Couple weeks ago I upgraded my mothers computer from Microsoft XP to Linux Debian Lenny (testing). Everything is working except sound with pogo.com java games. After couple weeks searching for a fix and reading ALSA documention and tinkering around.

the problematic soundcard is

$ lspci
...
00:11.5 Multimedia audio controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller (rev 70)
...

This is what I ended up with to get the sound to work with the pogo.com java games. First I created the ~/.asoundrc file, and this what I added to the ~/.asoundrc file.

!defaults.pcm.card 0
defaults.ctl.card 0
defaults.pcm.device 0
defaults.pcm.subdevice -1
defaults.pcm.dmix.device defaults.pcm.device
defaults.pcm.dsnoop.device defaults.pcm.device

After saving the file we have to restart ALSA

# /etc/init.d/alsa-utils restart
Shutting down ALSA…done.
Setting up ALSA…done.

Note: this fix may not work for everyone.

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I use a bluetooth headset with VLC when I am using my laptop to listen to music or video streams etc. The headset works when I add alsadev=bluetooth in ~/.vlc/vlcrc

Under the section ‘# ALSA Device Name (string)’ change it

From:

# ALSA Device Name (string)
# alsadev=default

To:

# ALSA Device Name (string)
# alsadev=default
alsadev=bluetooth

Refer to this blog post for setting up bluetooth headset here

Notes:
Problems I have come across is when you change the Audio device back to ‘default’ through Settings => Preferences => Audio => Output modules => ALSA, you have to do the above method again when you like to use bluetooth headset again.

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This is a quick how to setting up bluetooth audio under Debian.

First off we need to install a couple packages:

# apt-get install bluez-utils bluez-gnome bluez-audio

Now we need to run ‘hcitool scan‘ to get the address of the bluetooth device. For example,

$ hcitool scan
Scanning ...
	00:00:00:00:00:00	Nokia BH-501

Now to get the audio part to work:

Modify or create your ~/.asoundrc to contain

pcm.bluetooth {
    type plug
    slave {
       	pcm "bluetooth_hw"
    }
}

pcm.bluetooth_hw {
         type bluetooth
         device 00:11:22:33:44:55
         profile "auto"
}

Where 00:11:22:33:44:55 is the bluetooth address of your headset that you got from ‘hcitool scan‘ output

Now to test the bluetooth headset audio is working with ‘arecord‘ and ‘aplay‘ for example,

$ arecord -Dplug:bluetooth -f S16_LE | aplay -Dplug:bluetooth -f S16_LE
Recording WAVE 'stdin' : Signed 16 bit Little Endian, Rate 8000 Hz, Mono
Playing WAVE 'stdin' : Signed 16 bit Little Endian, Rate 8000 Hz, Mono
Aborted by signal Interrupt...
Aborted by signal Interrupt...

Finally configure your audio applications to use the alsa device ‘bluetooth’.

Example fro setting up Skype to use the bluetooth headset:
Right click on the Skype icon on the gnome-panel and go Options => Sound Devices and change the ‘Sound In’ and ‘Sound Out’ to ‘bluetooth’ and click apply.

And for other applications have a read here

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Nvidia closed source driver has to be modified (for all (71.86.04, 96.43.05, 169.12 and 171.06) but the latest driver (173.08)) in order to run on 2.6.25 as detailed here.

When you apply the patch and generate the custom executable, the install works as advertised.

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Jonathan Oxer (ex Linux Australia President) was on the channel 7’s Sunrise program yesterday morning showing off his technological house.

Read the full article here

Download the segment via torrent here

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This is a great article about Jonathan Oxer, whose entire house is connected to a central computer and can be controlled remotely via a computer or mobile phone.

Teeming with technology, the abode conjures up images of The Jetsons but, much to the surprise of visitors, the house looks no less ordinary than a typical suburban dwelling. Wires, switches and gizmos are concealed, true to Oxer’s philosophy of “having everything work invisibly”.

Read the full article here

View the Photo Gallery here

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