[SOLVED] Another Slackware user with PulseAudio problems

55020 · 09-06-2017, 07:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by selfprogrammed

I think the end-result of this thread is that Slackware got it wrong. They bought into the PulseAudio takeover story, and broke the audio support for every legacy program.
As this thread shows, it is possible to setup PulseAudio to work with ALSA having primary
control of the audio. For some hardware it is necessary to have it set up that way.

I have not seen any claim by Slackware that it is now only for those people lucky enough to have the audio hardware that PulseAudio will detect auto-magically.

<RANT>
I deleted most of the RANT I had here, simply because there are too many people who just want to get a word in and they don't consider that they are just saying "it works for me" to a bunch of people for whom it does not work. No amount of RANT is going to get them to think twice about what they are saying, or where they choose to say it. This is a problem in too many of the threads in Linux Questions.

Reports from those people who have a narrow enough application that it would work for them are simply irritating when the thread question is about fixing that thing for the people for whom the misbegotten stock setup does not work.

As I am the original poster, and I have closed this thread, I claim that I should get the last word on this. Start your own thread if you want to argue. Please, Only post here if you have some exciting new fix or a better fix for getting PulseAudio to allow Legacy ALSA applications to work.
<END RANT>

Hiya!!!

I just wanted to point out that when you excluded people who have it working all those months ago, you excluded the people who know *how* to get it working!

And thanks for inventing those new rules about closing threads and having the last word!

Richard Cranium · 09-06-2017, 08:27 PM

Jesus Christ, let it go @55020.

The OP found a solution that was acceptable to him/her. AFAIK, he/she doesn't post crap in the other PulseAudio issue threads, telling people how much PA sucks and so on.

Good for @selfprogrammed

1337_powerslacker · 09-06-2017, 08:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by selfprogrammed

I think the end-result of this thread is that Slackware got it wrong. They bought into the PulseAudio takeover story, and broke the audio support for every legacy program.
As this thread shows, it is possible to setup PulseAudio to work with ALSA having primary
control of the audio. For some hardware it is necessary to have it set up that way.

I have not seen any claim by Slackware that it is now only for those people lucky enough to have the audio hardware that PulseAudio will detect auto-magically.

There are several points of interest here. Briefly:

If you happen to have 20+ years of successful distro maintenance under your belt, then you get to critique the addition of components.
If you cared to read the ChangeLog for the addition of Pulseaudio, you would understand why it was added. It was not added for arbitrary reasons.
Additionally, if you cared to do a search here for pulseaudio, you would discover that, for the vast majority of people, PulseAudio works just fine. It's only for some (few) people, who have specialized needs, that the addition of PulseAudio causes issues. Can't please everyone.

Food for thought.

Happy Slacking!

wjaguar · 02-20-2019, 07:28 PM

Maybe a bit late for a response, but my pain with PA is recent and acute. Today was the day (the night) when sound disappeared on my system one time too many. Never again. My heartfelt thanks go to ninikos whose guide allowed me to restore my setup to sanity in about five minutes.

And to another user whose pontification was the polar opposite of useful, I got a word to say as well. So, here go several points of correction.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 1337_powerslacker

If you happen to have 20+ years of successful distro maintenance under your belt, then you get to critique the addition of components.

This is so old it's not even funny, but let me reiterate it specifically for you:
Unless you happen to have 20+ years of successful egg-laying, do you or don't you get to critique a rotten egg in your breakfast?

Quote:

If you cared to read the ChangeLog for the addition of Pulseaudio, you would understand why it was added. It was not added for arbitrary reasons.

If you think that the reasons of supporting some people's HW (Bluetooth) justify breaking things for other people (like me with my very regular TWO soundcards in one system), think again.

Quote:

Additionally, if you cared to do a search here for pulseaudio, you would discover that, for the vast majority of people, PulseAudio works just fine. It's only for some (few) people, who have specialized needs, that the addition of PulseAudio causes issues. Can't please everyone.

For MUCH vaster majority of people, Windows works just fine. For the vast majority of the rest, OS X does. For the vast majority of the 2% that remain, it is so called "mainstream" distros. If you have no better argument than "we are the legion" on a Slackware forum of all places... you should have stayed with MS products.

ReaperX7 · 02-20-2019, 08:45 PM

Pulseaudio isn't actually needed any longer for Slackware. About half a year or so ago, a new library came out that did away with requiring Pulse for BlueZ. I think I posted it in the "Requests for Slackware 15" megapost, so trace my username back and you'll find the library.

I dislike Pulse too because it still hijacks the audio stack and still doesn't behave.

bassmadrigal · 02-20-2019, 10:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wjaguar

If you think that the reasons of supporting some people's HW (Bluetooth) justify breaking things for other people (like me with my very regular TWO soundcards in one system), think again.

This was a major point of contention when pulseaudio was initially introduced to Slackware. But for the vast majority of users, pulseaudio just works (a lot of times, better than alsa since there was usually no need to tweak files to have it output to the right device). For the ones who it didn't work for, there were attempts to try and fix the issues, but sometimes a piece of software just doesn't do what a person needs it to do. That is why there is both dhclient and dhcpcd. Unfortunately, pulse doesn't mix well with other audio solutions, so for 14.2, there were only guides on how to minimize the impact of pulse or excise it completely (which required rebuilding programs that had a hard dependency on pulse). For -current, Pat now has made available pure-alsa packages, allowing someone to not rely on pulse at all.

I don't like how pulse was forced onto Slackware by BlueZ removing support for alsa, but I also have no problems with pulse and it works on all my systems. I had issues with alsa for pretty much my last 10-15 years of Linux where alsa would default to a different audio output than I wanted and I always had to tweak files to get it to play to the right device. Once configured, it would work without issue. Pulse hasn't required that configuration.

For me, I'm fine with either system. While alsa almost always required initial tweaking, it was easy for me to do and was reliable once tweaked.

Richard Cranium · 02-21-2019, 06:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bassmadrigal

I had issues with alsa for pretty much my last 10-15 years of Linux where alsa would default to a different audio output than I wanted and I always had to tweak files to get it to play to the right device. Once configured, it would work without issue. Pulse hasn't required that configuration.

For me, I'm fine with either system. While alsa almost always required initial tweaking, it was easy for me to do and was reliable once tweaked.

I always found ALSA to be a monumental PITA when dealing with sources and sinks that came and went. (USB headphones in particular.) I eventually configured it to output to a single set of speakers and never attempted to change outputs.

OTOH, I don't have multiple sound cards and I don't do any sound editing at all. My use cases aren't the same as those people who do those things; since Pat added pulse-free packages in -current, maybe this bone of contention will go away.

bassmadrigal · 02-21-2019, 11:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richard Cranium

I always found ALSA to be a monumental PITA when dealing with sources and sinks that came and went. (USB headphones in particular.) I eventually configured it to output to a single set of speakers and never attempted to change outputs.

OTOH, I don't have multiple sound cards and I don't do any sound editing at all. My use cases aren't the same as those people who do those things; since Pat added pulse-free packages in -current, maybe this bone of contention will go away.

I've always had much easier setups. Just a single output that would never change, 3.5mm out via the soundcard on my desktop and HDMI out on my HTPC. I've never had to deal with adding/removing usb sound devices, but I know that was a sore spot for many users using alsa.