[Jack-Devel] Jack Problems

[John Rigg]

On Fri, Mar 22, 2019 at 06:30:50PM -0400, liebrecht at grossmann-venter.com wrote:
> Dont want to sound disrespectful, but I need to ask.
>
> Who are the experts that will be using Jack.
>
> I havent been on an audio related usergroup where anything positive has  
> been said (except largely what I posted) about jack. By large 95% of  
> users complain about jack.

It appears to me that you've been having problems with Pulseadudio,
but you insist on saying it's jack's fault. My advice: get rid of
pulseaudio, which has no business being on a serious recording
system at all IMO.

Jack was designed for pro audio use. That doesn't mean others shouldn't
use it, but like any professional tool there's some learning involved.

I don't know who those users are who have nothing good to say about
jack, but I suspect there's some ignorance involved (I don't mean to
be rude). I've used jack since 2005 in my work as an audio engineer,
and it allows me to do things that my Windows- and Mac-using colleagues
are unable to do due to the arbitrary restrictions built in to so much
proprietary software. There's no way I'd go back to those systems even
though I could easily afford to.

> I myself have been using Linux since 97 and did a lot of  
> unix and assembler programming before 97.
> I wrote some of the most complex numerical software on Linux for  
> clusters. I am well educated with three postgraduate degrees one of  
> which is numerical methods. Audio has been a lifelong interest, and  
> still is semi-professionally as I have been a performing musician my  
> entire life.
>
> If I cannot make sense of it and become an "expert" who will unless they  
> have special information.

I have to admit I'm a little puzzled here. Surely the source code is
the obvious documentation to use for an experienced programmer is it
not? Even without that there's a lot of documentation out there on
the alsa and jack web sites, and a quick look with top or ps would
tell you if you have two conflicting audio servers running (which I
suspect is the cause of your problem).

> With software, a lack of proper specification and scriptable advice,  
> leads to no one being able to come to grips unless they go study the  
> code - even if the application is dead simple. I dont want to do that  
> and shouldnt need to as just need to be a user in this case that wants  
> to become an expert if possible.

There is a proper specification: the API docs. It sounds like you want
to become an expert but don't want to do any of the necessary work to
achieve that. That may sound harsh, but I think you've made a lot of
unfair and misdirected criticisms in this thread.

John