Re: Tragic State of FreeBSD Audio/Sound

On Wed Jul 22, 2026 at 2:23 AM EEST, vermaden wrote:
>> This is a gradual work so it cannot be
>> all committed in a massive commit.
>
> So keep it in CURRENT when it belongs ... why this half way done shit was=
 spread into STABLE tree?

What is half-done and commited to -STABLE?

>> A quick look at mixer(8)'s man page would
>> suggest otherwise... The rewrite was
>> introduced in 14.0, and was never MFC'd to 13.*.
>
> As I said earlier - I do not remember exactly when the fuckup happened - =
I would gladly still use 13.x line ... but its EoL unfortunately ... the 14=
.x is my only choice now ... and its already broken as fuck.

Regarding the change that you are ranting about, you didn't say you
don't remember when it happened, you just didn't even bother to even
read the man page.

>> This is wrong in all aspects. The
>> tool does introduce something new:
>> muting and unmuting.
>
> What is the difference between volume=3D0 and muting? ZERO.

That now you can unmute the device and restore the previous volume
automatically. Try doing that with pre-14.0 mixer(8) as a challenge.

> Do not find the counter arguments where they are not. Current audio/sound=
 subsystem on FreeBSD is fucked up beautifully - more people then me confir=
med that.

>> And you could not do the same with the old syntax (...)
>
> Great ... make ONE SMALL ADDITIONAL syntax for mute/unmute - but does not=
 fuck up entire audio/sound stack on FreeBSD because of it.

How did rewriting mixer(8) mess up the *entire* sound stack on FreeBSD?

>> I do not understand the obsession with POLA sometimes.
>
> Probably because FreeBSD is not your daily driver ...

I haven't used anything else on my machines except FreeBSD for many
years. Maybe you have someone else in mind?

>> At the moment I am the only consistent
>> sound developer on FreeBSD, and there
>> are a few more people who occasionally
>> contribute code, so resources are
>> naturally scarce. Instead of ranting
>> on MLs about how "tragic" sound is,
>> you could spend that time to file a
>> bug report so that we can try to
>> address your issues.
>
> Great, so you messed up EVERYTHING in FreeBSD audio/sound department hopi=
ng no one would notice? Why all these commits landed in STABLE in the first=
 place?
>
> Build and modernize whatever the fuck You want in CURRENT tree - but stay=
 away from STABLE where people expect things to actually work.
>
> I do not know what 'FreeBSD Foundation' told You when they started to fun=
d Your work - which is more then OK for me - just keep it all in CURRENT be=
fore its complete.
>
> Spreading commits to STABLE make EVERYONE life measurable with all these =
unfinished and broken things.=20

Will you give like, one, example of how "EVERYTHING" is messed up and
how "EVERYONE's life is miserable", apart from your particular buzzing
issue which you don't even know if it's actually related to my work, or
the mixer(8) rewrite?

>> This whole thread is entirely pointless
>
> Great ... so please tell me why entire audio/sound stack on FreeBSD that =
used to work flawlessly over DECADES is broken as fuck because of You?

No, you will tell us what is broken as f, which also worked flawlessly
for "DECADES", *specifically* because of me, and I am happy to work on
it.

> Looking at your ignorance level the only thing I want to tell You is the =
same thing that I can tell to 'Lennart Poettering' - which is 'get the fuck=
 off my lawn!' - but I will not do that hoping that You may actually try to=
 improve FreeBSD - just keep it in CURRENT before its ready and it does not=
 break all the FreeBSD desktop/laptop users we have up there.

Christos