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 If you want to use JACK, in general, it is sensible to start it <em>before</em> you run Ardour. This is not
26 necessary, but will provide you with more control and options over JACK's operation.
27 You can start JACK through its <abbr title="Command Line Interface">CLI</abbr>, or using a <abbr title="Graphical User Interface">GUI</abbr>
28 program, like <a href="https://qjackctl.sourceforge.io/">QjackCtl</a> or <a href="http://kxstudio.linuxaudio.org/Applications:Cadence">Cadence</a>.
31 If you open Ardour without specifying an existing session it will display
32 the <kbd class="menu">Session > New...</kbd> dialog and the <kbd class="menu">Audio/MIDI Setup</kbd> dialog.
33 See <a href="/working-with-sessions/new-session-dialog/">New/Open Session Dialog</a> for a description of those dialogs.