Bug#644809: [pulseaudio-discuss] Bug#644809: pulseaudio: Confusing warning `PulseAudio configured for per-user sessions`

[Paul Menzel]

Am Montag, den 10.10.2011, 10:55 +0200 schrieb Maarten Bosmans:
> 2011/10/9 Paul Menzel <pm.debian at googlemail.com>:

> > X-Debbugs-CC: pulseaudio-discuss at lists.freedesktop.org

Damn, I though that this setting would not put <submit at bugs.debian.org>
into the CC list and the correct bug address <644809 at bugs.debian.org>.

> > Dear PulseAudio Debian packagers and upstream PA folks,
> >
> >
> > the Debian init script `/etc/init.d/pulseaudio` [1] currently prints a
> > warning when PA is configured in non-system mode.
> >
> >        PULSEAUDIO_SYSTEM_START=0
> >        DISALLOW_MODULE_LOADING=1
> >        test -f /etc/default/pulseaudio && . /etc/default/pulseaudio
> >        if [ "$PULSEAUDIO_SYSTEM_START" != "1" ]; then
> >                log_warning_msg "PulseAudio configured for per-user sessions"
> >                exit 0
> >        fi
> >
> > In my opinion a warning suggests that something might be wrong and
> > therefore I am bringing this issues to your attention.
> 
> First of all: I appreciate that Debian (and thus Ubuntu) provides the
> init script to make it easier to run pulse in system mode.
> 
> The warning is correct when /etc/init.d/pulseaudio start is invoked
> manually. Because in that case the user expects pulse to be started
> and it isn't.

True, I have not thought about that.

> For normal bootup procedure (on an unchanged system), the warning
> should not be shown, because then it is expected that pulse is run
> per-user.
> 
> > In `/etc/default/pulseaudio` [2] there is the following explanation.
> >
> >        # Start the PulseAudio sound server in system mode.
> >        # (enables the pulseaudio init script - requires that users be in the
> >        # pulse-access group)
> >        # System mode is not the recommended way to run PulseAudio as it has some
> >        # limitations (such as no shared memory access) and could potentially allow
> >        # users to disconnect or redirect each others' audio streams. The
> >        # recommended way to run PulseAudio is as a per-session daemon. For GNOME/KDE/
> >        # Xfce sessions in Ubuntu Lucid/10.04, /etc/xdg/autostart/pulseaudio.desktop
> >        # handles this function of automatically starting PulseAudio on login, and for
> >        # it to work correctly your user must *not* have "autospawn = no" set in
> >        # ~/.pulse/client.conf (or in /etc/pulse/client.conf). By default, autospawn
> >        # is enabled. For other sessions, you can simply start PulseAudio with
> >        # "pulseaudio --daemonize".
> >        # 0 = don't start in system mode, 1 = start in system mode
> >        PULSEAUDIO_SYSTEM_START=0
> >
> >        # Prevent users from dynamically loading modules into the PulseAudio sound
> >        # server. Dynamic module loading enhances the flexibility of the PulseAudio
> >        # system, but may pose a security risk.
> >        # 0 = no, 1 = yes
> >        DISALLOW_MODULE_LOADING=1
> >
> > As far as I remember this explanation is correct and also upstream’s, i.
> > e. your, view/recommendation.
> 
> Indeed, that is why we (upstream) do not provide the init script: to
> underline our recommendation.
> 
> > If this is correct I guess the init script should be changed to not log
> > a warning or explain the warning in a better way.
> 
> I'm not sure whether it is possible to differentiate between manual
> and bootup invocation of the init script. But that would be the best
> solution, I think.

Hopefully, Sjoerd has an idea.


Thanks,

Paul
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