[MPlayer-DOCS] sdl subdriver name for arts

[Joost Baas]

Diego Biurrun (diego at biurrun.de) wrote:
> Joost Baas writes:
>> in http://www.mplayerhq.hu/DOCS/HTML/en/devices.html#sdl it says:
>>
>> -ao sdl:name
>>     specifies SDL audio driver to use (i.e. dsp, esd, arts)
>>
>> however, the proper subdriver for aRTS output is called artsc, not
>> arts.
>
> Fixed.

Great!

>
>> Maybe it will be a better solution if the guys at libsdl would just
>> call it arts, like everybody does, but untill they do I think it's a
>> good
>> idea to have correct documentation.
>
> Maybe you should just tell them..

I get the idea their development isn't really open for outsiders when I
look at their website, but I will try to send them an email. It appears
they have chosen this name on purpose though, so I'm not sure if they will
do anything about it. Maybe the best solution will be to allow both names,
but I could understand if they don't want such a hack in their sources.

>
> Why the heck is it called artsc anyway?
>
>> Because the manpage (or mplayer -ao help) is the first place people will
> look
>> for the solution to this problem I suggest something like this:
>>
>> -ao <driver1[:device],driver2,...[,]>
>>  Specify  a  priority list of audio output drivers (optionally with
> device) to
>>  be used.  With SDL 'device' is valid, too, it means subdriver then.
>>  NOTE: To get a full list of available drivers, see -ao help.
>>  If the list has a trailing ',' it will fallback to drivers not listed.
>>
>>  EXAMPLE:
>>           -ao oss:/dev/dsp2,oss:/dev/dsp1,
>>                try to use OSS with the specified sound devices and
> fallback to
>>                others if it fails
>>           -ao sdl:esd
>>                specify the SDL subdriver (e.g. artsc, esd, alsa)
>
> The proper solution would be to document the suboptions of the sdl
> audio output driver instead.
>
> So while we're at it, driver authors speak up, what are the suboptions
> of the sdl audio output driver and the other ones that are listed as
>
> FIXME: Document suboptions for sdl, arts, esd, jack, nas, macosx, sgi,
> sun,
> dxr2, mpegpes, null, pcm, plugin.
>
> in the man page?
>
>> This took me about an hour to find out, and during my search I found
>> a load of other people with the same problem. They almost never had
>> the sollution though. Usually they had to do with "artsdsp mplayer
>> -ao sdl".
>
> Why not simply use -ao arts?

Because by using sdl as an intermediate layer you can have mplayer adjust
the volume. Arts apparantly doesn't have this option, at least not
implemented in mplayer. SDL can do this for you.

>
> Diego