I'm relatively happy using Pulseaudo with Jack/Jack-Mixer for my computer sound needs. On occasion, though, when playing music via Audacious, I find that the connections between audacious and jack-mixer drop. This seems to occur whenever a stereo music file is followed by a mono music file and is then followed by another stereo file.

Does anyone know of a way to force Audacious to maintain a stereo output even when the input program is mono? I wouldn't much mind if output was directed to only one channel or duplicated to both channels but I haven't run across any configuration settings--or plug-ins--that will let me opt for either of those. Either would be preferable to having the connections to jack-mixer drop altogether and force me to re-establish them manually. Audacious has an option to automatically connect to the "output" but that seems to connect automatically to the system playback channels and not to the audacious channels I've configured in jack-mixer.

Any hints, pointers to HowTos, etc., are warmly welcomed.

TIA...

--
Rick

Recompile audacious so it is built to use jackd. Guessing this is a Debian type system your using. Apt-get world. Make sure your alsa-plugins are compiled against jackd.
You can. Have all the media in the worldva d if it isnt built against pules and jackd. Tbe. It breaks.
I use slackware. Recompile what I need all the sources come with slackware like it should.
https://github.com/Drakeo/jack-pulse-sink

Would this actually be necessary? Audacious already supports Jack and is the output connection type I have been using: File->Settings->Audio->Output plugin->Jack Output.
No. Sorry I wasn't specific. This is happening on OpenSUSE so zypper or the YaST software manager would be the way to go. At last check, all the components in my audio playback chain were up-to-date. (I am due for an OS update which will change the environment, I'm sure. Then I can experience a whole new set of weird software behavior. :^/ )

One option I've considered is to find a method of identifying all the MP3s that are mono and remastering them to still technically be mono but stereo with the same content in both channels. That should prevent the channel changes that are causing jack-mixer channel connection drops. (If my theory about what's going on is correct.) Seems like it'll potentially be a lot of work, though. Opportunity for automation, eh?

Still looking for other options but I'm hoping that this doesn't wind up requiring a whole bunch of more software to fix what I would guess is a common problem. Hard to imagine my usage is unique.

Audacious should have something in settings to allow mono tracks to be remixed to stereo

or else set Audacious to use Pulseaudio playback rather than direct to JACK
Pulseaudio should be able to handle the changes between mono and stereo
and Pulseaudio JACK Sink should remain fixed to stereo

I've looked for this. Such an option doesn't seek to exist. There may be a plug-in available that lets a user set this up but if it exists I've yet to find it. Got any leads?

The reason I went with Jack was to gain more control of the volume levels of multiple sources than I could achieve using Pulseaudio. The jack-mixer program lets me control those in one place. If I rely on PA, I have to open each audio source--which is likely on a different virtual desktop and probably minimized to boot--and adjust it within the application itself using whatever finicky and a-pain-to-use volume control widget the developer decided upon.

Still looking ...

I've had "other" issues with pulseaudio over jack. My workaround is the have two users, one uses jack and audio via the alsa loopback device (snd-aloop). The other user uses alsaloop to route audio to pulseaudio over the network. The pulse over the network works directly, but changes like what you've mentioned crashes pulse after about an hour. It's easier to restart alsaloop locally than jack + jack_mixer + pulse on a remote machine every hour (or less).

$ alsaloop -C hw:Loopback,1,0 -f S24_LE -c 2 -r 48000 -n -A 0 -t 50000 -P pulse 2>&1 > /dev/null