[Klug-general] Linux Sound Programming

[George Prowse]

On 21/03/2010 09:10, James Morris wrote:
> On Sun, March 21, 2010 06:43, George Prowse wrote:
>> On 20/03/2010 17:46, James Morris wrote:
>>> On Sat, March 20, 2010 16:32, James Morris wrote:
>>>> On Sat, March 20, 2010 06:13, Thomas Edward Groves wrote:
>>>>> So much for having a yard of books on Linux!
>>>>>
>>>>> Why is *all* documentation so out-of-date / wrong / misleading?
>>>>
>>>> A) that's a massive over generalization
>>>> B) most people aren't interested in writing documentation
>>>> C) books on linux are a utter waste of time and space
>>>
>>> urrrgh, i've countered one over generalization with two more, duh.
>>>
>> Sound, with the exception of HAL and Xorg, is the most embarrasing part
>> of linux
>
> You've got to understand what the various API's were designed for:
>
> OSS - just don't bother with it.
> ALSA - kernel level hardware drivers and API
> PULSE - desktop sound integration - for that out of the box stuff.
> JACK - pro-audio sound server with real time low latency and epitomizing
> the unix modular way (ie connecting audio/midi ports of different
> applications together)
>
> PULSE and JACK don't work well together because they're designed for
> different things.

All of them, with perhaps the exception of ALSA seems like it was 
dreampt up in someone's potting shed as an answer to a problem that 
never should have existed.

All these fractions of applications are killing linux, you also have 
people deluding themselves that more is better when in reality having 
150 different ways of doing things just complicates matters.

Look at all the successful standards, everything from network naming to 
HTML, and it is all governed by one standard which it worked out by 
those most qualified to do it. If people want to add extra stuff to 
their work that isn't in the standard then they are free to do that but 
there is always the base.

Heh, base. That could so easily lead my rant round to the LSB. And 
abstraction. What is the obsession every coder seems to have with 
abstraction? If you want smaller binaries DON'T USE GCC!!!

*phew*, have I forgotten anything?