Re: Espeak Server Likes PulseAudio?

[Steve Holmes <steve@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well after two days of messing around and reading some write-ups for
ArchLinux concerning PulseAudio, I founhd a suggested configuration to
alter Pulse so it and ALSA function side by side now and I can use
Emacspeak, Speakup and Gnome with Speech Dispatcher without any speech
losses.  Also tim, I have not experienced any stability issues with
the emacspeak espeak server other than while I was battling with Pulse
and all.  It is using the pulse driver but I notice that espeak
natively is also calling up pulseaudio.c but what's strange is
espeakup does not; espeakup probably calls the espeak library function
directly and that appears to go through ALSA.  Anyway, I seem to have
all these environments working now and hopefully this "house of cards"
won't collaps on me:).  I sure wish the Linux sound system were a lot
simpler than all this.

On 3/30/13, T.V. Raman <tv.raman.tv@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Jason, You have articulated part of the issue correctly. The
> other reason why the pulseaudio / alsa combination gives such
> vastly varying results is that the layering is complex;  See
> Tim's earlier note.  If you have pulseaudio on a system, do an
> aplay -v of a .wav file and look at the output -- you'll see the
> audio buffers getting routed through multiple layers.  Now,
> depending on the soundcard and the memory buffer size it needs,
> sample conversions ... this can  go horribly wrong when you
> generate a lot of rapid audio requests -- something that happens
> with emacspeak a lot if you perform actions that both produce
> speech and a rapid sequence of auditory icons.  For the record,
> the first thing I did on my work machines after upgrading to
> Precise was to nuke pulseaudio -- that is getting harder and
> harder to do --
>>>>>> "Jason" == Jason White <jason@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
>     Jason> Tim Cross <theophilusx@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>     >> Note that there should be no problems with alsa and
>     >> pulseaudio. Pulseaudio is not a replacement for alsa. It
>     >> is another abstraction layer on top of it and pulseaudio
>     >> needs alsa
>     Jason>
>     Jason> Part of the problem might be that PulseAudio holds
>     Jason> devices open even when not in use, so that
>     Jason> applications which access the Alsa layer directly fail
>     Jason> to open audio devices.
>     Jason>
>     Jason> As I remember, there is a way to configure PulseAudio
>     Jason> to relinquish devices temporarily that aren't being
>     Jason> used by applications.
>     Jason>
>     Jason> With apologies in advance if I am wrong in the above -
>     Jason> it's a while since I read about these issues.
>     Jason>
>     Jason>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>     Jason> To unsubscribe from the emacspeak list or change your
>     Jason> address on the emacspeak list send mail to
>     Jason> "emacspeak-request@xxxxxxxxxxx" with a subject of
>     Jason> "unsubscribe" or "help".
>
> --
> Best Regards,
> --raman
>
> --
> Best Regards,
> --raman
>
> --
> Best Regards,
> --raman
>
>
> On 3/29/13, Jason White <jason@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> Tim Cross <theophilusx@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>>> Note that there should be no problems with alsa and pulseaudio.
>>> Pulseaudio
>>> is not a replacement for alsa. It is another abstraction layer on top of
>>> it
>>> and pulseaudio needs alsa
>>
>> Part of the problem might be that PulseAudio holds devices open even when
>> not
>> in use, so that applications which access the Alsa layer directly fail to
>> open
>> audio devices.
>>
>> As I remember, there is a way to configure PulseAudio to relinquish
>> devices
>> temporarily that aren't being used by applications.
>>
>> With apologies in advance if I am wrong in the above - it's a while since
>> I
>> read about these issues.
>>
>> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> To unsubscribe from the emacspeak list or change your address on the
>> emacspeak list send mail to "emacspeak-request@xxxxxxxxxxx" with a
>> subject of "unsubscribe" or "help".
>>
>>
>
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> To unsubscribe from the emacspeak list or change your address on the
> emacspeak list send mail to "emacspeak-request@xxxxxxxxxxx" with a
> subject of "unsubscribe" or "help".
>
>

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