Re: [Rhythmbox-devel] rb on pause doesn't seem to release the audio device

[Alex Lancaster <alexl users sourceforge net>]

>>>>> "JR" == John Russell  writes:

JR> When I play songs on rb, and then I pause them, none of my other
JR> sound programs are able to play anything until I exit rb
JR> completely.  I remember that this used to work a while ago where
JR> rb on pause would allow other things to play.  Something about
JR> letting go of the gstreamer stream.  I'm not sure.  Is there a way
JR> to get that to work again?  Its really nice for things like skype
JR> and online video where I can pause the music for just a second,
JR> run something else, and then play again.

JR> On the other side of the coin, if another app has the sound card
JR> and I try to play something in rb, I get no error of any kind, it
JR> just sits there patiently not doing anything.  And then, even
JR> after the other app has exited, rb still won't play anything until
JR> I have restarted it.  I'm not sure what is going on here either
JR> but it sounds related to the behavior I mentioned earlier.

JR> I searched bugzilla but couldn't find anything related.

Are you using ALSA with dmix?

http://alsa.opensrc.org/index.php?page=DmixPlugin

gstreamer (and hence rhythmbox) will use dmix if it is setup and
should allow multiple sources using the sound card.  

The problem is likely your other apps that are the problem not
rhythmbox/gstreamer, some proprietary apps like Skype use the old OSS
interface which "hogs/steals" the sound card.  Not much that alsa can
do about that, see:

http://juljas.net/linux/skype/

If it only happens when Skype is running, but not (say) another
gstreamer-based app, then it's Skype's fault. ;-)

Alex