[pulseaudio-discuss] Auto switching outputs

[Colin Guthrie]

'Twas brillig, and Erik de Castro Lopo at 05/08/10 04:00 did gyre and
gimble:
> Hi all,
> 
> I've acquired a pair of wireless headphones; the type that has a USB
> dongle that plugs into my machine and uses analog FM to communicate
> with the headphones.
> 
> These JustWorked(tm) under linux, but now I'd like to have audio
> (either PulseAudio or ALSA) auto switch to the headphones whenever
> they are plugged in.
> 
> Is this doable? Any hints?

Just use pavucontrol to move the streams you want to "automatically"
switch to the new device. Once you've moved them once, this will be
remembered forever.

Plugging them in while an app you've moved is currently playing will see
the stream moved across immediately.

There isn't really a great and easy way to automatically move the whole
output across. This exact model is currently supported under KDE with
the modules I wrote to implement their routing policy but it's not
exposed on Gnome.

I do plan to make this available under Gnome eventually too, but as
things stand Lennart doesn't quite yet agree with me on the correct
route forward.

More background here:
http://colin.guthr.ie/2010/02/this-is-the-route-to-hell/
and on numerous threads on this list.

In short it's 95% possible right now but it'll be 100% possible eventually.

Col



-- 

Colin Guthrie
gmane(at)colin.guthr.ie
http://colin.guthr.ie/

Day Job:
  Tribalogic Limited [http://www.tribalogic.net/]
Open Source:
  Mandriva Linux Contributor [http://www.mandriva.com/]
  PulseAudio Hacker [http://www.pulseaudio.org/]
  Trac Hacker [http://trac.edgewall.org/]