Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Nicolas George]

Le quartidi 4 fructidor, an CCXXIII, Chris Bannister a écrit :
> What file(s) are you talking about here?

~ $ apt-file show -x '^pulseaudio$' | grep '/usr/share/alsa'
pulseaudio: /usr/share/alsa/alsa.conf.d/pulse.conf
pulseaudio: /usr/share/alsa/pulse-alsa.conf

You can see that, at the very least, having pulseaudio installed will affect
the ALSA configuration. In the past, the result was making it completely
unusable without running the daemon.

Regards,

-- 
  Nicolas George


signature.asc
Description: Digital signature

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Chris Bannister]

On Tue, Aug 18, 2015 at 04:18:32PM +0200, Nicolas George wrote:
> Le primidi 1er fructidor, an CCXXIII, Ric Moore a écrit :
> > Pulse generally is a pussycat. It sits on top of alsa and if alsa is broken,
> > pulse is broken.
> 
> On the other hand, there are situations where ALSA works perfectly and just
> INSTALLING the pulseaudio package would break it, even if it was absolutely
> not used.
> 
> You can see traces of that problem in the configuration snippets that
> pulseaudio drops in ALSA:
> 
> @hooks [
> {
> func pulse_load_if_running
> files [
> "/usr/share/alsa/pulse-alsa.conf"
> ]
> errors false
> }
> ]
> 
> pcm.!default {
> type pulse
> hint {
> show on
> description "Playback/recording through the PulseAudio sound server"
> }
> }
> 
> The "pulse_load_if_running" guard was not always present.

What file(s) are you talking about here?

-- 
"If you're not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people
who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the 
oppressing." --- Malcolm X

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[David Wright]

Quoting Lisi Reisz (lisi.re...@gmail.com):
> On Monday 17 August 2015 16:40:04 Lisi Reisz wrote:
> > On Monday 17 August 2015 16:31:04 doug wrote:

> > > Well, I didn't know about dpms, but now I have looked at the man page,
> > > it is still not clear to me.
> > > I don't use a screen saver.  If I enter xset -dpms does that stop the
> > > display from timing out? And
> > > how do you get out of that mode? +dpms?
> >
> > I never want to - it just goes back on when I reboot, which I don't wnat it
> > to do, but I haven't got round to solving making it permanent. (There's
> > been a lot about it on this list.)  But I'll test and get back to you. 
> > +dpms does indeed seem likely.
> 
> Well, I just tried it.  +dpms made the dispaly start timing out again, after 
> I 
> had previously used <$ xset -dpms>.

xset q   is quite useful to see what's set. In some ways it's a clearer
inventory of its possibilities than man xset.

Cheers,
David.

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Lisi Reisz]

On Monday 17 August 2015 16:40:04 Lisi Reisz wrote:
> On Monday 17 August 2015 16:31:04 doug wrote:
> > On 08/17/2015 11:00 AM, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> > > On Monday 17 August 2015 15:49:49 doug wrote:
> > >> On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > >>> -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
> > >>> Hash: SHA1
> > >>>
> > >>> On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>> [...]
> > >>>
> >  so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio
> >  is a good idea.
> > >>>
> > >>> Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You
> > >>> might get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get
> > >>> just very few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).
> > >>>
> > >>> Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio.
> > >>> Or what are your choices besides pulseaudio.
> > >>>
> > >>> regards
> > >>> - -- tomás
> > >>
> > >> I have p/a on pclos, and in the past I have had to disable it, but the
> > >> latest version seems to work.
> > >> The commands in the gui's are a bit tricky--some don't seem to work
> > >> sometimes--perhaps they
> > >> depend on some other command. You just have to play with it to some
> > >> extent. The main gain
> > >> I see over alsa is the ability to direct audio out to two channels--a
> > >> built-in sound chip on the mobo
> > >> and the HDMI output (which includes audio) from a GeForce video card.
> > >> that way you can set
> > >> up a Youtube or or other media source on your local display, and pipe
> > >> it to your TV at the same
> > >> time.
> > >> BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a
> > >> mouse jiggler, so the picture
> > >> doesn't go away after a few minutes.
> > >>
> > >> --doug
> > >
> > > Why not just:
> > >
> > > $ xset -dpms
> > > before the video starts?  And deal with your screensaver.
> > >
> > > Lisi
> >
> > Well, I didn't know about dpms, but now I have looked at the man page,
> > it is still not clear to me.
> > I don't use a screen saver.  If I enter xset -dpms does that stop the
> > display from timing out? And
> > how do you get out of that mode? +dpms?
>
> I never want to - it just goes back on when I reboot, which I don't wnat it
> to do, but I haven't got round to solving making it permanent. (There's
> been a lot about it on this list.)  But I'll test and get back to you. 
> +dpms does indeed seem likely.

Well, I just tried it.  +dpms made the dispaly start timing out again, after I 
had previously used <$ xset -dpms>.

Lisi

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/19/2015 01:31 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1

On Tue, Aug 18, 2015 at 10:02:55PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:


i know what audio device i should be selecting, i have it set to
default in the ~/.asoundrc file and icweweasel just doesn't do
anything.


This half-answers my question in the other mail -- but still give
alsamixer a spin: there might be some setting which is wrong.

I've no idea how Iceweasel "does" sound, but I'll try to dig it up.


If you're going to mess with hand creation/edits of .asoundrc, and the 
like, don't use pulse. That merely guarantees pulse will not work at 
all. Ric


--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Reco]

 Hi.

On Wed, 19 Aug 2015 07:31:05 +0200
 wrote:

> > i know what audio device i should be selecting, i have it set to default in 
> > the ~/.asoundrc file and icweweasel just doesn't do anything.
> 
> This half-answers my question in the other mail -- but still give
> alsamixer a spin: there might be some setting which is wrong.
> 
> I've no idea how Iceweasel "does" sound, but I'll try to dig it
> up.

NPAPI plugins aside - iceweasel should produce sound via ALSA:

$ apt-cache show iceweasel | grep Dep | grep pulse | wc -l
0
$ apt-cache show iceweasel | grep Dep | grep asound | wc -l
1

Reco

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[tomas]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

On Tue, Aug 18, 2015 at 10:02:55PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> On Tue, 18 Aug 2015 08:57:43 -0400
> Edward Lukacs  wrote:
> 
> > robust software.  Linux has been amazingly good for most of its life but
> > over the last few years it has begun to show serious signs of bloating. 

[...]

> Honestly, at the risk of sounding like old man yelling at clouds, but I feel 
> the same.

Yep. The problem is that's difficult to target all users at once.
You are doing the right thing: try without, write about it. There
are others in your boat! (but never forget to respect people in
other boats, even if they have tailfins ;-)

> i know what audio device i should be selecting, i have it set to default in 
> the ~/.asoundrc file and icweweasel just doesn't do anything.

This half-answers my question in the other mail -- but still give
alsamixer a spin: there might be some setting which is wrong.

I've no idea how Iceweasel "does" sound, but I'll try to dig it
up.

Regards
- -- tomás
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Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[briand]

On Tue, 18 Aug 2015 08:57:43 -0400
Edward Lukacs  wrote:

> robust software.  Linux has been amazingly good for most of its life but
> over the last few years it has begun to show serious signs of bloating. 
> I mean the sort of thing that Detroit did when they put tail-fins on
> cars and the sort of unmentionable obscenities that came out of
> Microsoft whenever they needed to generate more revenue, i.e., install a
> bunch of new options and features in a software package that few people
> needed, but which required changes which were incompatible with the last
> version, thus forcing their customers to update to bloatware which
> strained their old boxes enough to make them want to buy new ones.

Honestly, at the risk of sounding like old man yelling at clouds, but I feel 
the same.

it's due to the ever increasing layers upon layers of abstraction.  I find it 
incredibly difficult to find out how things are glued together.  Those layers 
of abstraction make documentation hard to maintain and write.

some things get better, like X always seems to work now (and that's a big deal 
!).

others get worse.  pulse audio is a complete mess and trying to figure out how 
to modify things is just god-awful. it took me several hours to find out how to 
modify my default.pa file to select the right default audio output. and then 
what happens - pulse audio will idle your sink , AND THEN NOT REACTIVATE IT 
when you actually want to use the audio again.  freaking idiotic. so back to 
the default.pa file to disable some wacky module that idles your default audio 
sink.

> 
> My own opinion, for what it's worth, is to keep your system simple,
> stupid, as the saying goes. 

truly.

but these days even simple doesn't work.

i just removed pulseaudio and 
audacious works fine (because i can select the audio device), but iceweasel 
won't play any audio (and i'm NOT using flash). won't generate errors, EVEN 
STRACE SHOWS NOTHING.

just won't work.
 
amazing...

what's even more amazing is that i see problem reports going back 5 years 
precisely about iceweasel not playing audio.

i know what audio device i should be selecting, i have it set to default in the 
~/.asoundrc file and icweweasel just doesn't do anything.

oh well. audacious works- i got tunes :-)

Brian

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/18/2015 08:57 AM, Edward Lukacs wrote:
 it took me a half hour to totally eliminate

it and set up a complete alsa installation which is utterly reliable.  I
will not go back, even if pulseaudio is repaired and made less of a
system hog.


I don't get this. You got alsa working "complete" after blaming pulse 
for not working?? Again, Pulse does not work if alsa is not "complete" 
and working. And yeah, I installed Slackware from a stack of floppies, 
and worked for Red Hat during the IPO days. Blah blah. That just means I 
can make more spectacular mistakes and do. :) Ric



--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/18/2015 08:57 AM, Edward Lukacs wrote:


My own opinion, for what it's worth, is to keep your system simple,
stupid, as the saying goes.


I used to feel as you do, and ranted on pulse whenever the opportunity 
arose. But, that was years ago. Pulse is far more simple to use, when it 
comes to multiple sound sources that require hand edits to some obscure 
file. Pulse works better on a Desktop machine, but so does everything 
else. Pulse ONLY WORKS when alsa works. Ric



--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Nicolas George]

Le primidi 1er fructidor, an CCXXIII, Ric Moore a écrit :
> Pulse generally is a pussycat. It sits on top of alsa and if alsa is broken,
> pulse is broken.

On the other hand, there are situations where ALSA works perfectly and just
INSTALLING the pulseaudio package would break it, even if it was absolutely
not used.

You can see traces of that problem in the configuration snippets that
pulseaudio drops in ALSA:

@hooks [
{
func pulse_load_if_running
files [
"/usr/share/alsa/pulse-alsa.conf"
]
errors false
}
]

pcm.!default {
type pulse
hint {
show on
description "Playback/recording through the PulseAudio sound server"
}
}

The "pulse_load_if_running" guard was not always present.

Regards,

-- 
  Nicolas George


signature.asc
Description: Digital signature

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Edward Lukacs]

I am far from a guru, but I am a twenty-one year Linux user since Kernel
0.91.  Pulse audio has been, at least since Kernel 3.0, a pain in my
side.  I currently run Jessie 8.0 on both my Compaq desktop and my HP
laptop (64 bit AMD Sempron and Turion x2 respectively,) On both systems
Pulseaudio craps out the instant that I try to make any settings changes
at all.snf I have been unable to find out why in any reasonable period
of time. 

The fact that someone here described the hughe CPU load that it causes
finally caused me to act.  it took me a half hour to totally eliminate
it and set up a complete alsa installation which is utterly reliable.  I
will not go back, even if pulseaudio is repaired and made less of a
system hog.

Being an experienced user and a retired sysop/lan/domain and ISSO
manager for many years (RTE-A, HP-UX, Ultrix, IRIX, QNX, Linux over the
years) but not a really good programmer, I rely on and prefer simple and
robust software.  Linux has been amazingly good for most of its life but
over the last few years it has begun to show serious signs of bloating. 
I mean the sort of thing that Detroit did when they put tail-fins on
cars and the sort of unmentionable obscenities that came out of
Microsoft whenever they needed to generate more revenue, i.e., install a
bunch of new options and features in a software package that few people
needed, but which required changes which were incompatible with the last
version, thus forcing their customers to update to bloatware which
strained their old boxes enough to make them want to buy new ones.

My own opinion, for what it's worth, is to keep your system simple,
stupid, as the saying goes. 

Ed

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/17/2015 10:10 PM, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

On Mon, 17 Aug 2015 13:25:24 +0200
Arno Schuring  wrote:




Date: Sun, 16 Aug 2015 13:37:37 -0700
From: bri...@aracnet.com


[..snip list of PA inadequacies..]


so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
idea.


It's a good thing you're asking for opinions, because that's what
you're gonna get. A lot of it, probably ;)


uh. honestly. i had no idea this was a hot-button.

I was just wondering if I _really_ needed it.

My problem is simple.  When the laptop comes up from suspend, it selects the 
laptop speakers instead of the speakers which i have very specifically set up 
as default in default.pa.

i find it very difficult to figure out how to do anything in pulse audio.


Pulse generally is a pussycat. It sits on top of alsa and if alsa is 
broken, pulse is broken. Simple ...usually. So, when trouble shooting 
pulse problems fire up alsamixer first. You'll usually find something 
with the volume turned way down or muted. Then make sure you have 
pavucontrol installed. You use that to configure pulse, set volume 
levels and select in/outputs. Works for me and should for you too 
...until the word "laptop" was used.


There is no telling how any specific laptop will work with alsa/pulse. I 
have an ASUS laptop and loathe it. Truth be known, I'd like to take a 
hammer to the POS. :) Ric




--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Mart van de Wege]

Arno Schuring  writes:

>> Date: Mon, 17 Aug 2015 23:16:55 +0200
>> To: debian-user@lists.debian.org
> [..]
>>
>> You can't install gnome without the pulseaudio libraries, but it runs
>> perfectly fine without the daemon.
>>
>
> On Debian?
>
> $ aptitude why gnome-core pulseaudio
> p   gnome-core Depends pulseaudio
>
> This to me suggests that it doesn't even install without the daemon.
>
>
And if you were to pull in pulseaudio through that package and disable
the daemon, Gnome would run just fine.

Why are you so invested in not simply admitting you were wrong?

Mart

-- 
"We will need a longer wall when the revolution comes."
--- AJS, quoting an uncertain source.

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[David Wright]

Quoting Arno Schuring (aelschur...@hotmail.com):
> > Date: Mon, 17 Aug 2015 23:16:55 +0200
> > To: debian-user@lists.debian.org
> [..]
> >
> > You can't install gnome without the pulseaudio libraries, but it runs
> > perfectly fine without the daemon.
> >
> 
> On Debian?
> 
> $ aptitude why gnome-core pulseaudio
> p   gnome-core Depends pulseaudio

There's a thread starting at
https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2015/04/msg00616.html
discussing this new meaning of the word "core". Note for example that
gnome-core also depends on the "essential component" iceweasel and
5 dozen other packages!

> This to me suggests that it doesn't even install without the daemon.

No idea. I don't use it.

Cheers,
David.

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[CaT]

On Mon, Aug 17, 2015 at 07:10:34PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> I was just wondering if I _really_ needed it.

You don't -really- need it. I haven't seen it bring anything of worth
to me yet other than bluetooth audio. If it wasn't for that I'd ditch
it as it just adds complexity.

Since you're using xfce, it's totally optional. Try getting rid of it
and see how you fly without.

-- 
  "A search of his car uncovered pornography, a homemade sex aid, women's 
  stockings and a Jack Russell terrier."
- 
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/wacky/indeed/story-e6frev20-118083480

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[briand]

On Mon, 17 Aug 2015 13:25:24 +0200
Arno Schuring  wrote:

> 
> > Date: Sun, 16 Aug 2015 13:37:37 -0700
> > From: bri...@aracnet.com
> >
> [..snip list of PA inadequacies..]
> >
> > so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a 
> > good idea.
> 
> It's a good thing you're asking for opinions, because that's what
> you're gonna get. A lot of it, probably ;)

uh. honestly. i had no idea this was a hot-button.

I was just wondering if I _really_ needed it.

My problem is simple.  When the laptop comes up from suspend, it selects the 
laptop speakers instead of the speakers which i have very specifically set up 
as default in default.pa.

i find it very difficult to figure out how to do anything in pulse audio.

so i thought- if i don't really need it, i'll be all set, right. well- probably 
not, better ask for some opinions.

however the fact that i have two possible "sinks" makes me think it might be 
just as much trouble to get rid of it as to figure out why it  doesn't do what 
it should.

> 
> It can be a good idea, or it may cause your hair to fall out or turn
> gray. When I ditched pulseaudio, my idle system load average (as
> reported through uptime) dropped from 0.7 to 0.03, which was
> vindication enough for me.

i don't seem to have any issues like that. strictly a suspend/resume problem.  
a suspend/resume that i've seen in mailing lists going at least 5 years back 
and nobody every seems to know how to fix it.

> 
> If you're running Gnome, ditchting pulseaudio is simply not possible.
> Not sure about other full-featured DEs, I think at least KDE still
> allows you to use alsa directly. Then there's the case that bluez5 also

i'm using xfce but i could go back to openbox in a flash if i needed to.

ah well- sounds like a rock and a hard place.

Brian

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[doark]

> BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a
> mouse jiggler, so the picture doesn't go away after a few minutes.
Why all this technical mumbo jumbo? "Mouse jiggler" indeed! Just use
the word "cat" :)

I believe that:
xset s off
is what your looking for.
Of course, different DEs will want you to do it differently.
And some players support turning off the screen saver themselves.

Incidentally, I've been running my desktop and laptop without pulse for
several months (fvwm blackbox windowmmaker depending on what I feel
like), no problems (though I must confess that I'm not running
debian (PATA devices, an SATA MotherB, and systemd don't get along) :) .
I find the experience RAM & disk freeing.

David

RE: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Arno Schuring]

> Date: Mon, 17 Aug 2015 23:16:55 +0200
> To: debian-user@lists.debian.org
[..]
>
> You can't install gnome without the pulseaudio libraries, but it runs
> perfectly fine without the daemon.
>

On Debian?

$ aptitude why gnome-core pulseaudio
p   gnome-core Depends pulseaudio

This to me suggests that it doesn't even install without the daemon.


Regards,
Arno

  

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Mart van de Wege]

Arno Schuring  writes:

>> Date: Sun, 16 Aug 2015 13:37:37 -0700
>> From: bri...@aracnet.com
>>
> [..snip list of PA inadequacies..]
>>
>> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a 
>> good idea.
>
> It's a good thing you're asking for opinions, because that's what
> you're gonna get. A lot of it, probably ;)
>
> It can be a good idea, or it may cause your hair to fall out or turn
> gray. When I ditched pulseaudio, my idle system load average (as
> reported through uptime) dropped from 0.7 to 0.03, which was
> vindication enough for me.
>
> If you're running Gnome, ditchting pulseaudio is simply not possible.

Bull.

You can't install gnome without the pulseaudio libraries, but it runs
perfectly fine without the daemon.

Mart

-- 
"We will need a longer wall when the revolution comes."
--- AJS, quoting an uncertain source.

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Brian]

On Mon 17 Aug 2015 at 13:18:35 -0400, Ric Moore wrote:

> On 08/17/2015 12:09 PM, Gene Heskett wrote:
> >On Monday 17 August 2015 11:35:36 Ric Moore wrote:
> >
> >Welcome back, Ric. ;)
> >
> 
> It's good to be alive! I wound up with a quad bypass. It was like getting
> fsck AND a re-boot. :) Ric

Best wishes!

One hopes the upgrade came with sysIVinit and nothing new-fangled. :)

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/17/2015 12:09 PM, Gene Heskett wrote:

On Monday 17 August 2015 11:35:36 Ric Moore wrote:

Welcome back, Ric. ;)



It's good to be alive! I wound up with a quad bypass. It was like 
getting fsck AND a re-boot. :) Ric



--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Gene Heskett]

On Monday 17 August 2015 11:35:36 Ric Moore wrote:

Welcome back, Ric. ;)

> On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
> > Hash: SHA1
> >
> > On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio
> >> is a good idea.
> >
> > Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You
> > might get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get
> > just very few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).
>
> To the point of being labeled a trolling issue.


Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Lisi Reisz]

On Monday 17 August 2015 16:31:04 doug wrote:
> On 08/17/2015 11:00 AM, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> > On Monday 17 August 2015 15:49:49 doug wrote:
> >> On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> >>> -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
> >>> Hash: SHA1
> >>>
> >>> On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> >>>
> >>> [...]
> >>>
>  so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is
>  a good idea.
> >>>
> >>> Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You
> >>> might get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get
> >>> just very few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).
> >>>
> >>> Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio.
> >>> Or what are your choices besides pulseaudio.
> >>>
> >>> regards
> >>> - -- tomás
> >>
> >> I have p/a on pclos, and in the past I have had to disable it, but the
> >> latest version seems to work.
> >> The commands in the gui's are a bit tricky--some don't seem to work
> >> sometimes--perhaps they
> >> depend on some other command. You just have to play with it to some
> >> extent. The main gain
> >> I see over alsa is the ability to direct audio out to two channels--a
> >> built-in sound chip on the mobo
> >> and the HDMI output (which includes audio) from a GeForce video card.
> >> that way you can set
> >> up a Youtube or or other media source on your local display, and pipe it
> >> to your TV at the same
> >> time.
> >> BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a mouse
> >> jiggler, so the picture
> >> doesn't go away after a few minutes.
> >>
> >> --doug
> >
> > Why not just:
> >
> > $ xset -dpms
> > before the video starts?  And deal with your screensaver.
> >
> > Lisi
>
> Well, I didn't know about dpms, but now I have looked at the man page,
> it is still not clear to me.
> I don't use a screen saver.  If I enter xset -dpms does that stop the
> display from timing out? And
> how do you get out of that mode? +dpms?

I never want to - it just goes back on when I reboot, which I don't wnat it to 
do, but I haven't got round to solving making it permanent. (There's been a 
lot about it on this list.)  But I'll test and get back to you.  +dpms does 
indeed seem likely.

Lisi

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Ric Moore]

On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

[...]


so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
idea.


Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You might
get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get just very
few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).


To the point of being labeled a trolling issue.


--
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
http://linuxcounter.net/user/44256.html

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[doug]

On 08/17/2015 11:00 AM, Lisi Reisz wrote:

On Monday 17 August 2015 15:49:49 doug wrote:

On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

[...]


so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a
good idea.

Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You might
get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get just very
few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).

Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio. Or
what are your choices besides pulseaudio.

regards
- -- tomás

I have p/a on pclos, and in the past I have had to disable it, but the
latest version seems to work.
The commands in the gui's are a bit tricky--some don't seem to work
sometimes--perhaps they
depend on some other command. You just have to play with it to some
extent. The main gain
I see over alsa is the ability to direct audio out to two channels--a
built-in sound chip on the mobo
and the HDMI output (which includes audio) from a GeForce video card.
that way you can set
up a Youtube or or other media source on your local display, and pipe it
to your TV at the same
time.
BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a mouse
jiggler, so the picture
doesn't go away after a few minutes.

--doug

Why not just:

$ xset -dpms
before the video starts?  And deal with your screensaver.

Lisi


Well, I didn't know about dpms, but now I have looked at the man page, 
it is still not clear to me.
I don't use a screen saver.  If I enter xset -dpms does that stop the 
display from timing out? And

how do you get out of that mode? +dpms?

--doug

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Lisi Reisz]

On Monday 17 August 2015 15:49:49 doug wrote:
> On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
> > Hash: SHA1
> >
> > On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a
> >> good idea.
> >
> > Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You might
> > get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get just very
> > few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).
> >
> > Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio. Or
> > what are your choices besides pulseaudio.
> >
> > regards
> > - -- tomás
>
> I have p/a on pclos, and in the past I have had to disable it, but the
> latest version seems to work.
> The commands in the gui's are a bit tricky--some don't seem to work
> sometimes--perhaps they
> depend on some other command. You just have to play with it to some
> extent. The main gain
> I see over alsa is the ability to direct audio out to two channels--a
> built-in sound chip on the mobo
> and the HDMI output (which includes audio) from a GeForce video card.
> that way you can set
> up a Youtube or or other media source on your local display, and pipe it
> to your TV at the same
> time.
> BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a mouse
> jiggler, so the picture
> doesn't go away after a few minutes.
>
> --doug

Why not just:

$ xset -dpms
before the video starts?  And deal with your screensaver.

Lisi

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[doug]

On 08/17/2015 02:10 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

[...]


so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
idea.

Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You might
get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get just very
few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).

Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio. Or
what are your choices besides pulseaudio.

regards
- -- tomás

I have p/a on pclos, and in the past I have had to disable it, but the 
latest version seems to work.
The commands in the gui's are a bit tricky--some don't seem to work 
sometimes--perhaps they
depend on some other command. You just have to play with it to some 
extent. The main gain
I see over alsa is the ability to direct audio out to two channels--a 
built-in sound chip on the mobo
and the HDMI output (which includes audio) from a GeForce video card. 
that way you can set
up a Youtube or or other media source on your local display, and pipe it 
to your TV at the same

time.
BTW: if you're going to watch a long video, you may want to get a mouse 
jiggler, so the picture

doesn't go away after a few minutes.

--doug

RE: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Arno Schuring]

> Date: Sun, 16 Aug 2015 13:37:37 -0700
> From: bri...@aracnet.com
>
[..snip list of PA inadequacies..]
>
> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
> idea.

It's a good thing you're asking for opinions, because that's what
you're gonna get. A lot of it, probably ;)

It can be a good idea, or it may cause your hair to fall out or turn
gray. When I ditched pulseaudio, my idle system load average (as
reported through uptime) dropped from 0.7 to 0.03, which was
vindication enough for me.

If you're running Gnome, ditchting pulseaudio is simply not possible.
Not sure about other full-featured DEs, I think at least KDE still
allows you to use alsa directly. Then there's the case that bluez5 also
requires pulseaudio for any kind of bluetooth audio, and the inability
of modern "audio chips" to handle more than one audio stream at a time.
If you can live with those limitations (I know I can), you can go pure
alsa.

You may need to read up on configuring alsa through .asoundrc and/or
configuring gstreamer defaults through dconf. You especially might want
to look into the alsa dmix plugin if you expect to have sound output
from multiple programs at the same time.

So yes, it is doable, depending on what other programs you use and
what features you expect.


Regards,
Arno

  

Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[tomas]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

On Sun, Aug 16, 2015 at 01:37:37PM -0700, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

[...]

> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
> idea.

Be warned that this has been a long standing hot-button issue. You might
get very strong opinions in both directions (or you might get just very
few, because people are wary of protracted flame wars).

Better try more concrete questions: how to achieve X with pulseaudio. Or
what are your choices besides pulseaudio.

regards
- -- tomás
-BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
Version: GnuPG v1.4.12 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAlXRetsACgkQBcgs9XrR2kaXMQCZAYI9G7SjFiRbylyM1xEr1AEE
/skAnR3TrVMd8m3/ZM61ZsxkeNN+tLPE
=6qRf
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Re: should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[Patrick Bartek]

On Sun, 16 Aug 2015, bri...@aracnet.com wrote:

> first there was the obsure changes to the pulse audio config that so
> that my USB speakers would be made default.
> 
> then there was the fact that it automatically idled my USB speakers,
> so i had to disable that "feature".
> 
> now on resuming from suspend it decides to switch to different
> speakers and not restore THE DEFAULT sink (it's a laptop, so instead
> fo restoring the default sink, it restores to the laptop speakers).
> 
> so rather than go into the mess that is pulse audio and figure it
> out, i'd really rather get rid of it.
> 
> However it's been my experience that i'll simply exchange one set of
> problems for another.
> 
> so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio
> is a good idea.

Which version of Debian are you running?

Which laptop?

Before you blame pulseaudio, look elsewhere.  Maybe, the USB speakers
are not available soon enough coming out of the suspend, and you get the
laptop speakers which are, etc.  Check the logs and configs.

Set pulseaudio, not to run at all, reconfigure, and see if the same
problems occur.

B

should I get rid of pulse audio ?

[briand]

first there was the obsure changes to the pulse audio config that so that my 
USB speakers would be made default.

then there was the fact that it automatically idled my USB speakers, so i had 
to disable that "feature".

now on resuming from suspend it decides to switch to different speakers and not 
restore THE DEFAULT sink (it's a laptop, so instead fo restoring the default 
sink, it restores to the laptop speakers).

so rather than go into the mess that is pulse audio and figure it out, i'd 
really rather get rid of it.

However it's been my experience that i'll simply exchange one set of problems 
for another.

so soliciting opinions on whether or not getting rid of pulse audio is a good 
idea.

Thanks,

Brian