[pulseaudio-discuss] Audio outside gnome-session and device suspension (request for help)

[Hynek Hanke]

Hello,

I'm working on speech-dispatcher, that is an accessibility application, 
basically an interface to speech synthesis. Its services are used by 
programs running inside gnome-session as well by those who are not (for 
example a text console screen reader, a reader for GDM or something that 
talks when it is impossible to start X etc.) I'd like to consult one 
thing with you that we face when trying to migrate to PulseAudio.

We have a special Pulse Audio daemon running under the user 
speech-dispatcher for our system-wide Speech Dispatcher (which is 
independent of Gnome Session or X) and then each user launches his own 
Pulse Audio and Speech Dispatcher inside his gnome session. Each Speech 
Dispatcher opens a connection to Pulse Audio at startup and doesn't 
close it until it is terminated (it sends multiple requests to play 
something or it may not send anything for quite a while, but it doesn't 
want to close the connection for performance and other reasons). Now 
obviously, if both Dispatchers keep the connection, there is a conflict 
over which of the two PulseAudio daemons can access alsa:hw:0,0.

It never happens that both of the Pulse Audios would be asked to play a 
sound at once, so in theory, everything is fine. In practice however, it 
seems that PulseAudio keeps alsa:hw:0,0 open as long as the Speech 
Dispatcher is connected to it, regardles of whether it is currently 
playing something or not.

I've tried to suspend the sink when there is nothing to play in Speech 
Dispatcher. This does the expected thing and I'm now able to switch 
between these two Dispatchers/Pulse Audio daemons as long as I don't ask 
them to play both at the same time (which is not a problem, as I said).

The unwanted effect of the suspension of the sinks however is that it 
affects all other clients connected to the same Pulse Audio, which is a 
big problem for the one inside gnome-session.

What I want to do, is to say to Pulse Audio: ''My application is not 
going to play anything now, you are free to close hw:0,0 if you wish''. 
And if all the applications connected to Pulse Audio say this, then 
Pulse Audio would free the access to the soundcard. Currently, what the 
suspend seems to do however, is to tel Pulse Audio: ''I don't want you 
to play anything now,'' which is something I can't really do because I 
have no information about the other clients, whether they need the 
soundcard or no.

So is there some possibility to say: ''Please suspend the sink if nobody 
else needs it now''?

Or perhaps I'm on a wrong path and there is a better way how to make two 
Speech Dispatchers running under different users switch smoothly without 
having to close the connection to Pulse or affecting other sound 
applications?

Thank you for your help,
Hynek Hanke