[LAU] PulseAudio and Alsa

[Andrea Del Signore]

On Sun, 31 Aug 2008 07:37:34 -0600, Stephen Doonan wrote:

> I recently installed Fedora 9, then Ubuntu Hardy Heron and the
> UbuntuStudio packages. In both cases, a new soundserver (new to me),
> PulseAudio, was installed by default and has caused me some confusion
> and frustration.
> 
> What is the feeling among Linux audio users about PulseAudio?
> 
> Is it a good development? Will it eventually replace ALSA, or does it
> instead simply add an additional level or layer of abstraction and
> indirection to audio in Linux. Will the simplicity it seems to aim for
> add yet more complexity to the issues surrounding configuration and
> troubleshooting of audio in Linux, especially for those who use the
> specialized audio applications that many Linux-audio-users use?
> 
> How are users responding to the development of PulseAudio and its
> inclusion in Linux distribution installations? Remove it afterward and
> revert to pure ALSA, disabling Gnome and KDE specific soundservers?
> Learning to live with PulseAudio and how to make it work well with
> Ardour, Jamin, Rosegarden, Muse, Qtractor, Qjackctl, etc.? :-)
> 
> -Steve
> (Steve Doonan, Portales, New Mexico US)

Hi Stephen,
        
        as others have said PulseAudio and Jack are somewhat the same 
thing and
        they complements one to each other.
                
        They are all "sound server" like ESD and aRTS but with some 
difference in
        the target audience:
                
        * PulseAudio is a desktop sound server with implements stream 
mixing,    
          network transparency, sample caching, and more
                
        * Jack is a pro audio sound server that can connect different 
          applications together with an emphasis on latency and sample 
syncro...
        
        and from the PA or Jack point of view Alsa is just the sound card 
driver.
        
        You can read some more about PulseAudio here:
                
        http://pulseaudio.org/
                
        And to be complete not everyone likes PulseAudio.
        
        http://jeffreystedfast.blogspot.com/2008/06/pulseaudio-solution-
in-search-of.html
        
        The response from Lennart Poettering main PulseAudio developer 
(in this post he
        explains better than me the scope of PA):        
        http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/jeffrey-stedfast.html
                      
        Kind regards,
        Andrea