You are not logged in.

#1 2005-02-22 18:20:52

incinerator
Member
From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Registered: 2005-02-15
Posts: 80

[solved] kde without arts - problem with aplay/knotify

Hi,

I finally got convinced to switch of arts for kde. Amarok runs much better now but I face a problem with knotify/aplay.

With arts not active knotify won't play sounds anymore. knotify is the program responsible for kde's bells and whistles, like playing a sound when you open or close a window etc.
knotify specifies an option for an external player, which I think is the thing to use in case you don't use arts.

I configured that option to use aplay, the sound replay program provided by alsa. However, that has problems. Many kde sounds come with 8khz sample frequency. If I play one of these sounds with aplay their playback frequency is much to low and the sound is heavily distorted. It seems the downmixing does not work.

If I use aplay -Ddmix or -Dduplex I get following error:

Playing raw data 'KDE_Beep.ogg' : Unsigned 8 bit, Rate 8000 Hz, Mono
aplay: set_params:857: Sample format non available

I think that may have something to do with my .asoundrc or maybe there is another program to use for sound playback I don't know about. Also, I could be that knotify IS supposed to play the sounds even without arts running and something else is wrong.

Here is my .asoundrc, any advice is welcome:

# Set default sound card
# Useful so that all settings can be changed to a different card here.
pcm.snd_card {
     type hw
     card 0
}

# Allow mixing of multiple output streams to this device
pcm.dmix {
     type dmix
     ipc_key 1024
     slave.pcm "snd_card"
     slave {
          # This stuff provides some fixes for latency issues.
          # buffer_size should be set for your audio chipset.
          period_time 0
          period_size 1024
          buffer_size 16384
     }

     bindings {
          0 0
          1 1
     }
}

# Allow reading from the default device.
# Also known as record or capture.
pcm.dsnoop {
     type dsnoop
     ipc_key 2048
     slave.pcm "snd_card"

     bindings {
          0 0
          1 1
     }
}

# This is what we want as our default device
# a fully duplex (read/write) audio device.
pcm.duplex {
     type asym
     playback.pcm "dmix"
     capture.pcm "dsnoop"
}

###################
# CONVERSION PLUG #
###################
# Setting the default pcm device allows the conversion
# rate to be selected on the fly.
# duplex mode allows any alsa enabled app to read/write
# to the dmix plug (Fixes a problem with wine).
pcm.!default {
     type plug
     slave.pcm "duplex"
}

# Apparently this is wrong (breaks mplayer for me opening the device)
#ctl.!default {
#     type plug
#     slave.pcm "snd_card"
#}

########
# AOSS #
########
# OSS dsp0 device
pcm.dsp0 {
     type plug
     slave.pcm "duplex"
}

# OSS control for dsp0 (needed?...this might not be useful)
ctl.dsp0 {
     type plug
     slave.pcm "snd_card"
}

# OSS control for dsp0 (default old OSS is mixer0)
ctl.mixer0 {
     type plug
     slave.pcm "snd_card"
}

Cheers,
Dominik

Offline

#2 2005-02-25 22:31:51

incinerator
Member
From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Registered: 2005-02-15
Posts: 80

Re: [solved] kde without arts - problem with aplay/knotify

Ok, I came to a solution.

My .asoundrc was ok. It was aplay that I wasn't aware of it couldn't handle .ogg files, it tried to play it anyway and that's why I got garbled sound output *headdesk*

I installed alsaplayer, after running it once I edited .alsaplayer/config to use the "text" user interface by default. Setting alsaplayer as external player for knotify seems to work.

However, knotify won't let me play sounds in quick succession, so I lose a knotify sound every now and then.

Offline

#3 2005-02-25 23:59:10

Mith
Member
From: out there
Registered: 2004-10-05
Posts: 163

Re: [solved] kde without arts - problem with aplay/knotify

thx!!
I've never bothered doing something about kde not playing sounds without arts but your solution works pretty nice!
as a side note, in case someone doesn't want to install alsaplayer, mplayer just works the same

I'd definitly make a wiki entry out of this. There's gotta be more people who disabled the artsd for some reason and live with the fact of not having any sounds, this is a simple quick solution..


ArchLinux (x86_64) w/ kdemod

Offline

#4 2005-02-27 02:33:31

incinerator
Member
From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Registered: 2005-02-15
Posts: 80

Re: [solved] kde without arts - problem with aplay/knotify

Hehe, I actually went back to run artsd, after all. The problem with sounds getting lost when played in quick succession annoyed me.
Seems the artsd in kde 3.3.2 does coexist rather nicely with alsa. amarok set to xine and artsd still running seems to work without problems.

Offline

Board footer

Powered by FluxBB