Disable PulseAudio flat volumes to prevent it from pushing volume level to max

[Simo Sorce]

On Tue, 2015-09-22 at 16:58 -0500, kendell clark wrote:
> hi
> Oops? My apologies. I didn't mean to accuse anyone in particular of
> causing my problem. It makes it easier if someone either top or bottom
> posts, but I'm certainly not going to insist on it. I also need to
> figure out how to just reply to the list, rather than to the person who
> sent the message as well as the list. Maybe I should've read my message
> through better before sending, I didn't mean to accuse anyone of
> anything or sound irritable.

No problem, but replying to a specific message tends to carry a meaning
in mailing lists, that's why I pointed it out to you. I did not mean
that I actually am irritated, sorry for the cryptic response on that
part.

On the reply style, it is pretty useful to most of us to get inline
replies in most cases because then you know exactly what has been
replied to. Our clients of choice tend to handle quotation well, and
display it in a manner that makes immediately clear what it is being
responded to.

Perhaps you need to find a way (or a client) that makes it easy for you
to separate quoted text from normal text. I assure you that being able
to just skip back a few lines and read the quoted context of the reply
is often very valuable.

Simo.

> Thanks
> Kendell clark
> 
> 
> On 09/22/2015 04:51 PM, Simo Sorce wrote:
> > On Tue, 2015-09-22 at 16:31 -0500, kendell clark wrote:
> >> hi
> >> Just a polite request. I'm having trouble following the thread because
> >> there are so many intermingled responses, with different bits of it
> >> quoted and commented on. Would everyone mind putting their responses
> >> either on the top or the bottom of the message? Top would be better for
> >> me, but I also don't want to irritate anyone, since I've been yelled at
> >> on the arch list for top posting, even though as a blind person it makes
> >> following messages, especially long threads like this, easier.
> >> Sorry for the OT
> > 
> > This list traditionally follows the good rule of *not* top-posting, and
> > commenting inline.
> > 
> > You are the only one top-posting and breaking the thread as far as I can
> > see. You also commented on a sub-thread that had no top-posting
> > whatsoever and seem perfectly understandable, and replied to my post as
> > if I was the cause of your trouble (which doesn't seem so from the
> > content of your post), so your comment may come a little bit irritating.
> > 
> > It sucks that gmail has poor threading support and confuses you, but you
> > chose that tool, maybe you can find something better.
> > 
> > Simo.
> > 
> >>
> >>
> >> On 09/22/2015 01:29 PM, Simo Sorce wrote:
> >>> On Tue, 2015-09-22 at 09:56 -0400, Matthias Clasen wrote:
> >>>> On Tue, 2015-09-22 at 15:51 +0200, Lennart Poettering wrote:
> >>>>> On Thu, 17.09.15 20:59, Germano Massullo (germano.massullo at gmail.com)
> >>>>> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>>> Today I had a scary experience with the audio of my computer.
> >>>>>> I was listening to music with Amarok, using my headphones... The
> >>>>>> KMix
> >>>>>> volume level was ~ 35%. When I logged into a video conference
> >>>>>> application, the volume suddenly reached the 100%. I was shocked,
> >>>>>> having
> >>>>>> the maximum audio level shooted in your ears is a painful
> >>>>>> experience.
> >>>>>> The conference application that triggered PulseAudio pushing volume
> >>>>>> to
> >>>>>> maximum level probably should have never asked the system for a
> >>>>>> 100%
> >>>>>> audio level, but on the other hand, PulseAudio should never allow
> >>>>>> an
> >>>>>> application to make such sudden changes.
> >>>>>> To avoid that, you have to set
> >>>>>> flat-volumes = no
> >>>>>> in /etc/pulse/daemon.conf
> >>>>>
> >>>>> This is a non-sensical request. If an app uses the mixer APIs to set
> >>>>> the volume of something to very loud, that's what happens. Flat
> >>>>> volumes have nothing to do with that.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I mean, the app you are using shouldn't set the volume like this, and
> >>>>> that's the key here. If you turn off flat volumes you win about
> >>>>> nothing, you just work around this specific app. Soon the next app
> >>>>> will come along and play the same game with the actual device volume,
> >>>>> and you won *zero*.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Don't mix flat volumes with misbheaving apps. Turning off flat
> >>>>> volumes
> >>>>> is a hack around the broken apps at best, and completely pointless..
> >>>>
> >>>> For better or worse, misbehaving apps are a reality that is probably
> >>>> not going to go away... I think we need to have a volume control
> >>>> approach that is at least somewhat tolerant against such apps and has
> >>>> some safeguards.
> >>>
> >>> Indeed, sticking your head in the sand and saying it is a misbehaving
> >>> app is not a useful answer.
> >>>
> >>> Apps misbehave, its a fact of life, you can deal with it, or not deal
> >>> with it, if you do not deal with it you have a bad system that causes
> >>> grief.
> >>>
> >>> I disabled flat-volumes long ago for the same reasons people had to in
> >>> this thread. Yes in theory I can beg every app to be perfect, but in the
> >>> mean time I can't get my ears blasted (or in some cases end up with
> >>> un-audible input/output). whatever it is with flat-volumes I could never
> >>> figure out what was going on, while w/o flat-volumes it is very simple
> >>> as each app is individually either low or high and an app raising its
> >>> volume doesn't cause all other apps to disappear never to return ...
> >>>
> >>> Disabling flat-volumes may be a workaround but it works very well
> >>> apparently. So something probably needs to be improved in flat-volumes,
> >>> and until then it is as good an option to disable it by default.
> >>>
> >>> Simo.
> >>>
> > 
> > 


-- 
Simo Sorce * Red Hat, Inc * New York