Ask Slashdot: Stop PulseAudio From Changing Sound Settings?

New submitter cgdae writes Does anyone know how to stop PulseAudio/Pavucontrol from changing sound settings whenever there is a hardware change such as headphones being plugged in/out or docking/undocking my laptop ? I recently had to install PulseAudio on my Debian system because the Linux version of Skype started to require it. Ever since, whenever i dock/undock or use/stop using headphones, all sound disappears, and i have to go to Pavucontrol and make random changes to its 'Output Devices' or 'Speakers' or 'Headphones' tab, or mute/unmute things, or drag a volume slider which has inexplicably moved to nearly zero, until sound magically comes back again. I've tried creating empty PulseAudio config files in my home directory, and/or disabling the loading of various PulseAudio modules in /etc/pulse/*.conf, but i cannot stop PulseAudio from messing things up whenever there's a hardware change. It's really frustrating that something like PulseAudio doesn't have an easy-to-find way of preventing it from trying (and failing) to be clever.

[In case it's relevant, my system is a Lenovo X220 laptop, with Debian jessie, kernel 3.14-2-amd64. I run fvwm with an ancient config.]

Comments

Pulseaudio not smart enough for me

[Blaskowicz]

I dislike that pulseaudio doesn't set its volume at what was the last value, when I boot and autologin to my desktop. The sound control applet (or is it a tray icon) does remember, but it registers after twiddling it up or down.
As I use an amplifier at 100% volume and Alsamixer is set at -2dB that result in very loud sound coming from the music player or video player etc. if I forget about it. Fortunately the amp is low powered and 2x12 watts so I guess the sound comes out at around 100 decibels only. Would be fun to try a dB meter to know exactly

Just reading this gives me the creeps ...

[Qbertino]

Just reading this gives me the creeps and makes me sad.

Note: I've been a FOSS advocate since the 90ies and have used Linux since '99. It's my only OS of choice for Inet facing servers and just recently, after years of x86 Linux neglegt and OS X usage (typing this on my MB Air) have finally again bought a Linux-only computer - a refurbished Thinkpad W510, pimped out with 18GB of memory and a 256GB SSD. With Ubuntu 14.04 LTS installed. I expected it to be a tad of a step backwards.

It was.

What I saying is, that one of the very neat advantages of Apples products is the prime qualtiy integration of hard- and software. With installing Ubuntu I was back to fiddling around with NVidia drivers a la 2003, annoying non-memorised bluetooth settings, praying for my extra Logitech Mousebuttons to work (they do, thanks to manual X-configability) shoddy/broken compiz desktop acceleration and other fussing around. I'm an expert, so I very well know that I would have the same mess on a Windows system and much more so and no way to fix it. And I also do have very good reasons for moving away from Apple (walled garden, non-turing complete iOS computers/devices, etc.) but I also have to say that FOSS utility computing still being stuck with problems we had back in 2002 really depresses me at times.

Timothys post brings up all images that show what's wrong and anoying with FOSS.

I'd so whish for one vendor to say: OK, we're building expert, top-quality utility computing hardware and going fully FOSS with it - 100% HW/SW integration and all. Personally I'm whishing for a MB Air/Ultrabook like device with low-power CPU and 20+hrs of battery life, fully open-speced HW and some neat and bold features like custom non-tiling setups for the UI, special functions supported out of the box and stuff like that. ... But then again, it's 2014 with computers a dime a dozen and such a project just one successful kickstarter campaing away. Maybe I should get of my ass and start one ...?

Anyhow, I'm sick of fiddling with stuff that should be basic comodity in 2014 and having to deal with issues like the one timothy has. Just had to let that out.

My 2 cents.