Try

Thanks @ZhaoLin1457 and @LuckyCyborg for all the pointers,

I've successfully built FF 67.0.4 and it is using my existing profile.

Update: I had to install both cbindgen (src site) and nodejs (slackbuilds) as dependencies (as mentioned in the previous posts).

You said it was "sabotage". What are they trying to sabotage? You seem to imply they have some sort of deal with the devil to push pulse only systems, if not, what are you implying with "sabotage"?

Maybe they aren't rare in the Slackware world, but I still imagine people disabling pulse is very rare in comparison to the people who don't even give it a second thought.

You can still use Firefox as you want, but you just have to enable an option that is no longer enabled by default. You didn't make any mention of my speculation is that they made it disabled by default since no one is working on it and they don't want a potentially broken feature that no one is checking to be enabled by default?

ehartman is absolutely correct in that I mean just the alsa code within Firefox is unmaintained. alsa itself is still alive and well, having released 1.1.9 on 10 May 2019.

This is my guess on why it is disabled by default. Between Firefox and alsa changes, if the alsa code inside Firefox is not adjusted as needed to these changes, it will break at some point. Hopefully there will be enough of an alsa-using userbase that someone with the know-how is able to provide a patch (and maybe Mozilla would even apply it), but that is not guaranteed and Mozilla doesn't want an unmaintained feature that could be potentially broken to be enabled by default.

I don't have time for semantics.

The point is, the code is already there, ALSA is very mature and is unlikely to get breaking changes, and flipping it to disabled at the time they did, was simply to obsolete it sooner, so they can remove it sooner, so they don't have to deal with it. I find that obnoxious and I'll not blow smoke up anyone's ass and pretend it's OK.

P.S. Pulseaudio still causes some problems, just for example, I have to disable that real time scheduling (a method I disagree with anyway) and force it to the old interrupt mode of scheduling (tsched=0) or I get problems with audio crackling in some games (mostly older games through Wine, but not only). Note that isn't on Slackware (I use Manjaro for games) but if not for that override I'd be disabling pulseaudio there.

True. As demonstrated by the rest of your post, where you wander about pure ALSA supremacy and PulseAudio hatin', while the user quoted by you talks about the code from Firefox.

Let's see the bright side: most likely the support for ALSA from Firefox is doomed probably in no more than several major releases. Because they said clear and sound that they will NOT write a sound server on Firefox, just for the sake of some superstitions and FUD ventilated in some forums.

So, the PulseAudio hatters better to consider which one will be their next browser, because Firefox will not support their obscurantism anymore not so long in future.

Honestly, I will love to see that day, because those few vocal PulseAudio hatters will have no reasons to derail anymore the threads about Firefox. And the future is bright... :D

We simply don't know why they moved it to not being disabled automatically. You say it's sabotage, I say it's likely something much less nefarious.

But yes, if you have no developers that want to work on the the alsa codebase (and who knows how long it's been since developers seriously worked on the alsa codebase within Firefox), it makes sense to obsolete it sooner so they can remove it sooner (if that's their final goal... it may be to just leave it unmaintained). It may be obnoxious for those that want it, but that's what you get when you use someone else's software. Complaining about it on the Slackware forum gets you nowhere.

The problem as I see it is disabling it BEFORE it is "obsoleted". I may be especially upset because I donated to Mozilla just a few months before they disabled ALSA while it still obviously works, but so what? The Firefox devs could and should have taken a page from Pat V's book like how he dealt with Gnome. When that software became the equivalent of having to "fit a square peg in a round hole" he dropped it and explained why. Nobody could install the previous working version of Gnome in new Slackware and have it work. Dropline and others had to be willing to do all the jumping through hoops to make any Gnome install and run on newer Slackware.

How is simply checking the ALSA box any skin off Mozilla devs noses? It is off mine and some others.

FWIW not only do I have considerable confidence that firms do track what is being discussed on Forums (do you imagine the writers of "Game of Thrones" are unaware the final chapter has been met with hatred and disgust?) but I did write to Mozilla expressing my distaste for such a currently arbitrary and unnecessary decision and that I was seeking to leave Firefox despite having used it and supported it literally from Day One.

I don't think being "obsolete" is the question here. Alsa itself is still in active development and shows no signs of dying and it is still used in many programs for sound output, so it is apparent that alsa itself is not obsolete. Obviously programs are still free to interact with alsa for sound ouput if they desire, but apparently the Firefox developers have stopped wanting to work on the code to use alsa directly for sound output, so in that case, the alsa code within Firefox is obsolete. It still works for now, but who knows what changes might come about from alsa or Firefox that could break it. If testing alsa isn't part of their checks with new releases, how will they know if it's broken or not? If it's unmaintained, it's unmaintained. They chose to make that option disabled by default because it is unmaintained and to prevent a potentially broken feature to be enabled by default.

Thanks, bassmadrigal, as usual your responses are clear and concise. I am still curious though. If both PA and ALSA options are enabled wouldn't Firefox just use whatever was default on each system?... well... at least until their level of maintenance ultimately fails?

I guess my point is that it's been over a year now iirc since direct support was disabled yet it still works and that's a year I could've not had to jump through hoops at what seems no cost to Mozilla and I and others might be less upset with Mozilla's callousness or lack of concern for niche users. To me this seems a distinct change in policy from days gone by when Firefox was available for OS/2, BeOS and probably more and smaller niche cases of which I am unaware.

This I don't know for sure... If they kept alsa enabled on their binary builds or enabled in the configure option, if alsa support is ever broken, people may try and file bug reports. With it being disabled by default, it may make it less likely for people to complain to Mozilla if it does break.

I don't want to beat a dead horse but I think he just moved. It seems to me the message could have simply been "Use at your own risk since at some point it will very likely break" instead of "It will likely break sometime in the next year or two but we are choosing for you now. Just stop... or use ESR." Which choice is more reasonable? Which did Mozilla choose? See?

But that's what they're doing... people just have different thoughts on how they should accomplish it. You can still run an alsa-supported Firefox, you just have to build it yourself after enabling the option. For some, that may seem unacceptable, for others, it's a way of life. You and others obviously disagree with how Firefox has handled it, while I and others seem to think it's business as usual. I don't think we'll ever come to an agreement on whether they handled it right or wrong. Maybe just agree to disagree?

But I also have no horse in this race since I use pulse and I don't use Firefox.

That's more relevant than you think, since mozilla already made the browser have soft dependency on GNOME.
So I'd expect it to look for network manager, GNOME shell and wayland, sometime in the future.
Since B2G and chrome components addition, it all went downhill, they expect the OS to conform to their program and put limitations where there was flexibility.
Whatever works best for you I guess, just saying Netscape Navigator in wine looks more and more like a viable solution to me, given the circumstances.

Netscape Navigator is exactly why I said "Firefox literally from Day One"(I have NEVER used IE but to download Navigator or Firefox) but it is my impression it is not only deprecated but discontinued altogether. I don't see how it could be viable in any environment.

There have been a number of threads and posts on LQN from people using older, weaker hardware facing the issue of being unable to properly run newer releases so I did some experimenting. I rebuilt Slackware install isos of older versions with updated libraries and kernels. I was able to successfully install and run updated versions this way 5 releases older than Current but the deal breaker was always browser versions that would not run with other older or missing libraries. Some, only a few years old, were rejected from even displaying many web pages. The further back the browser, the less function they had. I found the experience not a little disturbing.

I know it's the code in Firefox we're talking about... the code that has to INTERFACE with mature ALSA libraries, that are unlikely to receive changes that are going to BREAK the code in Firefox, any time soon, and most certainly not at the time they turned it off, and still not to this day. The code is already there in the browser.

I'm not buying what you're selling.