event sounds not working

[bob58]

Hello....I have replaced my KNOPPIX 3.3 installations with 3.4. I like it alot and works well. However, I noticed that the EVENT SOUNDS do not work. The sound itself is OK, for instance I can play cd's and all.

In CONTROL CENTER under SOUND there is a button to test sound, and when I click it, it does work and the KNOPPIX START UP SOUND plays.

Its just the NOTIFICATIONS do not work. Not that its a big deal, but I kind of liked them. KNOPPIX ver. 3.3 the sound events worked fine. Does anyone have the same problem?

bob58 :cry:

[Cuddles]

Bob58,

Funny thing, even with v3.3 I couldn't get my "notifications" to work - but then again, I was using ALSA. With the new v3.4, kernel 2.6.6, I, again, have ALSA - my notifications remain to be heard - the last time I heard any KDE sounds was when I booted off the CD to install Knoppix to the hard drive ( same was true with v3.3 )

For me, my guess is that I need something setup in my OSS emulation settings, or something, since ALSA is running on my sound now - not sure if you said, or not, are you using ALSA as well? If so, we are BOTH in the same boat, maybe... If you are just running off the "standard" and "default", OSS sound, and Arts - ( aaaaaa, that was when all my sounds were working, notifications, window iconization sounds, etc... those were the days... but then again, without ALSA, I couldn't get some of my "die-hard" sound editting software to work on OSS, and they would only work with ALSA - hence my running ALSA )

Not sure if I helped, or not, here,
Ms. Cuddles

[Markus]

You might find the answer here: http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12054

[Cuddles]

Hey Markus,

I tried the "artsplay", it didn't work, but I tried the "aplay", which never worked for me, but did this time - but, I can only change the player in root -=- when I try to change the player in my "user" KControl - it is shaded out - and it is stuck with "alsaplayer [options[" - which hasn't worked....

Where is the user settings for the "player" stored, so that I can "manually" change the player in the file, or how can I get the "player" unshaded so that I can change it within KControl? ( I already tried to "enable" the sound system, thinking that the "sound system" being disabled was causing the shading, and thus, unable to change the player, but that didn't work )

Thanks in advance dude, this is getting somewhere, and, I might add, more than I was at just a few moments ago, and all, thanks to you for the suggestion,
Ms. Cuddles

[champagnemojo]

Where is the user settings for the "player" stored, so that I can "manually" change the player in the file, or how can I get the "player" unshaded so that I can change it within KControl?

Go into the .kde directory under your user directory, then /share/config and find the file .knotifyrc. You can either change the external player or turn external player off.

[Cuddles]

Sorry to say,

But in that specified directory/folder, I not only don't have any [dot] files, but, I also don't have the file you specified, any clues???

Thanks for the quick response, none-the-less,
Ms. Cuddles

[champagnemojo]

Yeah...sorry Cuddles, it's not .knotifyrc...it's just knotifyrc.

I just got a bit wild with my dots there. :P

[Markus]

It's dotless if that's a word.

markus@mrk-fujibox:~$ cat .kde/share/config/knotifyrc
[Misc]
External player=aplay
LastConfiguredApp=Konsole
Use external player=true
Volume=100

[StartProgress]
Arts Init=false
KNotify Init=true
Use Arts=false

EDIT: My post seems to have been pointless which at least is a word.

[Cuddles]

Y E S

You can have it both ways !

That worked, I've now got system notifications and ALSA working at the same time, I never thought it to be possible :D -=- There IS a GOD !

Thanks, millions, for the assistance :)
Ms. Cuddles

[CrashedAgain]

I got my system notifications to work by setting
Arts Init=true
Knotify Init=true
Use Arts=true

but then I guess I'm using aRTs. I don't understand why these are defaulted to false and I don't understand why you can't change them from Kcontrol. Used to be able to select 'start arts automatically' from Kcontrol, now it's just 'enable sound system' but it doesn't set these necessary settings true. Go figure.
I really don't understand this aRts/ALSA thing; exactly what each one does & why or how they are different. There seems to be a general opinion that alsa is 'better' but I don't know why. I wish somebody would explain this in detail.

[bob58]

I tried using ARTSPLAY as external player and that solved the problem :lol:

My sound notifications are working now....thanks for advice all.....I wanted to use the startup & shutdown sound files "initiating startup sequence / initiating shutdown sequence". I found them on a website and put them in my /usr/share/sounds directory. What i noticed is, on shutdown, knoppix doesnt let the "initiating shutdown sequence" file play in its entirety. It only plays up to "initiating..." and cuts off.....maybe shutdown sound event files have to be small. I could edit the file to say only "shutdown". well i am glad the sounds are working....bob58

[Cuddles]

CrashedAgain,

Here is what I have gotten from all of this, from what I have heard, to what I have found...

Arts - old sound system for Linux - outdated, and not much "functionality", it also, isn't very "new" to the technology that is currently needed for playing "serious" sound setups....

ALSA - "new" "defacto" - trying to be "default" - sound system for Linux - only, it still has a lot to go before it could "just be set with a activation button in KControl" kinda thing. With ALSA, you can "configure" serious sound settings, like 5.1 speaker outputs, major "mixer" configurations... In my own words, ALSA is to Arts, as, say a "SoundBlaster (top of the line)" is to a "AdLib" sound card that (barely) gives you more than a better system speaker sound...

Add into the above, one more detail - some of the more "serious" sound editting/creation packages that are coming out, will not function unless you have ALSA running - these programs will refuse to run, with a probable error stating "no sound found" - even if you have Arts running and functioning...

Currently -=- ALSA is not as "user-friendly" as Arts is, and requires some serious "playing with" to get it to work, most of the time, "requiring" kernel source compiling to get it to even start, and a lot of CLI work to get it configured, which was my case with kernel 2.6.6 and v3.4 - but it runs great if you just run the "cheatcode" off the CD, and don't install it to the hard drive. My previous "trick" on v3.3 was to use the "cheatcode" alsa on the CD, then run the hdinstall - in that version it worked, but, alas, in v3.4 this "trick" doesn't work...

So, from what I hear, and the thoughts that came with it - go with ALSA, if you can get it working - Someday, from what I feel, way down the road, Arts is going "bye-bye", and ALSA will be the only thing for sound on Linux. Considering the amount of "work" it takes to get ALSA working, let alone, getting it to actually "play" sound, this "road" may be a way bit off -=- Who knows, by the time ALSA is ready to be included as the "default" sound system for Linux, and Arts is no longer provided, they might have "another" sound system theory in the "back-burner" by then -=- and, hopefully, it is easier and more friendly than ALSA is, at least at this point. [?]

Hopefully, this helps,
Ms. Cuddles

[Markus]

Ahem, I'm far from an expert in sound for linux but I believe OSS is the old soundsystem which is becoming replaced by ALSA. ARTS is KDE's mixer that runs on top of the soundsystem, so if you want better compatibility I'd go for pure alsa and not arts+alsa.

[Cuddles]

DOH!

Thanks Markus, I didn't even realize that it used the "front-end" name, vs. the "back-end" - you got me.... OSS - so... do the following in my (long) previous post...


~$ search --replace --global --ignorecase arts oss

Thanks again for pointing out that I am not a perfect geekette,
Ms. Cuddles

[Markus]

Don't worry about it Cuddles. I've certainly made my fair share of mistakes here :D
Might as well see if I'll manage another one so here goes:

Between the kernel and the soundcard you have either OSS or ALSA. One or the other can also be compiled into the kernel but not both at the same time, which is why it's better to use modules if you're not sure which one you're going to use.
OSS is as said the older one and being more simple, easier to setup. If you want something newer for instance for MIDI you need ALSA which again as more versatile is more difficult to setup.
A lot of older programs are made for OSS and that's why ALSA comes with OSS emulation.
KDE uses ARTS as a way to give sound to many programs without them talking to the ALSA driver directly and possibly borking it with simultaneous requests, and just to make it more complicated, if you have GNOME you can use ESD (ARTS equivalent) but don't have to :).
This is also why you have to choose different external players for your KDE system notifications according to your sound setup. I'm running ALSA without ARTS so I have aplay as the external player.

[champagnemojo]

Also, from what I understand, aRts uses software mixing, whereas alsa utilizes the mixer capabilities of your soundcard. I think this is why aRts often tends to take up alot of your cpu. I imagine this is also part of why alsa sounds better for most people.

[CrashedAgain]

I tried using ARTSPLAY as external player and that solved the problem :lol:

My sound notifications are working now....thanks for advice all.....I wanted to use the startup & shutdown sound files "initiating startup sequence / initiating shutdown sequence". I found them on a website and put them in my /usr/share/sounds directory. What i noticed is, on shutdown, knoppix doesnt let the "initiating shutdown sequence" file play in its entirety. It only plays up to "initiating..." and cuts off.....maybe shutdown sound event files have to be small. I could edit the file to say only "shutdown". well i am glad the sounds are working....bob58
You should already have the startup/shutdown sounds.../usr/share/sounds/startup.ogg & shutdown.ogg.
How are you calling the shutdown event sounds? Knoppix script (I forget which one & I tried but can't find it again) just uses the command 'play /usr/share/sounds/shutdown.ogg'.
Try it...it works but you may have to kill the arts daemon first: use ps xa \ grep arts to find the process number the 'kill process number':
root@1# ps xa | grep arts
818 ? S 0:43 /usr/bin/artsd -F 128 -S 8192 -s 60 -m artsmessage -c drkonqi -l 3 -f
2516 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/artsd -F 10 -S 4096 -s 60 -m artsmessage -l 3 -f
2681 pts/1 S+ 0:00 grep arts
root@1# kill 818
root@1# kill 2516
root@1# play /usr/share/sounds/startup.ogg
playing /usr/share/sounds/startup.ogg
root@1#

To all the others who replied with explanations: Thanks. It's a little clearer now.
It appears maybe you can't entirely get away from arts if using KDE, however., for instance KDE's embedded sound player 'Kaboodle' uses the arts deamon & restarts it if needed when it is called.
I seem to remember in an earlier version of Knoppix sound files would preview play if the mouse was hovered over it in Konqueror but I can't figure out how it was done. Anybody know? (maybe I'll post this question separately)
For what it's worth configure xmms has the following output plugin options:
ALSA plugin
aRTs plugin
Disk Writer plugin
eSound output plugin
OSS plugin
so it appears that here at least ALSA, OSS & aRTs are pretty much equivalent.
If the aRTs deamon is running you MUST use tha aRTS plugin else you get a 'couldn't open audio' error. Since some KDE apps will start the aRTs daemon automatically, it appears either you can't use these apps or you are committed to arts....or maybe this is not correct either???
Guess I'm still confused!