Notification Sounds Never Worked under Linux Mint

Posts: 2 · allanr 23 Jul 2019, 13:32

I've been using FreeFileSync for quite a while now on a Win 7 PC and a Linux Mint PC. Very pleased with performance - except - I've never been able to get the "Notification sounds" working under Linux (file syncing is fine).

Linux audio is OK with all other apps.

Going into Tools > Options > Notification sounds > then browsing for e.g. "gong.wav" proceeds normally, but then clicking on the the play triangle doesn't do anything, neither does sound play after Compare or Sync.

I'm using the latest FreeFileSync/FreeFileSync_10.14_[Donation_Edition]_Linux.zip and open to suggestions.

Thanks, Allan.

Posts: 7052 · Zenju 24 Jul 2019, 16:10

Sounds have been disabled on Linux in order to avoid the SDL dependency years ago. Much has changed since then, so let's give it another try:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/izulvkp5zr7try2/FreeFileSync_10.15_beta_Linux.tar.gz

Posts: 306 · bgstack15 24 Jul 2019, 16:59

I am away from my relevant dev machines, but I look forward to testing this. Is the program using Pulseaudio for the sounds?

Posts: 7052 · Zenju 24 Jul 2019, 17:02

It's using SDL2 statically linked. Inspecting the ldd output shows no additional dependencies, so this looks promising.

Posts: 2 · allanr 24 Jul 2019, 19:03

Success !! FreeFileSync_10.15_beta_Linux.tar.gz provides working sound on Linux Mint C 19.1

Appreciate you looking into this so quickly.

Many thanks,
Allan

Posts: 306 · bgstack15 24 Jul 2019, 19:09

Would you please consider making this dependency a compile-time option, to statically link sdl2 or dynamically link? I could see some potential benefits if both are available.

Posts: 7052 · Zenju 24 Jul 2019, 20:38

You have that already. Whether SDL is used or not (and how) is specified during wxWidgets build time.

Posts: 306 · bgstack15 25 Jul 2019, 03:06

I finally got to test the beta. It played audio for me as well, on Devuan Ceres (testing). I do have both pulseaudio and alsa libs installed.

Posts: 7052 · Zenju 25 Jul 2019, 08:12

On openSuse Leap 15.1 the sounds did not work in my tests at first, but setting the SDL_AUDIODRIVER environment variable did the trick:

SDL_AUDIODRIVER=alsa ./FreeFileSync

Not sure why SDL didn't pick "alsa" automatically, when "pulseaudio" didn't work.

Posts: 7052 · Zenju 26 Jul 2019, 13:57

Not sure why SDL didn't pick "alsa" automatically, when "pulseaudio" didn't work. Zenju, 25 Jul 2019, 08:12

Fixed. FFS will now support both ALSA and PulseAudio by dynamically selecting what is available.