[pulseaudio-discuss] User-hostile obfuscation in PulseAudio Volume Control is a real pain.

[Erik Christiansen]

On 22.07.17 11:59, Georg Chini wrote:
> On 22.07.2017 11:37, Erik Christiansen wrote:
> > Even when a Debian 9.0.0 box is connected to a HDMI monitor, PulseAudio
> > Volume Control displays only 3 of its 5 tabs, supressing the vital
> > Configuration tab, needed for switching audio output to HDMI.

> Hi Erik,
> 
> I don't really understand. Are you talking about pavucontrol when
> you are saying "PulseAudio Volume Control"?
> As far as I know, pavucontol always displays 5 tabs, the configuration
> is one of them and there is no option to suppress any of the tabs.

Many thanks for your response. I'm not sure which executable is linked
to "PulseAudio Volume Control" in the LXDE desktop menu on Debian 9.0.0,
but you're doubtless right.

I owe an apology for blaming pavucontrol for not showing all tabs. Now
that I know there are 5, there is cause to try enlarging the window, and
lo! the other two are revealed. After three decades of using *nix, I'm a
lot more familiar with the command line, but figure that in the LXDE
desktop menu the window size for pavucontrol has been made too small,
and pavucontrol is smart enough to adjust - unfortunately with quite
small left/right triangles up in the corners. I've asked on debian-user,
but might have to send smoke signals to their dev list. The hidden tabs
lost me two evenings, and some hair. It would be nice to spare others
the pain.

> If this is different in your distribution or you are not talking about
> pavucontrol, the pulseaudio mailing list is the wrong place to complain.
> You have to go back to the maintainers of your distribution. (Although
> I am running Debian unstable and pavucontrol there displays all 5 tabs,
> so I understand your complain even less.)

Thanks. I'll pursue it there. There's half a yard of screen width beside
the pavucontrol window, so the unnatural lateral compression is entirely
unwarranted. Perhaps unstable has recognised the problem, and instituted
a fix. For myself, I'll make notes. The wet RAM isn't what it used to
be.

Erik