[linux-audio-dev] Which API to use for simple clients?

I have two Audio related projects that need updating. 1. "rsynth" formant based text-to-speech synthesis 2. Audio::* Perl modules. Both have existing /dev/dsp style backends at present, which have been working fine. But recently (SuSE 9.0 install?) when run under ALSA emulation of /dev/dsp they both started producing segfaults - "after program had exited", (neither valgrind nor gdb can give any info on the fault). So I decided it was time to do a native ALSA backend(s). I have rsynth backend working, and perl Audio:: one almost working. But before going forward I would like to solicit opinions on what is the "right" API to use. The Linux audio world seems to be in a state of flux with these options (please tell me if I missed any): 1. Venerable OSS stuff - Widely available :-) - Some cards have quasi or truely commecial drivers rather than free / opensource ones :-( - emulation via ALSA (at least as shipped by SuSE) seems broken :-( 2. ALSA - Reasonably widely available :-|, and improving - Opensource :-) - Documentation is lacking :-( Everything hinges on the "Configuration Space" concept, but I can't find an explanation of how that works. This is the sticking point with perl code - I can't find how to change the sample rate / channels, so _seems_ I need to close and re-open. 3. JACK - Gets lots of excited "this is cool" kind of coverage :-) - realtime :-) - Callback style not ideal for speech synthesis or play-from-file of my simple apps. complex :-( 4. Enlightenment Sound Demon - Seems to be used by KDE etc. - haven't looked into it further. 5. Network Audio System - Works on many platforms Linux/Solaris/X Terminals :-) - X-like "imake" style rather than configure :-( - Linux version still seems to be based on OSS - so recurse ;-) 6. Presumably there is some kind of telephony API as well, for sending sound to incomming phone calls via modem / ISDN Complexity and callbacks don't scare me - I do perl/Tk after all! But this is a 2nd-string project so I don't want to do a lot of complex stuff for an API that is vanishing - I would rather either use a simple stable interface, or pitch in and help on the "comming" complex API. Suggestions anyone? (I just subscribed to both lists - so reply to your favourite list.)