Well, Windows is back on the disk.

[Michael Richter]

>>I'll cheerfully learn.

>>Where, exactly, is ALSA documented again?  And its interactions with
>>OSS and the other misbegotten software turds that seem to float around
>>the Linux multimedia bowl?

>>Give me docs--complete and coherent ones--and I'll gladly learn.

> If you've been reading the LKML, there certainly aren't many. If you ask
> the LKML, I'm sure you'll get a response like, "the header files". It
> works in practice. :)

So much for Linux on the desktop.

If I have to read kernel code to make something work we're talking
about fifteen layers of information too far from the end-user
experience.  Were all other OSes this way it would be bad enough, but
in the arena Ubuntu wants to compete in sound cards Just Work<tm>. 
Having Ubuntu require reading of kernel source to get half-there
operation that Mysteriously Fails<tm> slightly less than the default
scenario is not going to give anybody a good impression.

Here's what you're competing against, for reference:
- In Windows, since '98 (and possibly earlier -- I don't have any '95
disks left anymore), sound cards either Just Work<tm> out of the box
or they work after installing an easily-found, easily installed
driver.
- In Windows, since '98 (or earlier), in a system with multiple sound
cards, telling the OS which one you want as the default device means
all audio activity goes to that default device.
- In Windows, you see the pattern, AC3-encoded (or DTS-encoded, etc.)
audio played on a system that doesn't support AC3 (for whatever
reason) gets converted intelligently through software into a format
which is supported.
- In Windows, if a format isn't supported it gives intelligent error
messages like "no codec for this file format" instead of "device
busy".  This means you can easily figure out you're dealing with a
codec issue and can Google on "<name> codec" to find the software you
need.
- In Windows, when the desktop starts, if it can't play the startup
noise (because of a hardware misconfiguration, say) it doesn't hang
the system.

My Ubuntu experience in all but one case was radically different.
- My sound cards were recognised by Ubuntu.  This put Ubuntu way ahead
of any other distro I tried.  Kudos are well-deserved here.
- Ubuntu, however, got confused by my system having two sound cards in
it.  It would randomly switch between them when doing sound-based
things.  Or some programs would ONLY go to the undesired sound card
(because it was card 0) or simply fail to produce sound at all.  If I
removed one sound card, however, and sadly the desired card, all such
confusion vanished.
- Ubuntu does no intelligent chaining of codecs to downmix complicated
formats to simpler setups.
- Nastiest of all: GNOME just locked up tight when it tried to play
the startup sound and couldn't.

--
Michael T. Richter
ttmrichter at gmail.com
Jabber: mtr1966 at jabber.cn