Announcing the jammr online jamming platform

[Stefan Hajnoczi]

Today we're launching jammr, the online jamming platform that I've been working
on, and publishing the Wahjam patches to support the new protocol. jammr is
why I have been developing and maintaining Wahjam. I invite you to check it
out at http://jammr.net/.

I wanted to share more than just the patches though. This mail explains
jammr's vision and the reason for the new protocol.

So why am I working on a new jamming platform?

Computer music enthusiasts are already well-served. And I tried to do the same
for open source enthusiasts by starting the Wahjam project. But for everyone
else the hurdles are too high and things have not improved for years.

Online jamming is somewhat stuck and we're trying to change that. Our goal is
to make it easy and fun to use, so that everyone can jam together online. This
means simplifying, focussing on user experience, and overhauling things to fit
today's technology.

Okay, but why create a new protocol?

Incompatible changes are necessary to fix flaws in the existing protocol. For
example, the existing protocol uses local character encoding when text is
transmitted. This makes it impossible to accurately display characters between
users with different language settings. The new protocol uses UTF-8
consistently.

Beyond this we're adding new features, like private jams, which extend the
protocol to transmit user privileges.

Will Wahjam continue to be developed?

Yes! jammr uses Wahjam as its client and jam session server. Therefore Wahjam
automatically gets the improvements that we make for jammr.

Will Wahjam drop old protocol support?

Absolutely not. I mentioned earlier that computer music enthusiasts are
already well-served with what we have and I don't want to take that away. The
jammr patches make Wahjam a multi-protocol client!

Finally, I want to thank everyone in the community who has shown interest,
engaged in technical discussions, and is helping us in our common goal to jam
together online.

Please let me know if you have any questions about jammr.

Stefan