MuseScore M1/Apple Silicon Optimization?

• Feb 22, 2021 - 18:27

I was wondering if Musescore will ever get optimized (meaning not through the x86-to-ARM/RISC converter that Apple uses, but rather, coded with ARM/RISC) to run on Apple Silicon like M1, and if so, if it might be able to run on iPads, since I would like to use an iPad Pro as my main laptop at some point. And since iPhone and iPad apps can now run in macOS Big Sur... It would be a dream to have the reverse happen with iPadOS...
anyway
Just wondering if there's any work being done towards optimizing for the new Macs


Comments

I don't really know the details here, but my understanding is that merely compiling for the M1 chip would be relatively simple assuming all the tools and libraries we rely on are also supported on that platform. Which is probably not the case yet but might well be within the next few months, just guessing. However, none of this really in any way helps in terms of getting MuseScore to run on an entirely different OS for which none of the these tools or libraries exist now and are unlikely to start existing any time soon. Not to mention that designing an app to work on a touchscreen-only interface is extremely different from designing one for desktop-type systems. Even if technically could run, it wouldn't be all that usable because it's not designed for that. But, you can certainly have some fun playing with this idea using a remote desktop utility to allow the iPad to "drive" another system.

In reply to by GreatestShowman100

You might want to check out StaffPad (also part of the Muse Group) for the iPad. It’s designed for the Apple Pencil and basically is an empty sheet music page on which you write your music. The app automatically recognises your handwriting and converts it to MIDI. StaffPad also has a pretty nice sounding audio feedback and you can export your projects via XML to import them to Musescore afterwards. I really like it when I‘m on the piano or on the road. :)

While it would be nice to have MuseScore running natively on the ARM M1 chip, I have found that Apple's x86 to ARM translator (aka Rosetta) is so efficient that MuseScore uses less CPU resources running on my MacBook Air M1 than it did on my MacBook Air Intel. Besides the MuseScore process itself, I had seen coreaudiod (a Mac built-in I think) running at up to 20% whenever MuseScore had a score open (even when not playing the score) on my MacBook Air Intel, but only about 4% on my MacBook Air M1. So all in all, no problem running the x86 compiled MuseScore on the M1.

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