-debian/+archive/ubuntu/plugins/+build/10577165

Helm 64bit: https://launchpad.net/~kxstudio-debian/+archive/ubuntu/plugins/+build/10577164

and cross your fingers there isn’t any kxstudio packages in new versions needed for a standard ubuntu, but I doubt that. If it was, installation would just fail.

OMG now I remember too, helm .deb doesn’t come with the VST, only with LV2 (which Renoise can’t handle).

You indeed need to build it from source.

no, just install the kxstudio debs instead, vst is inside… >;-)

Thank you so much for your help ! I will try this after work ! Have a nice day.