[LAU] multiple applications using the soundcard with alsa

[Arnold Krille]

On Monday 19 October 2009 19:28:41 Atte Andre Jensen wrote:
> A question came up on my local (non-audio) lau: Is it possible to
> automatically mix audio from different apps (desktop apps like firefox,
> flash, skype, system sounds, stuff like that) with alsa. I tend to say
> "yes" based on things I think I head mentioned here, but couldn't find
> the posts, so I have to ask again. If possible, what does it take?

Yes and yes.

Yes, because for quite some time alsa defaults to using the dmix-plugin. And 
since a much shorter time distributions seem to have picked this up.

And yes, because there are soundcards that allow for more then one app to open 
the device at a time. SBLive for example allows 32 (or was it 64) opens and 
the meastro3 chip allows 2 or 3 apps simultaneously.

Not to talk about some distributions thinking about adding a single-
soundserver/-system to circumvent a problem which was solved by alsa long ago 
after the single-soundserver solution named aRts/esd didn't work out...

Have fun,

Arnold
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