Skype and Google-Talkplugin don't start, may be audio/video config problem

[Mario Storti]

Hi all,

I have Fedora 16, and my problem is that I can't run Skype neither
Google-Talk Plugin for videoconferences. Skype simply crashes

>  [mstorti at galileo ~]$ gdb skype
>  GNU gdb (GDB) Fedora (7.3.50.20110722-9.fc16)
>  Copyright (C) 2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
>  License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later
>  <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
>  This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
>  There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.  Type "show
>  copying"
>  and "show warranty" for details.
>  This GDB was configured as "x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu".
>  For bug reporting instructions, please see:
>  <http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/bugs/>...
>  Reading symbols from /usr/bin/skype...(no debugging symbols
>  found)...done.
>  Missing separate debuginfos, use: debuginfo-install
>  skype-2.2.0.35-fc10.i586
>  (gdb) r
>  Starting program: /usr/bin/skype
>  [Thread debugging using libthread_db enabled]
>  Using host libthread_db library "/lib64/libthread_db.so.1".
>  [New Thread 0x81a8ab40 (LWP 6904)]
>  [New Thread 0x819e4b40 (LWP 6905)]
>  [New Thread 0x81963b40 (LWP 6906)]
>  [New Thread 0x816afb40 (LWP 6907)]
>  [New Thread 0x814ffb40 (LWP 6908)]
>  [New Thread 0x8147eb40 (LWP 6909)]
>  [New Thread 0x813fdb40 (LWP 6910)]
>
>  Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault.
>  [Switching to Thread 0x816afb40 (LWP 6907)]
>  0x4fab511e in pthread_getschedparam () from /lib/libpthread.so.0

And Google-Talk also doesn't start, it offers me to install the plugin
for chat and video, but in fact I have it installed and I think that
it is the latest version.
Name        : google-talkplugin
Version     : 2.1.6.0

The most amazing thing is that I can run OK both Skype and
Google-Talkplugin UNDER OTHER USER IN THE SAME MACHINE (my user is
`mstorti', and I created another `mstorti2' just to try things). Right
now my workaround is to switch to user `mstorti2' each time I have a
videoconf, but it is getting too annoying!! :-(

Also I can say that I used Skype/Google-Talkplugin without problems
before, I think that something was messed up with some upgrade almost
6 months ago (perhaps when upgrading to Fedora 15 or near).

I think it is a problem of configuration of either the camera of the
audio, but

* I have audio OK, for instance in Amarok or Firefox/Youtube
* I can record audio in Audacity
* I test my camera in System Settings -> Multimedia -> Phonon -> Video
    Recording and it seems OK.

The only conflict that I note is that when I start a video on YouTube
I can't hear at the sometime music from Amarok for instance. (It's
probably useless anyway, but I report this because normally I could to
that before all this problem started).

I am sometimes tempted to do a fresh install of Fedora from scratch,
but I'm somewhat lazy because I have a lot of packages locally
installed (I'm using this system since 2007) and I'm skeptic that it
will help.

Any ideas??

TIA, Mario

-- 
-------------------------
Mario Alberto Storti [cel. +54-342-5122135]
CIMEC (INTEC/CONICET-UNL)
Predio CONICET-Santa Fe
Colect. Ruta Nac. 168 Km 472, Paraje El Pozo
3000 Santa Fe, Argentina
Tel: +54-342-4511594 (ext 1015), Tel/Fax: +54-342-4511169
Home: +54-342-4550193, e-mail: mario.storti at gmail.com
http://www.cimec.org.ar/mstorti
-------------------------