7 There are several ways of <dfn>starting Ardour</dfn>, which may vary
8 depending on which platform you are using it.
11 <li>double-click the Ardour icon in your platform's file manager (e.g.
12 Nautilus on Linux, Finder on OS X)</li>
13 <li>double click on an Ardour session file in your platform's file manager</li>
14 <li>on Linux, you can also start Ardour <a
15 href="/ardours-interface/starting-ardour/starting-ardour-from-the-command-line">on
16 the command line</a></li>
19 When Ardour is run for the very first time, a special dialog is displayed
20 that will ask you several questions about your setup. You will not be asked
21 these questions again, but you can always modify your choices via the
22 <kbd class="menu">Edit > Preferences</kbd> dialog.
25 In general, it is sensible to start JACK before you run Ardour. This is not
26 necessary, but will provide you with more control and options over JACK's
30 If you open Ardour without specifying an existing session it will display
31 the <kbd class="menu">Session > New...</kbd> dialog. If JACK is not already
32 running, there will be an extra <kbd class="menu">Audio Engine</kbd> tab in
33 that dialog to configure JACK, which Ardour will then start automatically.
36 If you did specify an existing session but JACK is not already running, the
37 <kbd class="menu">New Session</kbd> dialog will contain just the Audio Engine tab.