[pulseaudio-discuss] Suggestions for enhancement of pulseaudio

[Lennart Poettering]

On Wed, 07.10.09 10:43, stan (gryt2 at q.com) wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> Just some possible features to add to pulse to make if easier to use.
> 
> When the pa_simple model is used and the pa_simple object is returned,
> return the server's default rate, channels, and format in the struct so
> an application can decide if they want to conform to reduce the need
> for resampling.  

We do have a negotiation API similar to this in the complex
API. The simple protocol really should just be simple, and that's
it. I have no plans in adding any additional APIs to it.

> When pulse chooses its default configuration, it should query the sound
> device to determine the native rates and formats it supports, and choose
> one of them so it doesn't have to do resampling.  I have an onboard
> NVIDIA CK8S chip that doesn't do 44100 natively, only 48000.  Yet pulse
> is using 44100 as its default configuration for that device.

PA only uses native sampling rates. We always did, always will. We explicitly
disable resampling when opening the audio devices
(SND_PCM_NO_AUTO_RESAMPLE). We only resample if an application then
tries to connect to a sink with a non-matching sample spec.

> If there are no other applications using pulse, and it receives a
> request for a rate, format, or channel configuration different than the
> default, and if the requested format is supported natively on the sound
> device, it switches to that as its default configuration for the
> duration of the request. 

Has been requested before. I don't think this makes sense. Just think
of this: we're idle, then an event sound is played at 8000hz. While
that is playing a music stream starts. According to your scheme we'd
have to open the audio device @ 8khz, then either stay with it (which
case is unnacceptable) or have a big dropout because we need to reinit
the device while music is still playing (which is unnacceptable, too).

And this is not an artifical example. There are many more like
this. For example, I usually have music playing at CD quality. Then I
start to play a movie at 5.1 and then after a while I notice that I
better switch the music off. In you scheme the movie would continue to
play in 2ch all the time.

So, I really don't think this will fly. 

That said, when adding codec support in PA I'll also add a module that
will be able to autoswitch profiles based on the streams connecting to
a sink/source/card. This may then be used to implement a scheme like
what you suggest, even though I don't think it makes much sense.

Lennart

-- 
Lennart Poettering                        Red Hat, Inc.
lennart [at] poettering [dot] net
http://0pointer.net/lennart/           GnuPG 0x1A015CC4