FC3 wishlist - sound server

[Max K-A]

> Any program that supports ALSA output also supports DMIX. In the
> attached setup, the default device is set to DMIX. But as you said,
> legacy applications only supporting OSS won't be able to use DMIX.
> However, the majority of open source applications do support ALSA, so I
> wouldn't say that "in general" applications can't use DMIX.   

	Yeah, I suppose you're right about that. I started using ALSA on RH9
(because OSS doesn't support my M-Audio Delta 44), and back then it was
pretty much an OSS-only world, with a little ALSA on the side.

	It seems like most projects support ALSA directly, now. Although I do
vaguely recall having difficulty with dmix, even so. Maybe it's just my
card -- it's peculiar, in that it only accepts 32-bit input.

	It may be my left-over prejudices from a year ago or so, but I still
wouldn't feel comfortable making a dmix device my default ALSA device.
(But as I said, might just be my card.)

> In some cases (like Real Player 8), there is support for esd and OSS, so
> one could run esd on top of dmix and then play RP sound through esd.

	Now that's probably a fine idea.

	-Max