Re: Sound support on potato
Thomas Hood wrote:
>
> There's some confusion to be cleared up here.
>
> > o esd: this program depends on alsa
>
> No it doesn't. For esd to run there have to be some sound drivers
> installed but these drivers can be either OSS or ALSA (or any other).
>
yep. esound -> oss, esound-alsa -> alsa right? I was confused because
of dselect's stupid UI. I think it has a wrong idea about "suggests"
thing.
> > IMHO such programs shouldn't depend on alsa, or any specific sound
> > driver. That should be flexible. All gnome packages depend on alsa
>
> No they do not. GNOME requires esd if sound is enabled in the
> control-center, but esd will work with either OSS or ALSA.
OK, I mean I got that but I was quite annoyed at the fact that
I haven't able to use my card's line input.
>
> One problem I do see with GNOME, however, is that when sound
> is enabled and esd isn't running, a GNOME application pauses
> each time it tries and fails to play a sound. Something needs
> to be done about this.
>
Can't this be fixed in esd?
> > o alsa: still we have the 0.4.x versions in potato. And may I remind you
> > that 0.4.x versions are obsolete?
>
> Yes they are obsolete. However, in order to release Debian it is
> necessary to freeze versions at some point so that everything can
> be made to work together. It would be nice to upgrade to 0.5.x,
> but this would break some sound packages because the ALSA API
> and libraries changed from 0.4.x to 0.5.x.
>
Aren't they backward compatible in most cases?
> > Is it a custom to make obsolete software to go in the "stable"
> > version?
>
> For the reasons given above, yes.
>
> > 0.5.x are the stable upstream releases. There
> > might be a few things that will work better with the old versions, so either
> > i) throw those packages away, since most of the stuff works well with oss
> > emulation. if they don't work with the new modules, who cares?
>
> So just toss out all packages that work with 0.4.x but not (yet) with
> 0.5.x ? Some people might want to use those packages.
>
Both 0.4.x and 0.5.x modules are made available, but the newer versions are
recommended. Are they both available in woody?
> > ii) if they require old versions of the libs, those libs could be maintained
> > in oldlibs section.
>
> True. But what makes more sense is upgrade all ALSA-related sound packages
> to the 0.5.x level. When this is done, people can upgrade their whole
> sound system to 0.5.x. But this ypgrade hasn't been completed yet, SFAIK.
>
Yes, but holding back a device driver because a not-up-to-date program isn't
working well isn't quite clever. I think most of the programs work all right,
so what's the point here?
> > o "other" sound drivers: I think it's a good idea to make other kernel sound
> > drivers as module packages as they are available. For instance, there's a not-very-good
> > SB Live! driver from creative.
>
> I am using alsa-modules-2.2.15_0.5.8a-1+2.2.15-1 downloaded from
> http://incoming.debian.org *the same day* that the 0.5.8a ALSA
> drivers were released. If there are other sound drivers you'd
> like packaged up, perhaps alien can be of help; or perhaps you'll
> become a maintainer.
>
If that creative thing would work, I would package it surely. But it's
a bit problematic. It doesn't seem to be release quality yet.
Ahem, so there are binary up-to-date alsa packages in woody? That's very nice.
I had to install alsa manually by making a bogus debian package for the 0.5.7
> > The problems with the alsa packages are, IMHO, quite urgent and should be fixed
> > some time. I don't think that the maintainer reads the bug reports at all, anyway.
>
> What makes you think that?
I don't think I've received any replies to the bug reports I filed. But if they are
all done on woody, it's ok.
>
> > For the argument that "These packages are stable, and many prudent packages use them",
> > I would like to suggest taking the author's opinion on this subject. I'm quite confident
> > that the author will suggest the latest stable releases for distribution. (version
> > 0.5.7)
>
> Once one takes into account the problem of actually getting a release
> out the door, one understands that the release can't include the very
> latest version of every software package.
>
Okay, but shouldn't we be taking the author's idea of stable release? So we use
kernel 2.2.15 because it's stable, but not 2.2.3 (obsolete) or 2.3.x (unstable)
> Having said that, I'll agree with you that Debian's releases come
> too slowly. Many people think that something needs to change.
>
Package pools?
> > In addition, there seem to be some sound applications which could be included in potato.
> > Perhaps those could be made into one of those mythical "potato updates" that people have
> > been talking about.
>
> Which applications do you have in mind?
>
Some mixer proggys, some wave editors, synths. I mean, stuff you would use for making
music. For instance, ecasound isn't in debian right? I didn't even run it, but there
seems to be some programs worth packaging.
Thanks,
--
++++-+++-+++-++-++-++--+---+----+----- --- -- - -
+ Eray "exa" Ozkural . . . . . .
+ CS, Bilkent University, Ankara ^ . o . .
| mail: erayo@cs.bilkent.edu.tr . ^ . .
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