Enlightened Sound Daemon
Encyclopedia
In computing
, the Enlightened Sound Daemon (ESD or EsounD) is the sound server
for Enlightenment
and GNOME
.
ESD will mix together the simultaneous audio output of multiple running programs, and output the resulting stream to the sound card.
ESD can also manage network
-transparent
audio. As such, an application that supports ESD can output audio over the network, to any connected computer that is running an ESD server.
ESD support must be specifically written and added into applications, as ESD does not emulate normal audio hardware APIs. Since ESD has been around for over a decade, earlier than almost any other sound server, a very large number of Unix applications have support for ESD output built-in, or available as add-ons.
ESD was maintained as part of the GNOME project, but as of April 2009, all ESD modules in Gnome have been ported to libcanberra for event sounds or GStreamer
/PulseAudio
for everything else.
Computing
Computing is usually defined as the activity of using and improving computer hardware and software. It is the computer-specific part of information technology...
, the Enlightened Sound Daemon (ESD or EsounD) is the sound server
Sound server
A sound server is software that manages the use of and access to audio devices, most notably, the soundcard. It usually runs as a background process...
for Enlightenment
Enlightenment (window manager)
Enlightenment, also known simply as E, is a stacking window manager for the X Window System which can be used alone or in conjunction with a desktop environment such as GNOME or KDE...
and GNOME
GNOME
GNOME is a desktop environment and graphical user interface that runs on top of a computer operating system. It is composed entirely of free and open source software...
.
ESD will mix together the simultaneous audio output of multiple running programs, and output the resulting stream to the sound card.
ESD can also manage network
Computer network
A computer network, often simply referred to as a network, is a collection of hardware components and computers interconnected by communication channels that allow sharing of resources and information....
-transparent
Location transparency
In computer networks location transparency describes names used to identify network resources independent of both the user's location and the resource location.A distributed system will need to employ a networked scheme for naming resources....
audio. As such, an application that supports ESD can output audio over the network, to any connected computer that is running an ESD server.
ESD support must be specifically written and added into applications, as ESD does not emulate normal audio hardware APIs. Since ESD has been around for over a decade, earlier than almost any other sound server, a very large number of Unix applications have support for ESD output built-in, or available as add-ons.
ESD was maintained as part of the GNOME project, but as of April 2009, all ESD modules in Gnome have been ported to libcanberra for event sounds or GStreamer
GStreamer
GStreamer is a pipeline-based multimedia framework written in the C programming language with the type system based on GObject.GStreamer allows a programmer to create a variety of media-handling components, including simple audio playback, audio and video playback, recording, streaming and editing...
/PulseAudio
PulseAudio
PulseAudio is a cross-platform, networked sound server commonly used on the Linux-based and FreeBSD operating systems.PulseAudio runs under Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and POSIX-compliant platforms, such as Linux and FreeBSD...
for everything else.
See also
- JACK Audio Connection KitJACK Audio Connection KitJACK is a professional sound server daemon that provides real-time, low latency connections for both audio and MIDI data between applications that implement its API...
- aRtsARtsaRts, which stands for analog Real time synthesizer, is an audio framework that is no longer under development. It is best known for previously being used in KDE to simulate an analog synthesizer....
d - NASNetwork Audio SystemThe Network Audio System is an open-source, network-transparent, client–server audio transport system. It can be described as the audio equivalent of the X Window System. NAS works on Unix and Microsoft Windows platforms. The project began in the early 1990s...
- PulseAudioPulseAudioPulseAudio is a cross-platform, networked sound server commonly used on the Linux-based and FreeBSD operating systems.PulseAudio runs under Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and POSIX-compliant platforms, such as Linux and FreeBSD...
- ALSA
- OSSOpen Sound SystemThe Open Sound System is an interface for making and capturing sound in Unix or Unix-like operating systems. It is based on standard Unix devices...
External links
- EsounD - The Enlightened Sound Daemon - Overview (old project home page)
- Current Gnome EsounD source archive (current Gnome releases)