Linux is not about choice (2008) • Hacker News Board

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#141

Post by octotoad » Mon, May 06, 2013, 11:44 PM UTC

aerique wrote: post #54

gue5t wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really isn't. Unless you have a card without a driver (exceedingly rare, though it's not uncommon to need a recent kernel to use recent hardware) ALSA pretty much Just Works. For complex features like streaming sound over the network you need PulseAudio, which due to its complexity takes more configuration and setup, but that's done out of the box on a fair number of distros. I don't know of any major software tha…

As a non-professional, I use a non-realtime JACK as the new ESD. I prefer that over the incomprehensible monster that PulseAudio is. My needs are simple: I want sound from my audio player (MOC), from my browser (f.e. Youtube), from games and they shouldn't interfere. So my audio player shouldn't have exclusive access to the device and prevent me from hearing Youtube at the same time. JACK does all this, is easy to co…

Whenever I see this 'multiple apps using a sound card at once' issue mentioned, I try to recall what sort of ALSA 'voodoo' I've employed to make this work for me. Then I realise; absolutely nothing.

I think the last time I ever had this problem was literally around 12 years ago, and it was caused by me fiddling with my alsa conf file. I haven't touched any ALSA related settings or done anything special in the last ~8 years, and I never have a problem with things like playing music and having a browser flash plugin using audio at the same time.

Not saying it doesn't happen to other people. Just genuinely curious and baffled.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#142

Post by takluyver » Mon, May 06, 2013, 11:48 PM UTC

npsimons wrote: post #59

glesica wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux is already winning the OS wars, it's called Android ;-) Just being snarky, I get your point. I've said this before, and I think it is important to keep in mind when discussing GNU/Linux: things work quite well... on supported hardware. The vast majority of tales of woe related to GNU/Linux and hardware end up coming down to incompatible hardware. This is a communication problem, not a technical problem. No one…

GNU/Linux evangelists, on the other hand, have, in the past especially, had a tendency to sell their operating system as magical software that works on every machine always. This is, of course, totally false. It's not totally false; Linux will work on almost everything, most of the time. While I'll second the notion that you should really, really, really, really make sure that your hardware is supported before you bu…

I think the distinction is that Linux can be made to work on almost anything - if you're willing to hunt through forums, edit config files, and on rare occasions compile a driver. And it might give you trouble, say, suspending and resuming. I doubt Windows is much better on a technical level, but then OEMs deal with choosing hardware and selecting drivers, so end users don't have to.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#143

Post by glesica » Mon, May 06, 2013, 11:49 PM UTC

npsimons wrote: post #59

glesica wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux is already winning the OS wars, it's called Android ;-) Just being snarky, I get your point. I've said this before, and I think it is important to keep in mind when discussing GNU/Linux: things work quite well... on supported hardware. The vast majority of tales of woe related to GNU/Linux and hardware end up coming down to incompatible hardware. This is a communication problem, not a technical problem. No one…

GNU/Linux evangelists, on the other hand, have, in the past especially, had a tendency to sell their operating system as magical software that works on every machine always. This is, of course, totally false. It's not totally false; Linux will work on almost everything, most of the time. While I'll second the notion that you should really, really, really, really make sure that your hardware is supported before you bu…

> It's not totally false; Linux will work on almost everything, most of the time.

For certain definitions of the word "work" :-). Much of the reputation GNU/Linux has for being wonky and difficult to use comes not from alpha hacker types, their systems work just fine, but from relatively ordinary people with work to do who were talked into installing "Linux" to escape malware, get access to more free software, speed up an old computer, etc. For these people, editing xorg.conf is an unacceptable pre-condition to using a computer. Is there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not (IMHO).

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#144

Post by sethrin » Mon, May 06, 2013, 11:55 PM UTC

quasive wrote: post #112

Udo wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it is. I use Linux servers mostly, but about a year ago I installed openSuSE on two new desktops. The problem was that, while sound "worked" in general, only one application could use the sound card at a time. That means when you have your audio player open, Youtube won't work at the same time. You'd have to close both apps and then re-open the browser so it could then hog the audio. The most annoying thing abou…

This is absolutely unacceptable, and the main reason I still use a SoundBlaster Live instead of my onboard sound. The SBLive can do hardware mixing and the Linux driver makes this transparent, so even OSS programs can run simultaneously. ALSA is supposed to be able to do this transparently (in software) with dmix, but in my experience that only works with ALSA-aware programs, not those using the OSS API. I don't care…

>I don't care that xxxx is deprecated: it should just work.

Setting aside the concept of extrapolating from a small sample size using an admittedly deprecated system (on apparently poor hardware) which hasn't seen any significant use this decade, to "Linux sound is still obnoxious"...

The temerity of insisting that any deprecated software work perfectly is appalling. I am sad to say that my imagination does not stretch so far as to envision a world where this was a reasonable expectation. The one small solace that I can bring away from your post is that such an attitude must engender its own punishment.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#145

Post by takluyver » Mon, May 06, 2013, 11:59 PM UTC

pyre wrote: post #75

npsimons wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux sound hasn't been a problem for some of us for, oh, I don't know, well over 10 years (1999? 1998? I can't remember), and no, I'm not talking about "well I can write sound drivers, therefore it works for me, har har har!" I've never quite understood the problems people had, since I've always had Linux sound "just work" for me out of the box. Sure, back in the ISA bus days, you had to specify things like IRQs, bu…

I don't know about now, but running Linux on a ThinkPad X41 a couple of years ago with suspend-to-RAM. After a fresh boot a sleep-wake will work twice before the auto switching between speakers and headphones quits. Hibernating and waking will fix it only for one sleep-wake cycle. A full reboot would fix it so that it would work for two more sleep-wake cycles. I was fully willing to get my hands dirty with a little h…

I know how frustrating it can be when your bug isn't getting attention, but I've also been on the other side of that. It's not like Ubuntu (or any project) has hordes of developers who're just too lazy to tackle your bug: maybe not many people have that model, or don't tend to switch between speakers and headphones much. Maybe people couldn't reproduce the bug, or maybe just no-one could see how to fix it.

There's a whole host of reasons why bugs don't get fixed, but it's rarely because the project as a whole 'just decided to shelve it'.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#146

Post by takluyver » Tue, May 07, 2013, 12:05 AM UTC

throwaway1980 wrote: post #52

ctdonath wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is sound still a problem on Linux? I realize the article is about 5 years old, but Linux has been around for a long time now, and sound is a really basic function I'd expect even obtuse geeks would want to solve. If it is still a problem, seems that's a definitive concise example of why Linux can't win the OS wars: some things must work, even if nobody wants the task of making it work; sometimes the only solution is…

Yes, also problems with wireless/wired network card drivers and DVD playback are common. These are the kinds of things where you've just gotten them working, then you upgrade your distro and they stop working again. In theory they all probably work, even for your hardware, but getting the right versions of all the software necessary running at once on your machine is a pain. It doesn't have anything to do with paying…

OK, I'm curious: DVD playback is definitely a bit of a fiddle (mostly for legal reasons), and I've heard of wifi problems (although I understand most recent chipsets work)... but wired network drivers? I've never heard about problems with wired networking, and none of the computers I've installed Linux on has ever had a problem with it.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#147

Post by stephen_g » Tue, May 07, 2013, 12:46 AM UTC

octotoad wrote: post #141

aerique wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a non-professional, I use a non-realtime JACK as the new ESD. I prefer that over the incomprehensible monster that PulseAudio is. My needs are simple: I want sound from my audio player (MOC), from my browser (f.e. Youtube), from games and they shouldn't interfere. So my audio player shouldn't have exclusive access to the device and prevent me from hearing Youtube at the same time. JACK does all this, is easy to co…

Whenever I see this 'multiple apps using a sound card at once' issue mentioned, I try to recall what sort of ALSA 'voodoo' I've employed to make this work for me. Then I realise; absolutely nothing. I think the last time I ever had this problem was literally around 12 years ago, and it was caused by me fiddling with my alsa conf file. I haven't touched any ALSA related settings or done anything special in the last ~8…

Always confused me too. Alsa worked well, and then I remember Ubuntu introducing PulseAudio too early when it was immature, and it was horrible for a while, but six months later it had all been fixed and I never had any issues with PulseAudio again... What was that, like five or six years ago now?

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#148

Post by pyre » Tue, May 07, 2013, 12:48 AM UTC

takluyver wrote: post #145

pyre wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about now, but running Linux on a ThinkPad X41 a couple of years ago with suspend-to-RAM. After a fresh boot a sleep-wake will work twice before the auto switching between speakers and headphones quits. Hibernating and waking will fix it only for one sleep-wake cycle. A full reboot would fix it so that it would work for two more sleep-wake cycles. I was fully willing to get my hands dirty with a little h…

I know how frustrating it can be when your bug isn't getting attention, but I've also been on the other side of that. It's not like Ubuntu (or any project) has hordes of developers who're just too lazy to tackle your bug: maybe not many people have that model, or don't tend to switch between speakers and headphones much. Maybe people couldn't reproduce the bug, or maybe just no-one could see how to fix it. There's a…

I realize that there are reasons, and I'm not necessarily angry at Ubuntu, but I've dealt with these types of issues before and it's frustrating. I had the ALSA source code and was ready to attempt some hardware hacking, but:

1) The chipset was a common one, and the issue specific to this model. I had no idea how to proceed from there.

2) I couldn't make heads or tails out of the structure of the code, and what was happening (or why). I tried to find some sort of "this is happening here" where I could work out the rest from there, but couldn't find it.

3) I volunteered myself on the bug page, but there was never a response to it.

4) I've never hacked on kernel code (beyond compiling it from scratch 'back in the day') or done any hardware hacking, but I was willing to look at resources if people pointed me in the right direction.

The project "as a whole" doesn't do anything with respect to specific bugs (there are exceptions), but the individuals that do take action, take that action on behalf of Ubuntu.

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#149

Post by marshray » Tue, May 07, 2013, 1:08 AM UTC

Who is this redhat.com and why should I care what color their fedora is?

Of course I'm being a quite facetious here. But the point is that I have many computers and VMs running several operating systems, many with Linux kernels, but somehow I've not chosen the Red Fedora. I wasn't aware they even cared that much about desktop users.

Perhaps I have the "disease which strangles the mind"?

Re: Linux is not about choice (2008)

#150

Post by mgkimsal » Tue, May 07, 2013, 1:15 AM UTC

Udo wrote: post #88

ctdonath wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is sound still a problem on Linux? I realize the article is about 5 years old, but Linux has been around for a long time now, and sound is a really basic function I'd expect even obtuse geeks would want to solve. If it is still a problem, seems that's a definitive concise example of why Linux can't win the OS wars: some things must work, even if nobody wants the task of making it work; sometimes the only solution is…

Yes, it is. I use Linux servers mostly, but about a year ago I installed openSuSE on two new desktops. The problem was that, while sound "worked" in general, only one application could use the sound card at a time. That means when you have your audio player open, Youtube won't work at the same time. You'd have to close both apps and then re-open the browser so it could then hog the audio. The most annoying thing abou…

"The most annoying thing about this, however, were some of my desktop Linux friends who insisted this behavior was totally acceptable and not a bug."

Bingo. Spot on, and you've hit the biggest meta-issue when discussing desktop Linux usability issues. There isn't an agreed upon definition for "acceptable" that everyone can use to determine if something is really broken or not. I hit the same issue years ago, complained on some forums, people told me it wasn't a problem, I was doing something wrong, etc. Finally someone grokked what I was describing, agreed that I would be reasonable to expect 2 apps to be able to play sound at the same time, but that it "wasn't a big deal" and "never bothered" him. For a server, yes. For a desktop environment, it's been unacceptable to me for years, and was a primary reason why I switched away from desktop linux for day-to-day work (after about 5 years of dealing with the ups and downs of desktop linux' evolution).