I don’t remember how L and R were mapped (nor whether they were available in the high/low/metal/wood… structures proposed in JB Percussion library). What I remember is I had to make choices to ditch out swells (kind of useless in notation software, where you need more granular pieces to match any tempo) and map things such as snares on/off as add-on key switches. Five years later I think your approach with individual instruments could work — using a play-back template loads as many instances as there are instruments, which used to be a problem with the 2019 computer I had, but is no longer an issue.
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Yeah I can understand that. The problem with the combined instruments is having to assign the keyswitches yourself. Right now you are getting by that by providing a preset (through a playback template and example Dorico file). There are two problems with that approach - one is the issue that is encountered here, where the library has changed and so the preset no longer works (whereas if default keyswitches are used with individual patches, that would not be a problem).
The second issue with that approach is that Spitfire considers the posting of any DAW or notation program project file that has the library loaded, or any preset file to load the library, a violation of the EULA and they will send nasty cease-and-desist notices if they know you posted it. People on other forums have gotten nasty letters from Spitfire for such innocent behaviour as posting up their personal Cubase template (or whatever) with SSO loaded, or an example Cubase project file that shows how they mocked up a particular cinematic track. This happens because every save and preset includes copyrighted Spitfire scripts with contain their intellectual property, due to the bad design of Kontakt to save way too much data into the host application (the same reason why file saves get so ballooned with Kontakt). That’s also why sites like synthestration.com (which provides example tracks for composers to study) do not include any Kontakt examples whatsoever. Most library vendors that develop for Kontakt look the other way when people post templates and projects, it is only Spitfire that seems to go after the little guys for this. You’re just fortunate that Spitfire doesn’t seem to be monitoring this forum like they are some others - I suspect it isn’t on their radar (yet).
If they did find it, they would probably demand you in writing to take down the presets and remove the SSO instances from the Dorico project file (so that it just had a bunch of empty Kontakts loaded) and remove the endpoint data blob from the playback template (so that it would just load up a bunch of empty Kontakts on the end user’s computer. This would not be very usable or useful if everybody downloading this had to assign all the keyswitches themselves manually. At least by building to the factory nkis for the individual instruments, it ensures that if they did find this and complained and made you take those elements down, it would still work for the users by simply loading the correct factory nki onto the correct MIDI channel in the correct Kontakt instance.
I’m quite surprised by what you write !!! Not only did they know about that work, but I did share it on their own (now defunct) forum. Going after people that could provide tools that give other people the will to buy their products is totally nuts.
Fortunately, they did not send me any nasty mail. But I certainly won’t work on this library. After all, other very good companies supported me in that effort (Toontracks) because they know it’s good for their business !
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- in my opinion and that of everyone else who has bothered to express one, my symphonic renderings with SSO are in general better than the previous NPPE ones with CSS or BBC SO Core, which is not to say they couldn’t be substantially improved with more work.. I also find them better than the SSO NPPE largely because of the great acoustic (all microphones can be used) and all articulations are available, although the NP “intelligence” does score in some sections. . Not that I can post comparisons here because I only have the trial mode thanks to NP stopping engine sales. But you can listen for yourself and decide Spitfire Symphony Orchestra symphonic renderings
- I still use Kontakt 7 so can’t offer templates.
- Same answer as in 1. above. The extreme RAM usage is another issue with the NPPE, although my system just managed with a little extra virtual memory. But unlike with the BBC SO where I use without hesitation the NPPE, I don’t find it an overall advantage with the SSO. I downgraded to NP 4.5.1 as I can’t see any point in NP 5 as the sounds are not good enough for mockups (as opposed to proofing for live players). Some disagree of course. I suppose you could try NP 5.0.0 if still available but I dread to think how many hours it would take to process this sizeable library. And from my experiments with CSS and BBC Core, it’s not worth it anyway.
I bought SSO and had it installed before I realized that it uses Kontact 8 - I thought that was a little weird actually but I kept going. 
Anyway… I don’t believe there is anything proprietary to Spitfire in a Dorico expression map or percussion map, I’m pretty confident we can share those. And perhaps not whole Dorico projects but endpoint setups? I’m not that interested in testing the line, but I do think Spitfire is pro composer while certainly having their own approach or beliefs.
There isn’t anything at all wrong with sharing percussion maps or expression maps. But people who made SSO templates for DAWs and shared them with others for free were made to take them down and most brought them back but with a bunch of empty Kontakt instances in place of the ones with SSO already loaded (so that the end user would load SSO manually into the empty Kontakt instance, but at least everything else would be ready to go). Spitfire was of course fine with this, as long as the template did not include an already loaded copy of the library and the user still had to load it manually.
Based upon this, the endpoint setup itself would be fine, as long as it is just an empty Kontakt without the Spitfire instrument actually loaded in it. Once the Spitfire instrument is loaded, their scripts and other intellectual property are included in the data blob and might be distributed to people who don’t own the library. So competitors could use this to get a copy of private advanced Kontakt programming scripts made by Spitfire and use that IP in their own products.
And this also only applies to Spitfire’s Kontakt libraries - anything like BBCSO or Abbey Road One are not Kontakt libraries and so they do not save any intellectual property with the data blob in the host, and so you can do anything with those without any issues.
To be fair, I don’t think Spitfire is using these draconian tactics with the express intent to punish those who want to promote their libraries and facilitate the ease of use of such libraries. Instead, they just seem really concerned with their competitors gaining access to their intellectual property in those scripts in a scenario where the EULA might not have teeth (ex. someone who hadn’t actually bought the library getting access to them), and well-meaning users who didn’t even know they were doing anything wrong get caught up in it.