Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Hi there.

I'm a Linux newbie and Ive tried my best on this one but it's beyond me.

It seems that if I DARE, if I ATTEMPT or if I have the GUTS to install *****ANY**** multimedia program the sound goes out.

In the terminal when I use the command alsamixer I get this:

# alsamixer
ALSA lib dlmisc.c:337:(snd_dlobj_cache_get0) Cannot open shared library libasound_module_ctl_pulse.so (/usr/lib/alsa-lib/libasound_module_ctl_pulse.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory)
cannot open mixer: No such device or address
#

This error message appears to be some sort of conflict with pulseaudio. Now why a multimedia program would install pulseaudio and purposefully destroy alsasound in a destructive and simultaneous way is beyond my comprehension. I did manage to get sound working using various techniques but like a stubborn horse it always goes back to the way it was as if it's taunting me. "Oh yeah, i'll just work for a microsecond before breaking again. Do you like that?"

If I can't get this working then I won't even be able to play with my own thoughts and be anywhere near my computer. The only other answer I see is for me to stab myself in the ears with an ice pick. A painful solution but nonetheless an effective one.

Tell us one of the multimedia programs you installed?

Give us the specific details of how you did the install?

First we need to understand if what you installed was done correctly????

SMPlayer or Xine will cause the exact same problem, exact same error upon using the alsamixer command. The error will even manifest itself if only/either one of these is installed without the other.

Vlc will not because it locks up my system completely and does not even install so that doesn't count.

These programs I install using the package manager because I have not yet found an installer that will function. The smplayer txz installer and the bz2 archive both do not function likely due to some other files that need to be installed although I can hardly imagine what they are. if I try to run them after installation/unpacking nothing happens. Like it's playing peek-a-boo on me.

My current install has Xine. (yes, I've done multiple reinstalls to figure this all out)

Hello Insanitor,

Sorry to hear you are having baffling issues. Folks here will do their best to help.
Are you saying that the error only appears AFTER you have installed something?

Even when using the package manager, there are things you need to be aware of when using Puppy. Some of the programs that are offered may not be fully compatible despite being "on offer" to you. With Puppies that do not have a working pulse audio system for example, there can be complications if you install multimedia programs from other distributions (like Slackware) which were not compiled and configured specifically for Puppy.

Often it is worth looking here on the forum for versions of these programs which have been configured and compiled for Puppy versions (with no pulse audio). In this case everything should match up with no conflicts or errors. Puppy community members provide these things and will sometimes help with requests too.

Here is a build of VLC which I compiled in S15Pup32:-
http://smokey01.com/OscarTalks/vlc-3.0.18-i686-s15p.pet

Here is Audacious audio player compiled in S15Pup32:-
http://smokey01.com/OscarTalks/audaciou ... 6-s15p.pet

Maybe give those a try in a fresh install and see if the error arises after installing them.
(Download the .pet package and click on it to install it)

Sorry but installing software in Puppy Linux is not perfect all the time.

Read this topic:
viewtopic.php?t=1819

OscarTalks wrote: Wed Oct 11, 2023 7:46 pm

Hello Insanitor,

Sorry to hear you are having baffling issues. Folks here will do their best to help.
Are you saying that the error only appears AFTER you have installed something?

That’s right. If I get a problem, I like to identify what the cause is even if the cause is one of my actions.

Linux has this ability to humble and humiliate me. I’m older now and I’m now having trouble figuring out the difference between the two.

I’ll be installing your puppy compiled version (sorry if I’m not calling it it’s proper name. But then again, I don’t even know my own proper name).

bigpup wrote: Wed Oct 11, 2023 7:51 pm

Sorry but installing software in Puppy Linux is not perfect all the time.

Read this topic:
viewtopic.php?t=1819

Partial perfection. Hmmm. I’ll make an honest attempt to understand this concept. And your post on how to install all of these packages compiled for different Linuxes.<— or is it linii?

Thanks to all of you for helping me on this. And for tolerating my not doing whatever it was I was supposed to do.

I am also grateful that a moderator has decided to lend a helping hand.

I place not the blame on Linux but on my ignorance concerning it.

This puppy Linux has given my retro PC new life. Not bad!

Insanitor wrote: Wed Oct 11, 2023 9:24 pm

That’s right. If I get a problem, I like to identify what the cause is even if the cause is one of my actions.
I’ll be installing your puppy compiled version

Well I think you were on the right track as to the cause. Pulseaudio libraries and other files will be dragged in as dependencies by the package manager when you try to install something which requires them, but in this case it causes a conflict with the original native Puppy files.

I did a test in a fresh boot of S15Pup32, installing the VLC and Audacious which I mentioned above. I also added my build of guvcview webcam viewer and recorder, which is another multimedia app involving sound. If you are interested in that it is here:-
http://smokey01.com/OscarTalks/guvcview ... 6-s15p.pet
Anyway, with all those 3 programs installed, alsamixer still works without errors (which is the original problem you reported) so hopefully that will be OK.

OscarTalks wrote: Wed Oct 11, 2023 11:49 pm

I did a test in a fresh boot of S15Pup32, installing the VLC and Audacious which I mentioned above. I also added my build of guvcview webcam viewer and recorder, which is another multimedia app involving sound. If you are interested in that it is here:-
http://smokey01.com/OscarTalks/guvcview ... 6-s15p.pet
Anyway, with all those 3 programs installed, alsamixer still works without errors (which is the original problem you reported) so hopefully that will be OK.

I have just tested vlc.

Either I do not know how to use it properly or something is up with the program.

DVD's play a small bit jerky and some sounds do not work.

I think I've just discovered why the other multimedia programs mess up alsa.

To play some DVD's you need to be able to play sound on more than one track at a time (multichannel). Or perhaps some decoder for ac3? My guess is that pulseaudio can do this but alsa cannot.

About that jerkiness it might just be that vlc doesn't take advantage of my video card's built in dvd decoder chip.

I guess ill just use it to play only individual files on it.

Anyway, these are just guesses on my part. It's not like I programmed vlc or I write code.

You know, this is proven every day.

What you do not tell us is usually the clue to solving the problem.

VLC has all kinds of settings you can change.
So check the VLC programs settings.

Is sound provided by the computers builtin sound device or or some other sound device?

Is the device setup correctly in the S15pup32 sound system settings?

What specific graphics card?

I assume this DVD player plays the disks OK, using some other operating system?

Are the DVD's movies?

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

So check the VLC programs settings.

I did. And since there are a plethora of settings, I have no idea which setting I am supposed to choose.

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

Is sound provided by the computers builtin sound device or or some other sound device?

I have absolutely no idea. vlc has so many different settings that it's hard to tell which setting is the correct one. And if there's a correct setting.
At all. In puppy linux, whenever I attempt to change the sound configuration to whatever else is given in the options, the one I choose never sticks. I believe and have believed that this is the default configuration that one is not supposed to be changed since whenever I did attempt to change something the change did not stick. So if I cannot change the built in sound device that puppy linux uses, I can't and couldn't see what impact that makes. So in this case, I couldn't know what to say. If you are referring to the built in sound on the motherboard, it is disabled. Puppy Linux detects other sound devices from the PCI sound card I have installed. And it does not let me change it, it does not stick. In it's current configuration, sound is currently working. Alsa is working, sound is currently functioning.

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

Is the device setup correctly in the S15pup32 sound system settings?

I don't know the answer to that question either. It should be. Sound currently works.

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

What specific graphics card?

Usually graphics cards come with a built in DVD decoder chip. There was no option in vlc I could change in order to utilize it. None that I could see. It didn't make sense to me why such an option is not turned on by default except that it's just easier to use the CPU for DVD decoding instead of programming an algorithm to automatically detect it.

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

I assume this DVD player plays the disks OK, using some other operating system?

Of course, but as i previously indicated, graphics cards have built in DVD decoding. It does not make sense to say that a DVD doesn't play correctly in any operating system. In whatever operating system it is designed to play correctly in, there's usually a program to do this. So in some other operating system it's likely that such a program is not included. So then in this case, we're trying to use vlc to use as such a program.

bigpup wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 7:35 pm

Are the DVD's movies?

I did some research before hand and testing. DVD's are encoded with CSS. According to the vlc website, vlc does not include the required dependencies for DVD decoding in Linux. So my testing included playing one DVD that has no CSS encryption and one that does. And that research I have done answers that question. Why? If the DVD did not play correctly in the sense of some part not playing and another part that does, the probable cause would be a failure to properly utilize those files on a DVD other than VOB. So since I found no such problem I felt that this was irrelevant. What I did do is try my best to come up with my best guesses as to why something is the way it is and why something isn't. But even so I may still be incorrect. But that's why I made these guesses in the first place. To give information and not hide it. But I might be wrong. Maybe alsa does have the capability to play ac3 files or play more than one track at a time.

These were the reasons why I felt there was any information I felt was to give or not to. I did look at all the settings. If there's a way to change the settings that are correct for me, I do not know them. So I apologize to you if I made the incorrect assumptions to include information. So here it is. The information you requested and some you did not.

My video card is designed to work in Windows. Latest operating system is Windows XP. Compatibility is also for Windows 2000 and any Windows operating system that uses the Windows 9x Kernel.

Graphics card: ATI all-in wonder 9800 Pro. The software DVD decoder commonly used with this type of card in software is Raviscent Cinemaster. The program used to decode DVD's is ATI Multimedia center which includes programs to play DVD's SVCD's and VCD's as well as video files of various codecs.

Sound card: Soundblastee Live! model SB0100. EMU10k1 sound chip. This sound card is capable of surround sound but I'm just using stereo.

Motherboard: Asus P4C800-E Deluxe. ATX form factor. In BIOS the onboard devices disabled are the Fastrack and the built in sound. Nothing else is disabled.

The Hard Drive is a PNY SSD which contains the EXT3 partition with no others defined.

CPU: Pentium 4 Prescott. 3.0Ghz. 800Mhz FSB. Intel Hyperthreading.

DVD Drive is a Lite-on DVD writer. This DVD writer is currently set to USA which I believe is region 1.

Thanks for all that useful information!

This is what I now see you need.

1. Now we know you need help to setup sound correctly for use by the operating system in general.
you may have it already, but we need to give you info on how to make sure.

2. using a add on sound card from the one on the motherboard, is a big clue as to what settings need to be used.

3. Yes VLC is a mess with a lot of settings you could change.
Now we need to help you make the correct ones.

4. Pick a single DVD that is giving you issues and use that for testing.

I am not using S15pup32 right now, so I will have to get back to you to start giving you working information.
Give me a little time to get back to you.

But others may jump in and offer help.

WE only know what you tell us, so asking for information, is all we can do, to fully understand exactly what is going on.

This greatly helps when trying to find a fix.

You do what?
You see what?

Our spy drones are not looking over your shoulder at what you are doing or seeing what your computer is doing.
So all we know is what you tell us.

So telling us you do what? You see what?

Let's do the information gathering.

The sound system I'm assuming is currently alsa. I do not (because of the help I've received so far) have pulseaudio currently causing interference since sound is working after I have done YET ANOTHER reinstall. Oh God, I have not done stuff like this since I was first introduced to Windows 98.

vlc did not show me a "ATI DVD decoder" option or a "software Raviscent Cinemaster decoding" option so I think it's using the CPU. I do believe however is that the other programs that DID mess up the sound did somehow use pulseaudio in order to do the sound which I will explain my reasoning in more detail.

I was using Star Wars episode III as a DVD to test CSS encryption decoding. The science fiction movie studios are well known for overprotecting their work since those who have above average skills in computers are the very same people who would do something like trying to mess with copy protection so I decided to use a DVD like this one. I would have chosen a Star Trek DVD but none I have are as new as this one.

Now, to test a DVD that is not encrypted I chose a DVD someone had sent me which was burned to a Kodak DVD-R. Anything that was burned to a DVD-R is most likely NOT encoded with CSS. Otherwise, it would never play at all.

Now here is my reasoning about the sound.

The Star Wars DVD probably has a different sound. THX or ac3 or WHATEVER is usually built into these crazy and unnecessarily complicated movies. Perhaps 5.1 or 7.1 sound or WHATEVER is most likely encoded into it.

What I am not hearing? The voices. but some of the spaceship sounds yes (as if ships make sound in space which they DON'T!) and some spaceship sounds no. This makes no sense in general but in another way yes. Why?

I am assuming that pulseaudio can play one track at a time or maybe multiple audio streams. In other words multitrack playback. And I am assuming that ALSA does not. These programs that have DVD decoding built in (Xine and SMplayer) I think mess up the sound BECAUSE they require pulseaudio to decode the extra sound that commercial DVD's come with. God, I don't know if it's ac3?! The other DVD probably has no more than one track. It is a documentary. Who in their right mind use special sound on a documentary? To use more than 1 narrator? I doubt it. The documentary DVD does not easily have objects moving at various speeds to test how smooth DVD playback is. So that's why I can't report any. But ships in space? Oh, yes! You definitely can look at the background and look at how smoothly are objects moving. This is the other reason why I chose to use this DVD for testing.

As I said, I doubt that I am 100% correct in all of this after all, I AM MAKING assumptions.

My mistake I admit now was in making them and choosing (which to include) now since you've pointed them all out.

What I'd like to say is that before I posted this thread I made multiple reinstalls to determine that it was the installation of Xine and SMPlayer that causes the sound problem. It is because of this that I did not consider myself someone that would hide information. And I still don't know exactly what the sound is. Ac3? Multitrack decoding? Sounds and voices inside my head?

I was wrong then.

Don't install these programs with the package manager or you will suffer the tortures of hell, a justifiable punishment. Put through the ringer... Anyone reading this be free to use these things I said as lyrics.

First S15pup32 does not use Pulse Audio for sound.

It does have the specific apulse stuff that is put into Puppy, so that browsers that need to use Pulse audio, will provide sound.
It makes them think it is there, but it is using ALSA.

This is one of the Puppy versions you do not want to install Pulse Audio in.
Note:
A few very new Puppy versions are now using Pulse Audio for sound, BUT THIS IS NOT ONE OF THEM!
It took a lot of work to get it fully working in these newest Puppy versions and it still is not perfect.

1. making sure you have operating system sound correctly setup.

I assume you have some type of stereo speaker connected to output of sound device. (headphone or speakers)

Applications menu ->Setup ->ALSA Sound Wizard ->Sound Card Wizard

If it lists a bunch of different devices (cards).

Select the one that seems to be what is connected for sound.
If it has more than one listing for it.
Choose the one that has analog in the name.
Analog is usually what type sound is used in Puppy.

With this analog listing highlighted.
Select test.
Should hear static sound from left and right speaker.
If yes.
Click on select card/device to make it the default device to use.

You can click on configure and set anything it lists, as you want to.

In the listed selections. 00 is turned on mm is turned off.

Usually everything needed is turned on and set to a usable level.

Now close the Sound Card Wizard.

In normal use of sound in the operating system.
Right click on the speaker icon right side of the desktop tray.
Select Full Window.
Should see this open.
Here you can select and make changes to volume settings and selected settings.
This is mine yours may not have the same settings, but should have master, different speaker options, headphone, etc......... really depends on the hardware providing sound.
These are sliders and check on/off type selectors.

.
Yes, there is listed items you never really need to have selected or use.

Master is overall volume control. Left click on speaker icon and slide it up and down. This is moving master volume.

Test some kind of music file on a drive or music CD to see if general sound is OK.

One of the sound programs already in S15pup32 should be able to do that.

Is General Sound Working OK?

Is general sound working ok?

Yes. Currently, general sound appears to be functioning.

If I install Xine or SMPlayer, it won't!

There is no device listed that has the word, "analog".

Among the devices that are listed it is here where I cannot select anything else than default. It does not stick. But this condition happens ONLY when I install SMPlayer or Xine.

At the moment however, I CAN select another device and it DOES stick but none work properly.

When sound IS messed up the alsa sound wizard is unable to play a test sound (option #2). Currently, it IS now able to.

Music CD's do play. Mario Lanza still sounds good.

All the tests you mentioned give similar results. There's nothing wrong at the moment concerning what tests and info you requested.

Just some disjointed thoughts after reading this whole thread. The install method for this puppy has not been mentioned, neither how much RAM is in the system. Those probably do not concern the sound system but are usually taken into consideration, especially for an ancient system.

I believe S15pup only does frugal installs and cannot do a full install without some tinkering. If it is a frugal install then it is loading fully into RAM (how much RAM in this Pentium4 system?) Is there enough RAM (1GB, 2GB or?) and if not, is there a swap file?

Just a reminder that there are other 32-bit puppies that would maybe be less challenging, such as Ubuntu-based 32-bit Tahr or Xenial available over at ibiblio.com or the bit more challenging Bionic (only because Bionic does not have an official software repository at ibiblio.org) There are also some very stable 32-bit versions of Slacko with a lot of software to choose from.

I know the 32-bit Bionic is capable of running the latest browsers, I do not know about Xenial or Tahr.

http://distro.ibiblio.org/puppylinux/puppy-tahr/
http://distro.ibiblio.org/puppylinux/pet_packages-tahr/

http://distro.ibiblio.org/puppylinux/puppy-xenial/32/
http://distro.ibiblio.org/puppylinux/pe ... es-xenial/

http://distro.ibiblio.org/puppylinux/

Maybe helpful, maybe not.

The system has 4GB of memory. And you’re right. This version runs off of RAM.

It can run the latest browsers but Seamonkey seems the fastest followed by Firefox.

I’ve got it running off of an SSD and it runs faster that way for some reason.

I chose this specific operating system since the others I thought I could choose from at the time were either older or required a UEFI pc.

Insanitor wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 3:22 am

DVD's play a small bit jerky and some sounds do not work.
I guess I'll just use it to play only individual files on it.

It has been several months since I originally compiled that VLC and my memory is not the best, but now you come to mention it I do vaguely recall that there was a glitch with DVD playback and I never figured out the reason. The 64bit build of VLC made in S15Pup64 did not have this problem and the library version numbers are the same so it was a bit of a mystery.

S15Pup32 does have Gnome Mplayer included, so you may find that this is better for the specific task of DVD playback as it is a front-end for Mplayer which does handle things differently from VLC.

The big media players like VLC do perform a lot of different functions and tasks, so users may prefer VLC for other things. The main thing I wanted to address was the original issue of installing certain multimedia programs causing alsamixer to fail.

Packages that are compiled within a Puppy (or a similar Puppy) are always more likely to work without errors. For SMplayer (which is also a front-end for Mplayer, but more sophisticated than Gnome Mplayer) you may wish to test some of the builds by norgo which were compiled in slacko:-
viewtopic.php?t=98

OscarTalks wrote: Fri Oct 13, 2023 1:13 pm

Insanitor wrote: Thu Oct 12, 2023 3:22 am

DVD's play a small bit jerky and some sounds do not work.
I guess I'll just use it to play only individual files on it.

It has been several months since I originally compiled that VLC and my memory is not the best, but now you come to mention it I do vaguely recall that there was a glitch with DVD playback and I never figured out the reason. The 64bit build of VLC made in S15Pup64 did not have this problem and the library version numbers are the same so it was a bit of a mystery.

S15Pup32 does have Gnome Mplayer included, so you may find that this is better for the specific task of DVD playback as it is a front-end for Mplayer which does handle things differently from VLC.

The big media players like VLC do perform a lot of different functions and tasks, so users may prefer VLC for other things. The main thing I wanted to address was the original issue of installing certain multimedia programs causing alsamixer to fail.

Packages that are compiled within a Puppy (or a similar Puppy) are always more likely to work without errors. For SMplayer (which is also a front-end for Mplayer, but more sophisticated than Gnome Mplayer) you may wish to test some of the builds by norgo which were compiled in slacko:-
viewtopic.php?t=98

I am so sorry, you are not going to like this. Nobody is going to like this.

Exactly 1 and half minutes ago I found this while checking your vlc with dependency checker...

File /usr/lib/qt5/plugins/imageformats/libqpdf.so has these missing library files:
libQt5Pdf.so.5
File /usr/lib/vlc/libs/libmatroska.so.7.0.0 has these missing library files:
libebml.so.5
File /usr/lib/vlc/plugins/demux/libmkv_plugin.so has these missing library files:
libebml.so.5 libmatroska.so.7
File /usr/lib/vlc/plugins/lua/liblua_plugin.so has these missing library files:
liblua.so

The program itself specifically says:

These libraries are missing: libQt5Pdf.so.5 these needed libraries exist but are not in the library search path (it is assumed that a startup script in the package

Puppy has examined all user-installed packages and found these missing dependencies: gst-plugins-base gstreamer libasyncns ocl-icd pulseaudio qt5

I clicked on that post. I have no idea which one to test. They all have names that I believe correspond to other versions of puppy. Which do I try installing? I do not have a 64 bit cpu so trying x86_64 is out.

And I'm not running slacko 630, 570, or 700.

Why is it complaining about libQt5Pdf.so.5? I'm assuming that's because there's no 32 bit version of libQt5Pdf.so.5. I've been running across this problem left and right since I've been doing this. It's a bitch and 3/4. Actually it's a Ramanujan infinite series complex fraction.

@Insanitor
smplayer-21.10.0-qt5-s-s15pup-i686.pet

not the bleeding edge but should work for you
no additional packages needed

The libraries relating to VLC plugins are in fact present (in /usr/lib/vlc/libs)
They are in a place where VLC knows where to look for them (via a wrapper script) but the dependency checker can't see them because they are not within the standard library paths.
If you were to stick to the standard Linux packaging and installation rules, VLC depends on Qt5 which is a large package and not included in S15Pup.
My package is a bit unorthodox and custom-made, designed to be as small as possible with (mostly) only the stuff connected to what is already included in S15Pup. The required bits of Qt5 are plucked out of Qt5 and included in the VLC package. These bits include some of the Qt5 plugins which will show as depending on system Qt5 libraries, but these are not needed for the functions of VLC (unless someone discovers otherwise) so there is no need to grab them and include them in the VLC package.
The aim was to create a VLC which was "install and go, standalone" and which would try to avoid conflicts with any other installed packages. If a user does not need it or is unhappy with it, the program can be quickly and easily uninstalled via the package manager.

Have you even tried to use the Gnome MPlayer that comes already installed in S15pup32?

I tried using it to play a movie DVD that is similar to what you are trying to play.

Sound was good for me.

It does have settings you were talking about maybe needing.

bigpup wrote: Sat Oct 14, 2023 1:07 am

Have you even tried to use the Gnome MPlayer that comes already installed in S15pup32?

I tried using it to play a movie DVD that is similar to what you are trying to play.

Sound was good for me.

It does have settings you were talking about maybe needing.

I tried Gnome Mplayer. I tried all the settings. It's absolutely terrible. Almost every single bug I can think of was present. It could not have been worse. When left at it's default settings it does not deinterlace the video even though the option to do so is checked.

However, I did download and test the version of SMPlayer as suggested by Norgo.

I am impressed. It requires that sound be tweaked in the options but it does play DVD's very well. I could pick nits but it works well enough that for all intents and purposes it's perfectly usable. It's really nice. I'm satisfied.

Strange emotional roller coaster this turned out to be.

I thank you all.

Welcome to Linux software!

Well, developers of Puppy versions try to have programs in them that will generally work very good.

Glad to see you did find a player that works for your issue.

Do wonder what settings you had to adjust in SMPlayer?

The DVD’s volume was extremely low.

I had to go into the settings and amplify it by a ridiculous amount like 800%.

I’m sure I could have gone into the alsa settings and turned up a slider for another device.

But in my opinion, a dvd player should have decent volume regardless of what operating system it’s used in.

DVDs by definition have low volume because of the way they are designed. But whatever plays them should compensate for that and SMPlayer doesn’t do that.

In Puppy the OS has an overall volume control.

The speaker icon in the right side of the desktop tray.

Left click on it and an adjustment slider will pop up. (master volume that controls all volume adjustments)

Slide it up or down to adjust overall volume.

right click on the speaker icon to bring up selections for doing individual setting adjustments.

Linux software has always been about you making setting choices not the program deciding for you.

Adjusting the master volume is the first thing I tried.

Out of all the programs I’ve used to play DVD’s, SMPlayer was the only one that had such low volume.

That made me think that adjusting the program itself was the correct course of action and not playing around with the other volume settings in Linux.

Had I done that, it would have blown out my speakers and destroyed my house… That’s because when I would have gone back to using anything else that uses sound, the destruction would begin. My conclusion? I thought was a bad thing.

But hey, my computer and I have relationship issues.