rplay fails to run

[Nils Kassube]

Nils Kassube wrote:
> Maurizio Dall'Acqua wrote:
> > On Tue, 10 Feb 2015 22:31:57 +0100
> > 
> > Nils Kassube <kassube at gmx.net> wrote:
> > > Maurizio Dall'Acqua wrote:
> > > > On Tue, 10 Feb 2015 20:27:33 +0100
> > > > Since there isn't /dev/dsp in a default Ubuntu system what can
> > > > replace it? I mean can I create a symlink to
> > > > /dev/default-ubuntu-audio-device? If so, what is it?
> > > 
> > > Nowadays sound is handled by pulseaudio or at a lower level by
> > > ALSA.
> > > I think most applications use those sound systems instead of the
> > > old
> > > OSS (which used /dev/dsp). If you really need /dev/dsp for some
> > > reason, you can install the package "osspd".
> > 
> > Thanks for the suggestion. I have installed "osspd" package but
> > rplayd gives the same error message:
> > 
> > rplayd: rplay_audio_init: cannot open /dev/dsp
> > 
> > Should I do something more than installing "osspd"?
> 
> Well, maybe you should consider using some other application ...
> 
> If rplayd can't open /dev/dsp, it seems to be quite broken to me.
> After all that file is world readable and world writeable. And
> considering that the main website doesn't have much real info except
> a link to the source code (from 1999), that application may not be
> useful any more.

After some more experiments, it seems OK, if rplayd can't open /dev/dsp, 
even though that file is world read/writeable. What I had tried before I 
posted the conclusion above was to play some music and then cat some 
file to /dev/dsp which worked, i.e. there was some extra noise played 
together with the music.

But now I tried the same with the music played by user nils and the file 
sent to /dev/dsp by root. That wasn't successful though. Obviously the 
sound driver doesn't allow simultaneous input from various users.

So you could try to run rplayd as the user who is using the desktop. Or 
you could try to get rid of pulseaudio which is probably not possible 
for a desktop system.


Nils