Written by swalko the 23 Apr 08 at 19:52.
Category: Multimedia.
Related project:
Nothing/Others.
Status: Implemented
Rationale
In Hardy is in default installation integrated PulseAudio server. Most of applications are using PulseAudio. It will be very usable if will be created PulseAudio Volume Control applet similar to Volume Control applet. After left click on this applet user can see all audio streams named by applications (volume control for stream and icon for quick mute). Same applet is in Vista and for me it is the best Vista feature. Most of audio programs by muting stream from their gui completely mute alsa. This is not good, because i am watching tv in small window and if i want to watch video on web mus i completely close tv application. With this applet i click on it and temporaly mute tv application. Here is a picture of vista volume control http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/images/voume_mixer.jpg. I think better will be if audio streams and their control are oriented horizontally.
I'm sure this will be integrated into ubuntu, just give it time. For now, there are the pulseaudio guis in the repositories. If you install 'padevchooser paman paprefs pavucontrol pavumeter' then add 'padevchooser' to the startup commands you will get lots more functionality out of your pulseaudio server.
One problem with your idea of implementation is the fact that EVERY single soundstream will get its own slider. This quickly adds up to be unwieldy, as GNOME itself uses many EsounD streams. You can easily see how many streams there are at a given time using the above mentioned utilities.
As it stands, it's much more practical to be using a list based utility in paman, rather than a "simplified" slider system as you suggest.
to: mrhefter
Read carefully -> I talked about streams named by application. But ok, if you want how many streams? Right now i am listening music and reading news and voila ... TWO streams + - one (pidgin notifications)
I think my system is more practical and faster. If i want to mute some stream quick:
My system:
1 click on applet -> find stream -> 1 click for mute
Your system:
1 click on applet -> find Volume control -> 1 click on volume control -> find stream -> 1 click for mute
I don't think the last screenshot would work well with the HIG's, because that's too advanced and don't be needed most of the time when you just want to raise/lower the general volume.
Perhaps it could be included in the volume control you get when you right-click and "open volume control".
I have an alternate proposal. I will not make a mockup because I am lazy. But a panel control which when clicked pops up a vertical volume slider (ala the existing control) and which when right-clicked pops up a menu of labeled, horizontal volume sliders for sinks. But wait, there's more; the sinks could (optionally) be grouped, and each group would have a slider. My first inclination is for this slider to set all sliders grouped under it (perhaps by name) to its volume, but perhaps you want some other behavior. The master, of course, would control the output volume of whichever sink you chose.
The grouping is the key option, the control for opening the group would be the usual right-facing triangle which rotates to down-facing when clicked, and the menu opens. Nested volume controls would be indented, as per usual.
I don't want to have to run pavucontrol every time I want to change a volume, either.
I would have hoped such a thing would come from a pulseaudio dev.
I was just looking for this... It's a very nice idea, and I like a lot the last mockup posted, simple ans just what a lot of people would love to have. Great idea.
I LOVE your idea. Only detail is, pavucontrol should be launched when double-clicking the applet, and the apps' volume widgets should be further integrated to actually affect the slider in pavucontrol. Something like this:
I was commenting in a idea now marked as a dupe of this... I won't write here everything I already wrote there, so please take a look on what was discussed there: http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/15908/
The idea here is great, but there are so many other stuff to work on (concerning sound system) before this idea become able to be fully (and satisfactorily) functional.
Hey! We have started working with this idea. It's in very early developement stage at the moment, but it already has basic features. Project can be found at http://code.google.com/p/gnome-pulse-applet/ .
Looking great! Have you plans to include a slider for the general volume, too? That way it could replace the standard volume applet altogether.
Also:
-I think the volume levels should not appear centred on the applet, but rather to the right (or left if there's no place to the right). That's the way menus are usually spanned in gnome.
-The "mute" button should resemble those in the volume manager 16x16px, only show the button frame if you hover the cursor over it.
Master volume control will be included to next version. Better applet position and mute button ideas are great. We added them to applet already and they will be in next version.
Next version will be out in the beginning of February if everything goes as planned.