[Pkg-alsa-devel] Bug#356070: alsa-utils: Manpage arecord(1) and aplay(1) should give PCM/device syntax

[Ralph Aichinger]

Package: alsa-utils
Version: 1.0.10-1
Severity: normal


I used arecord (and aplay) for the first time yesterday and
wanted it to use the spdif connector (device 2) on my first
soundcard. I did not find out the right syntax to do this
from the manpage, e.g. should you use

arecord -Dhw:0:2 or -Dhw:0.2 or -D/dev/snd/dev/snd/pcmC0D2c

or whatever. Providing a simple exampe for this not too uncommon
action would be sufficient IMHO. Finding out by trial-and-error
is impossible. Also the options for listing devices are not
helpful for this, because the output is very cryptic and cannot
be reused for the "-D" option by copy&paste.

Also it is nowhere explained what "a PCM" is. Of course I know
PCM, Pulse Code Modulation, but what is "a PCM" in this context?
Is it more or less a device? The manpage should at least give 
a hint IMHO where to find out more, even if explaining may be too
complicated.

Thanks!
/ralph

-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell:  /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.4.22
Locale: LANG=de_AT.UTF-8 at euro, LC_CTYPE=de_AT.UTF-8 at euro (charmap=UTF-8)

Versions of packages alsa-utils depends on:
ii  dialog                    1.0-20060221-1 Displays user-friendly dialog boxe
ii  libasound2                1.0.10-2       ALSA library
ii  libc6                     2.3.6-3        GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
ii  libncurses5               5.5-1          Shared libraries for terminal hand
ii  linux-sound-base          1.0.10-3       base package for ALSA and OSS soun
ii  lsb-base                  3.0-15         Linux Standard Base 3.0 init scrip
ii  modutils                  2.4.27.0-5     Linux module utilities
ii  pciutils                  1:2.1.11-15.3  Linux PCI Utilities
ii  python                    2.3.5-5        An interactive high-level object-o
ii  whiptail                  0.52.1-3       Displays user-friendly dialog boxe

Versions of packages alsa-utils recommends:
pn  alsa-base                     <none>     (no description available)

-- no debconf information