Re: Just my 0.02$ on sound and stuff...

[Dominique Rousseau <rousseau neuronnexion fr>]

On Mon, Feb 16, 1998 at 06:29:59PM +0100, Fredrik Öhrström wrote:
> * The sound should be managed by a sound server
> 
> 	All different graphics cards are managed by the XServer. This
> 	server can be extended to handle new cards. No need to modify the
> 	kernel for this. I believe that this should apply to sound too. 
It would require to run setuid root (as X does), and could perhaps give some
problems about compatibility with existing software (but who cares, we have 
source for almost every of them :). How to make access to /dev/ entries ??
Pipes ?? (as gpm does when replicating mouse movements in /dev/gpmdata)

> 	Today we have to rebuild the kernel or modules to get sound.
> 	It would also be much easier if some company would like to offer a 
> 	separate server for a special sound card for proprietary, 
> 	non-disclosure and other such horrible reasons. Of course some 
> 	support in the kernel is necessary for example to support switching 
> 	of virtual terminals so the sound is related to a terminal and not 
> 	global. Maybe I am totally lost here and it turns out that
> 	sound must be in the kernel but we can still build a server.
> 	(In fact the first server probably uses the standard
> 	methods.)
To follow terminal, I think having a env variable like X does would help
the thing. I.e you set AUDIO=mybox:0 to say you want sound to go on your box
using server 0. This would allow to have multiple servers (multiple sound cards)
It would also require some authentification to avoid nasty people of sending 
sound in your ears !! (but X does it, so it should be possible to
get some inspiration of it)

> * The sound server also handles multiple clients
This is a MUST-HAVE ! Having Doom playing sound (shots and such), while mpg123 
plays the music would be really great !!! [with more horse-power than I have :)]

> * The protocol can be extended just like the X protocol.
> 
> 	In the beginning though it is more likely that the protocol
> 	changes before it stabilizes. A normal modplayer would only require 
> 	a simple protocol but if we use Timidity as a base we could use some
> 	sort of modified midi over the wires. Whatever.
This idea of MIDI over wires sound cool. It should allow those having 
external midi devices to play/record to/from them.
Imagine a keyboard connected to one machine, the sound going out of a second 
one, display on a third one and all application running on a central server....

> 	I have not spoken of FM modulated music because it is boring.
>  	But maybe someone wants to write a sound server for an adlib
> 	card that does its best (or worst) to simulate the
> 	different standard instruments with the FM synth.
Yes as well as people could write some X server to run on CGA cards :)

> Just my 2 cents. Please drop me a line if you have comments, want to
> code this or have coded this already! :-)
I have neither time nor knowledge in sound tools to help, but I think
it would be really great if all this could happen !!

-- 
Dominique Rousseau
mail:   rousseau@neuronnexion.fr                |    Hiroshima  45
        droussea@mygale.org                     |    Tchernobyl 86
web:    http://www.mygale.org/~droussea         |    Windows    95