UAD plugins are now automatically categorized in Logic Pro

[Deif]

It is still mind boggling that Logic doesn’t have plug-in search but v10.1.1 of UAD should help speed up the process of loading UAD plugins. Very handy. 
 

 

Changes in this Release

(Logic) UAD-2 plug-ins are now listed within Logic Pro categories

 

Edited September 14, 2022 by Deif

[wing]

Oh that's cool. Yeah I find it mind-boggling that Logic hasn't added a native plug-in search as well. It's one of my favorite things when using Pro Tools. Saves so much time.

In the meantime I highly recommend Speakerfood's Plugsearch. Honestly one of the best add-ons to Logic out there and worth every penny... until of course Apple finally gets around to adding it natively.

[des99]

Hmm, I wonder how they are doing that... Maybe their installer is writing plugin manager xml tag files directly to the tag database...

I hope not, as that's tantamount to messing with a users' installation (I have those menus very carefully curated, and wouldn't want plugin companies stomping all over my setup just to install their plugins in their preferred plugin folders...)

3 minutes ago, wing said:

Yeah I find it mind-boggling that Logic hasn't added a native plug-in search as well.

+1

Edited September 14, 2022 by des99

[des99]

Ok, confirmed - the UAD installer contains tagset files it writes to your plugin tag database, to automatically install it's plugins across those top level categories.

As I'm not actually installing them, I have no idea whether this is a user-install option - ie if the installer asks if it's OK to write to your plugin manager categories - I really hope so. If not, this is really bad. Can someone confirm whether this is a user option during install?

Those top level categories are by default where all the Logic plugins are listed, to surface them up top, rather than relegate them to the "Logic" menu below where they are less discoverable. And for people that never customise their plugin menus, or even know that's possible, that's fine. Third-party plugins are not listed there in a default config, you have to go to AU plugins in the list to get there, which also keeps them separate from the Logic plugins.

Assuming a default config, now UA put all their plugins in the Logic menus, which is bad enough, and if you've customised your settings, UA is going to write it's plugins all over the show, messing up your organisation and requiring you to "fix" this mess by removing everything - particularly if you only own a subset of UA plugins - say, 30 out of the 200+, because it's going to write all 200, including the plugins you don't own, into your custom config. Now your carefully curated plugin structure has hundreds of plugins you don't even own strewn about at UA's whim.

Really bad.

[wing]

42 minutes ago, des99 said:

As I'm not actually installing them, I have no idea whether this is a user-install option - ie if the installer asks if it's OK to write to your plugin manager categories - I really hope so. If not, this is really bad. Can someone confirm whether this is a user option during install?

I just installed the update. It did not ask if it was ok to write to my plugin manager categories specifically, no.

I see UAD plugins in all the standard Logic folders. I actually kind of like it, I've personally never been so fond of the way Logic separates their stock plugins from your third-party plugs, especially since the AU third-party list is as far as I understand by manufacturer and not category? Sometimes I'm looking for "that one reverb I love but I forget who made it..." etc. So I've always kind of wished categories could simply show everything relevant. If I look at Delays, it should be Logic and my third-party ones, too. At least I think so, but that's just me. Perhaps it should be an option to check in preferences or within the plug-in manager.

All that said, I will say I see your viewpoint and I agree it's not good for one manufacturer to suddenly cheat their way into those menus if others cannot (or if it's not common practice). And I would agree one of the more obnoxious sides of UAD is the way they list plugins you don't actually own. It's not good practice and I wonder if Apple will step in with legal action to force them to update this update by removing that feature.

However, I will say I've done my own curated folders and I see no issue within those. They are still appearing the same as before the installation. But yes, all the standard category folders are showing plugins I don't own. The plus side is I don't have to scroll up and down a super long list of UAD plugins and can find them more easily by category... but the downside is seeing a bunch I don't own or use.

[des99]

18 minutes ago, wing said:

I just installed the update. It did not ask if it was ok to write to my plugin manager categories specifically, no.

Thanks.

18 minutes ago, wing said:

I've personally never been so fond of the way Logic separates their stock plugins from your third-party plugs, especially since the AU third-party list is as far as I understand by manufacturer and not category?

Well, they are separate things - inbuilt FX that are part of Logic, and third-party plugins that are not. Plugins can't be listed by category, as there is no standard way of defining categories that everyone agrees upon, or that are included in the plugin specification.

The point is not that stuff though - the top level menus are not Logic's, or UAD's, they are the *user's* customised configuration. What Logic does, which is a change of behaviour, is that if you haven't customised your plugin manager, Logic just puts it's own plugins at the top, as a user convenience as it's less clicks to get at them.

But they are all customisable, and if I've gone to the effort of creating *my* top level "Reverb" folder, with my choice of favourite reverb plugins, and subfolders within for other stuff, I don't not expect after updating my UAD stuff to have 20 reverb plugins I don't own to be placed in *my* custom curated "Reverb" folder - without even being asked. It's a company thinking they are doing something convenient for the user, but in effect, they are crapping over my custom, personal configuration by, without permission, putting their own plugins in there - and they aren't even plugins I *own* - so now my custom config, designed for quick access to my most used tools, is populated with plugins I don't own and can't use, and I have to go through and figure out what UA has put where to delete them, and I can't just blanket delete them, and some of *my* UAD plugins may well have been there, so I have to try to remember which UAD plugins I *did* want there.

Horribly user-hostile "feature" as implemented. It might be a nice convenience for some folks, despite the slight imposition, but over-writing customised configs by putting all their plugins in your folders is *terrible*.

And we're going to have to do this *every time* we update the plugins, as it will put them all right back... *sigh*

Edited September 14, 2022 by des99

[Deif]

1 hour ago, des99 said:

Ok, confirmed - the UAD installer contains tagset files it writes to your plugin tag database, to automatically install it's plugins across those top level categories.

As I'm not actually installing them, I have no idea whether this is a user-install option - ie if the installer asks if it's OK to write to your plugin manager categories - I really hope so. If not, this is really bad. Can someone confirm whether this is a user option during install?

Those top level categories are by default where all the Logic plugins are listed, to surface them up top, rather than relegate them to the "Logic" menu below where they are less discoverable. And for people that never customise their plugin menus, or even know that's possible, that's fine. Third-party plugins are not listed there in a default config, you have to go to AU plugins in the list to get there, which also keeps them separate from the Logic plugins.

Assuming a default config, now UA put all their plugins in the Logic menus, which is bad enough, and if you've customised your settings, UA is going to write it's plugins all over the show, messing up your organisation and requiring you to "fix" this mess by removing everything - particularly if you only own a subset of UA plugins - say, 30 out of the 200+, because it's going to write all 200, including the plugins you don't own, into your custom config. Now your carefully curated plugin structure has hundreds of plugins you don't even own strewn about at UA's whim.

Really bad.

The installer didn't ask me but now that you mention that, I'm unable to delete a Category I had previously made that contained some UAD plugins since I installed it. I wonder if it's related.

Are you on the UADforums by any chance? If you're not, do you mind if I use your post to try and get some clarification from the UA representatives in that forum?

[wing]

19 minutes ago, des99 said:

But they are all customisable, and if I've gone to the effort of creating *my* top level "Reverb" folder, with my choice of favourite reverb plugins, and subfolders within for other stuff, I don't not expect after updating my UAD stuff to have 20 reverb plugins I don't own to be placed in *my* custom curated "Reverb" folder - without even being asked.

Ah ok, I see your point. I was under the impression there was some kind of standard way of categorizing plugins, I feel like I've seen it implemented before? I do believe Pro Tools has this, however that's using their own AAX which I'm sure they have a tighter lock over standardization of it perhaps.

To the point about your customized list, I can confirm this bit has been left untouched – it's only the standard Logic menus beneath that which have been populated.

I'm attaching two screengrabs of my plugin list, one from my own customized reverbs folder you see toward the top, and then the 'standard' reverb folder. In the former, this is exactly how I had it before. In the latter there are several more UAD options after Logic's. I don't own half of these.

Curiously, a problem which I'm seeing now, is that it appears I can't have... both? The ones in my custom folder are not in the standard folder. Hmm. Kinda defeats the purpose of UAD fussing about with this... custom menus are the way to go anyway.

Edited September 14, 2022 by wing

[des99]

31 minutes ago, Deif said:

Are you on the UADforums by any chance? If you're not, do you mind if I use your post to try and get some clarification from the UA representatives in that forum?

I am, but don't post there much these days. I have posted about this on GS, where Drew from UA will see my posts.

[des99]

41 minutes ago, wing said:

To the point about your customized list, I can confirm this bit has been left untouched – it's only the standard Logic menus beneath that which have been populated.

The top level menus are all customisable - that's the point of the plugin manager's organisation features. So if I want to customise my top level menus, I don't want Logic's default organisation - that's already available below anyway. So, say I delete everything, and then create a "Reverb" folder, and put my reverbs in there, the ones I want close to hand.

UA's installer will write tags for it's own plugins into that Reverb folder (because this is the same name that Logic uses to categorise its reverbs). The point is, it's *my* "Reverb" folder, not UA's to put all their products I don't own in.

UA are not going to put plugins into any folders that are named different to Logic's default categorisation - that's why it's not going to put anything into a folder called "_My Reverbs", or a folder called "Super tubby Tube Fatteners", but it *is* going to write them into "Dynamics" or "Modulation" or "Delay" or "Reverb" etc.

The point being, the installer didn't tell me it was going to insert all it's stuff into *my* plugin categories, nor give me the option to say "No, I really don't want that", it just stuck all it's products in as to *its* whim, not caring about the fact that it's messing up *my* Logic configuration.

Here's a link to my two (scroll down) forum posts on the issue:
https://gearspace.com/board/product-alerts-older-than-2-months/1376805-universal-audio-announces-uad-spark-uadx-native-subscription-service-52.html

Edited September 14, 2022 by des99

[winip]

I installed the UAD update and have confirmed that I am now running the current version. However, I do not see the UAD plugins listed in the Logic folders. Is there something I've missed?

Thank you

[des99]

2 minutes ago, winip said:

However, I do not see the UAD plugins listed in the Logic folders. Is there something I've missed?

They are put in the *top level* folders, not the Logic folders. What you see depends on a number of factors about which Logic version you are running, whether you've customised you plugin menus, whether you've hidden and plugins in the plugin managers and so on.

Can you do a screenshot of your top level "Reverb" plugin folder, on an audio insert, for instance?

[Maestro777]

23 hours ago, Deif said:

It is still mind boggling that Logic doesn’t have plug-in search but v10.1.1 of UAD should help speed up the process of loading UAD plugins. Very handy. 
 

Changes in this Release

(Logic) UAD-2 plug-ins are now listed within Logic Pro categories

 

Yep, I installed the new version as soon as I received the email. This was a very welcome and needed improvement with respect to the UAD plugins since the collection is so massive. The only benefit of not previously having this enhancement is that it forced me to memorize the names of the type of plugin I needed in any particular situation.

Wish I knew how they did it. I could benefit the same structure for some of my other plugins as well

Edited September 15, 2022 by Maestro777

[des99]

6 minutes ago, Maestro777 said:

With I knew how they did it.

It's just Plugin Manager tags. If you haven't explored the Plugin Manager in Logic, you can create your own plugin folders and move whatever plugins you want into them.

"Use the Plug-in Manager in Logic Pro"
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/logicpro/lgcp9e26ef17/mac

I *highly* recommend organising your plugin collection.

Edited September 15, 2022 by des99

[winip]

[winip]

Thank you des99. Sorry I did mean the top level folders. I am running the current version of Logic and Monterey.

[des99]

38 minutes ago, winip said:

Sorry I did mean the top level folders.

It's difficult to say what's happened on your system - I did download the UAD 10.1.1 installer yesterday, and verified that it does contain the plugin manager tags. And others have installed this and seen the plugin menu behaviour.

If you look at the tag database in Finder, do you have files that were installed today (or yesterday), depending on when you installed the 10.1.1 version recently released...

Edited September 15, 2022 by des99

[winip]

Thanks des99. Pardon my ignorance but I'm not sure how to see the tag database to see if the plugin manager tags were installed.

[xgman]

The only thing worse than Logic not having a search feature is UAD not having a way to automate removing demo plugins that you'll never want to try.

[des99]

35 minutes ago, winip said:

Thanks des99. Pardon my ignorance but I'm not sure how to see the tag database to see if the plugin manager tags were installed.

The folder to look in is ~/Music/Audio Music Apps/Databases/Tags

[Deif]

52 minutes ago, des99 said:

The folder to look in is ~/Music/Audio Music Apps/Databases/Tags

Are these tags for anything else aside from plugins? This installation created some sort of issue in my system. I can't delete some old folders I made that included some UAD plugins. They only show up in the Plug-In manager, not the plugin list. I'm wondering if deleting these tag files will solved it.

Edited September 15, 2022 by Deif

[Maestro777]

Hey, figured I'd throw out this bone for those having issues not seeing the new UAD categorized structure after having installed the updated UAD version. You'll probably want to use the Uninstaller before installing the latest drivers.

I have no clue as to why but sometimes trying to install UAD updated drivers while the older ones are still present can cause weird issues. I know this from experience.

If you've already installed the UAD updated drivers and see some weirdness, use the uninstaller and then install the latest version.

Hope this helps out some

[winip]

Thank you des99 and Maestro777. I checked I the folder and the newest file is from June, so it seems that this was not installed. I'll maybe give Maestro777's idea a try.

[wing]

On 9/14/2022 at 4:58 PM, des99 said:

The top level menus are all customisable - that's the point of the plugin manager's organisation features. So if I want to customise my top level menus, I don't want Logic's default organisation - that's already available below anyway. So, say I delete everything, and then create a "Reverb" folder, and put my reverbs in there, the ones I want close to hand.

Ohhh, all this time I actually thought those specific folders were required for Logic plugins only and unable to be customized. I had no idea you can change those or delete Logic's default organization, hence why I've made my own such as "_My Reverbs" etc... forcing it to the tippity top, the top-top level organization lol. Now I know, thanks for the insight!

[des99]

1 hour ago, Deif said:

Are these tags for anything else aside from plugins? This installation created some sort of issue in my system. I can't delete some old folders I made that included some UAD plugins. They only show up in the Plug-In manager, not the plugin list. I'm wondering if deleting these tag files will solved it.

These tags are how the Plugin Manager stores your plugin categorisations.

If you want to delete old folders, please see the solution I shared here:

 

[des99]

28 minutes ago, wing said:

Ohhh, all this time I actually thought those specific folders were required for Logic plugins only and unable to be customized.

If you customise them, you'll see all these Logic folders are still accessible from the old "Logic" menu further down.

Customising plugin lists is a great feature - keep all your most used tools close to hand, and organise them as you wish! 👍

[ozinga]

3 hours ago, xgman said:

The only thing worse than Logic not having a search feature is UAD not having a way to automate removing demo plugins that you'll never want to try.

I use this

https://uadforum.com/community/index.php?threads/uad-plugin-cleaner-for-mac-keep-daw-plugins-in-sync-with-console.51705/

[Marcus Aurelius]

Any solution yet to this issue?   I want to be able to control what plugins are in which folders, and UA has completely made a mess of my organization.  

[Marcus Aurelius]

Some info here and an app that supposedly solves the problem...haven't tried it yet:
https://uadforum.com/community/index.php?threads/ua-plugins-logic-pro-plugin-manager.64619/

[speakerfood]

On 9/15/2022 at 8:51 PM, xgman said:

The only thing worse than Logic not having a search feature is UAD not having a way to automate removing demo plugins that you'll never want to try.

PlugSearch can automatically hide all UAD plugins you don't own.