edit 7th June 2013 : Beta 3 out now https://xenakios.wordpress.com/2013/06/07/hourglass-1-4-0-beta-3-release/
(edit : problem with download link solved now. OS-X build uploaded.)
It’s taken far too long to get to this point. Anyway, for anyone interested, 1.4.0 beta 1 is finally available. No OS-X build this time as it’s a bit tiresome to do, but I will get to it during further 1.4.x releases.
www.xenakios.liitin.net/public_html/HourGlass_1.4.0beta1.zip
www.xenakios.liitin.net/public_html/HourGlass_1.4.0beta2.dmg
You can expect bugs and quirks, the beta tag is appropriate.
Changes since 1.3.x :
- Varispeeder offline processing module
- Rack DSP module that allows you to load multiple effects in parallel chains
- Fragment voice sends volumes and probabilities can be automated
- Various other changes
Xenakios's Blog 
Woohoo!
I would like to create some short helper text how to use HourGlass ‘most usefully’ with Reaper, there are many questions, at least in my mind, how to use it, only standalone, or as an editor inside Reaper, in real-time, or non-real-time, how are files of Reaper treated, are they destructively changed or non-destructively. How can midi mapped automated controls be written inside Reaper, do we have to record real-time audio output of HourGlass still, even if the file is coming from Reaper and so on. Just having some kind of helper text which can answer all these questions nicely. Or did you write already about these things anywhere? Thanks, I will check this new version soon.
When HourGlass is used as an external editor for Reaper (or a similar app with sufficient support for something like that, I don’t really know of any other suitable app though), it is best to use the action in Reaper that creates a copy of the selected audio item. The source file will be overwritten by default by HourGlass, but this behavior can be customized. (The overwrite behavior is convenient, even if slightly dangerous, because the resulting processing can be listened to inside Reaper in context with other material without having to import and position the offline rendered file separately.) Note that HourGlass never runs “inside” Reaper, there’s no kind of plugin operation available at the moment.
MIDI control can’t really come fully into play when using HourGlass in this external editor mode. What happens with the MIDI/OSC remote control movements can only be captured into an audio file by recording the live output of HourGlass. This admittedly is a shortcoming. The remote control movements should be writable as automation envelopes. I have looked into that but it is not entirely trivial to implement properly. The remote controls can also trigger changes in the sound which do not result from the automatable parameters. In principle these other kinds of actions might be recordable and playable back too, but that would be quite a complicated system to implement.
I think in principle MIDI CC data that is played back into the MIDI output ports in Reaper could be used to control HourGlass but I’ve never tested that, as there is no suitable free of charge virtual MIDI port thing available for 64-bit Windows, as far as I know. There’s also no manual assignment of MIDI CCs to parameters in HourGlass, it can only learn the MIDI controls. (Another shortcoming which should be relatively easy to fix, however.)
Ok, thanks for all the info. Did you check this: http://www.tobias-erichsen.de/software/loopmidi.html
What would be nice having is something like: Record live output of Hourglass in real-time, then replace the copied file of Reaper, meaning even if I manipulate those cc mapped parameters over the file playing time, those changes should be available in the resulting file, if possible. Otherwise ok, then we can not not play with the parameters, just find a setting you like and apply this to the whole file.
Changing parameters crazily, can create some other nice crazy results. Then we have to do all the work manually, as the saved file names of HourGlass are anyway known those could be auto-imported into Reaper somehow, using some automation tricks.
Just saw the (for me) new .ogg support, great! Thanks, now I do not need to use always .way anymore, usually while recording using HarddiskOgg, while listening to YouTube stuff maybe, just push a button, sample something, jump over to HourGlass and play with that snippet. Now, perfectly also with .ogg files.