[Bug 53031] New: Please add sndio as a sound backend

[WineHQ Bugzilla]

https://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=53031

            Bug ID: 53031
           Summary: Please add sndio as a sound backend
           Product: Wine
           Version: unspecified
          Hardware: x86-64
                OS: Linux
            Status: UNCONFIRMED
          Severity: enhancement
          Priority: P2
         Component: -unknown
          Assignee: wine-bugs at winehq.org
          Reporter: job+wine at tilde.team
      Distribution: ---

Currently for Linux, FreeBSD, and NetBSD, Wine supports ALSA, PulseAudio, and
OSS as audio backends. I think it would be nice if sndio(7) would be included
as well. It's a lightweight alternative to PulseAudio, and supports the three
operating systems I said earlier (as well as OpenBSD, which this sound server
came from).

This is currently our options for us sndio users to get audio to work in Wine:

1. Fallback to ALSA or OSS
2. Configure .asoundrc to use an aucat(1) pipe
(https://github.com/raphael/linux-samus/issues/200)
3. Use this alsa-sndio plugin (https://github.com/Duncaen/alsa-sndio) along
with this patch (https://github.com/Cloudef/alsa-sndio) to fix audio crackling
4. Use this libasound implementation that uses sndio
(https://github.com/Cloudef/libasound-sndio)
5. Just use PulseAudio

Option 1 would mean only one application can use the sound device at a time,
which would suck if you want to play a game with its music off while having
sound effects on, and get your music from somewhere else.

Option 2 will introduce a lot of latency if you don't configure the buffer size
of sndiod(8) and aucat(1). It is also hacky.

Option 3 is the best workaround for me, but it still introduces some latency I
don't want, which I can see while playing Touhou.

Option 4 works, but also hacky IMO. Also messes with alsamixer which I don't
like.

Option 5... Well might as well not use sndio in the first place then? :P

sndio also has support for network audio. And it arguably works better in that
regard than PulseAudio
(https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/3i849k/playing_around_with_openbsds_sound_server_sndio/).
One use-case I could think of is someone needing to use a proprietary music
program for Windows, and wants to play it to an OpenBSD box that is connected
to some special sound setup. That user wouldn't want the extra latency
introduced by options 2 to 5.

As for applications supporting sndio, well there are many, and an increasing
number thanks to the efforts of BSD porters. Firefox, VLC, libao, and OpenAL
are notable examples.

I'd really appreciate it if Wine could be one of the applications supporting
sndio as well.

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