VLC not using PulseAudio by default

It's normal that you had to install vlc-plugin-pulse, since that's the package that provides PulseAudio support. It may be a good idea to have vlc install the plugin by default, but it's probably too late in the cycle to do that due to risk of regressions. Still, I'm leaving this open to get the feedback of the MOTU Media team.

Good. Then I'll give my two cents about this:

Right now VLC is plain unusable when installed in Hardy, because it uses ALSA output by default which is seriously broken in a PulseAudio environment. It even leads to almost-complete X11 lockups.

However, installing vlc-plugin-pulse fixes all that. And if there's no PulseAudio available, it will fall back to ALSA. I don't see why there should be any regressions in making VLC depend on that package, because the way it is now, VLC doesn't work at all.

confirm what f-3582 says
vlc basically unusable until install vlc-plugin-pulse, then works perfectly, so makes sense to be a dependency

Had VLC audio breakage with latest batch of updates until I put in the vlc-plugin-pulse plugin. Should be a dependency, yes. Otherwise VLC users are gonna be irked...

By the way: Why is this showstopper bug considered "Wishlist"?

Expect hundreds of users to spam the forums and Launchpad because VLC doesn't work once Hardy is out.

i'll mark it as confirmed.
this really shouldnt be wishlist
all the hard work was done actually getting the plugin into the repos. this is simply about actually installing it.

what regressions can there be?
currently vlc doesnt work with pulseaudio, with vlc-plugin-pulse it does.
if pulseaudio is not running, its just falls back gracefully to alsa
there doesnt seem to be any scope for regressions. it fixes in one case, does nothing in the other

having popular applications not using pulseaudio is dangerous as forums seem to have lots of people suggesting killing pulseaudio to get anything done, even when it is not necessary

Is there any progress on this? I really think this is quite important to
get in for Hardy, and the "wishlist" importance should be reconsidered.

There's no technical evidence backing the claim that VLC doesn't work with ALSA output posted in this report and that behavior hasn't been reproduced by anyone triaging the report (it works with my configuration), thus the "Wishlist" status is most likely warranted. Anyway, the bug has an assignee and has "In Progress" status, which means that someone is actively working on fixing it at present, which in turn means the importance is moot at this point. Please don't post any more comments that don't add any new information; it will just annoy the subscribers.

Subscribing MOTU release to get an ACK.

Luke, I guess ubuntu-studio should ack this ;), so upload as you seem fit (and yes, looks good to me).

This bug was fixed in the package vlc - 0.8.6.release.e+x264svn20071224+faad2.6.1-0ubuntu3

---------------
vlc (0.8.6.release.e+x264svn20071224+faad2.6.1-0ubuntu3) hardy; urgency=low

  * debian/control: Make vlc-plugin-pulse a dependency of vlc, to enable pulseaudio
    by default. (LP: #208579)
  * debian/patches/demuxer-fix.diff: Patch to fix FTBFS, thanks to Gentoo bug
    214809.

 -- Luke Yelavich <email address hidden> Sat, 12 Apr 2008 09:23:55 +1000

I had been removing vlc-plugin-pulse as a workaround for bug 190754. VLC going through pulse can't even play a 128k mp3 under zero load without skipping on my system.

Now that's impossible. Of course, I can just run 'vlc --aout ALSA'. But this is bringing me closer to just removing pulse entirely, the opposite of the intended effect.

Running vlc through ALSA with everything else on pulse has never been a problem here, and certainly has not caused the lockups rumored above.