> the problem is: i install one app, install another app, > both are outputting sound, and it won't work. You mean: in the best case, only one of them is putting out sound :) . > you can port open source apps to audio, and blame > commercial companies to write apps for alsa > (Id did, the new doom III release has alsa support) To be honest, they shouldn't support ALSA, they should better support the non existing common unix audio layer. > but u still need to struggle around with alsa > config, etc. Yep. And normal users are not able to do so. > the problem is that it doesn't work out of the box > like on WinD0w$. well - don't get me wrong, i actually > like the fact that linux is highly configurable, and > i personally have no problem to write my .asoundrc, > but if linux should have success on the desktop, thats > definitely a must-have. Yeah, that's my idea. I for mysels can deal with the current status, but I have the common user in mind. And in fact, if we had a common audio layer, this doesn't steal you the possibility to tweak every system aspect manually. Best regards ce