Improved hardware profiling for audio

Hardware profiling is one of the unique features of EasyOS. It remembers the hardware setup when you bootup from a flash drive on different computers. Or even on the same computer if you change the audio card.

The concept is introduced the "How and why EasyOS is different" page:

https://easyos.org/about/how-and-why-easyos-is-different.html

Audio profiling was the first implemented, back when Quicky Linux was based on ALSA, not pulseaudio. Back then, I reluctantly adopted pulseaudio, as it was becoming increasingly required.

The script /etc/init.d/10alsa implements audio hardware profiling, but as have moved more towards embracing pulseaudio, the script has fallen behind. Today fixed it. Previously, it was recording /etc/pulse/default.pa for each hardware configuration, and now have added /root/.config/pulse.

What happens is copies are created for each hardware profile, for example /root/.config/pulse.0+pci+8086:7e28  

Tags: easy

Video encrypted folders & session saving

In response to a request in the comments section of one of the videos, I have created a video that shows what folders are encrypted. It also explains the basics of session-saving and how it can be configured.

"EasyOS Part11: Encrypted folders & session saving"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7VBvyWCq2w

Maybe might make the next one a look inside the 'initrd', which will be of interest to developers.   

Tags: easy

phoneCam Android webcam

I have created a simple application to use an Android phone as a webcam. Snapshot:

For more information, I have created a YouTube video:

"EasyOS Part10: Android phone webcam"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCAN3UHauQ0

Quite nice, but I will probably go back to using GUVCView and the laptop internal camera.    

Tags: easy

Zarfy monitor manager missing icon

Forum member Miminou reported the missing icon:

https://forum.puppylinux.com/viewtopic.php?p=173158#p173158

Zarfy is provided in a PET package. I rebuilt it with the missing icon.

Information about Zarfy here:

https://github.com/rbtylee/zarfy   

Tags: easy

Audio hardware profiling fix

When EasyOS is booted on a USB drive on different computers, it is supposed to remember the hardware setup for each one; this is called "hardware profiling".

A special string is generated, that identifies the audio hardware on the computer, but it wasn't working on my Zenbook laptop. It is /etc/init.d/10alsa that generates the audio hardware string.

I found that this "lspci -d ::0403 -n" had no output. "0403" is the class ID for audio devices. I discovered that there is another number, "0401" which is also a class ID for audio devices, see here:

https://admin.pci-ids.ucw.cz/read/PD/04

So, have modified 10alsa script, at line 228:

   AUDIO_IDS="$(lspci -d ::0403 -n | cut -f 1,3 -d ' ' | tr ' ' '|' | tr '\n' ' ')"
   #...ex: 00:1b.0|8086:1c20
   #20260701 zenbook laptop, audio device has class 0401 ref: https://admin.pci-ids.ucw.cz/read/PD/04
   if [ -z "$AUDIO_IDS" ];then
    AUDIO_IDS="$(lspci -d ::0401 -n | cut -f 1,3 -d ' ' | tr ' ' '|' | tr '\n' ' ')"
   fi

There is still some audio hardware profiling to do, as it was previously based on running MSCW (Multiple Sound Card Wizard) that is now deprecated.    

Tags: easy

EasySR screen recorder audio cutoff fixed

I posted about EasySR recently, and have been using it to create the YouTube videos, as EasyCast is unsatisfactory. I created EasySR about a week ago, a GUI frontend for the 'ffmpeg' commandline utility, and have been gradually improving it.

One problem is that audio cuts out before the video stops recording. I hunted online for solutions, none of them perfect, but did find a recommendation that reduces the audio cutoff to 800ms before the video stops. Still not good enough.

Just now did another search, framing the question to Google AI a bit differently; this time got an answer that fixes the problem:

Audio truncation when recording desktop using x11grab and pulse happens because the audio stream finishes exactly at the time it took for the video encoder (e.g., libx264) to initialize. Add the -apad audio filter to your output command to indefinitely pad the audio stream so it matches the video length.

A proper command structure using the pad filter looks like this:

ffmpeg -video_size 1920x1080 -framerate 30 -f x11grab -i :0.0 -f pulse -i default -af apad -c:v libx264 -preset ultrafast -c:a aac output.mp4

Key Flags to Prevent Cutoffs and Sync Issues:
-af apad: This FFmpeg filter prevents audio from falling short of the video stream by continually padding the audio with silence until the video stream ends.
-preset ultrafast: Lowers CPU usage during recording. Using high-load encoders without this flag is often the root cause of initialization delays that truncate the audio.
-async 1: If your audio and video slowly drift out of sync over a long recording, adding this legacy flag can help force them together (though it is largely deprecated, it is still used by many for desktop capture)

This is what I have put into EasySR, script /usr/local/easysr/easysr:

ffmpeg -framerate ${FPS} -f x11grab -i :0.0 -f pulse -i default -af apad -c:v libx264 -preset ultrafast -c:a aac -vf "scale=-2:${HEIGHT}" /files/media/video/EasySR/${FNAME}.mp4

...works great! The ordering of the components on the command line is tricky, had to get it just right. I haven't put in that "-async 1"    

Tags: easy

EasyOS YouTube Part-9

The previous video, Part-8, introduced Easy Containers. Part-9 explains a few extra details about Easy Containers. Also explains about running as the administrator (root) and "crippled root" in containers. Also shows how you can see what packages are in 'easy.sfs' and 'devx.sfs'. Also explains some tweaks for the webcam.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jj-Nl204_g    

Tags: easy

EasyOS YouTube video Part-8 Easy Containers

Easy Containers is unique to EasyOS, needed to create a video showcasing it. Now done.

"EasyOS Part8 Easy Containers"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQk8ftYQaeI

So much more that can make a video about... have to think what next.    

Tags: easy