[FFe] [touch] indicator needs to be able to control volume per audio role

[Ricardo Salveti]

Dear Release Team,

I would like to request a FFe for indicator-sound, in order to deliver the remaining features needed for Ubuntu Touch.

From the Sound design for Touch (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Sound#Phone), we need to change the default behaviour of the indicator in order to be able to change volume per audio roles, and not only the master volume.

On touch the master volume will always be at 100%, and each media role will have its own volume values, so we can have a different volume level for multimedia, ringtone and alarms.

This can be done using the streamrestore module in pulseaudio (via another dbus entry point that is only enabled on touch atm):
http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/PulseAudio/Documentation/Developer/Clients/DBus/StreamRestore/

There's also a sample script on python that can be used to set/get volume per roles:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jusa/pulseaudio-utils/master/pasr.py

And the current roles supporter by touch are: multimedia, alert, phone and alarm.

This change is touch specific as it needs a combination of configs that are available in ubuntu-touch-session for it to be used (different code path that only gets used on touch).

[Ricardo Salveti (rsalveti)]

MRs:
* https://code.launchpad.net/~rsalveti/indicator-sound/adding-support-for-sound-per-roles/+merge/235562
* https://code.launchpad.net/~rsalveti/ubuntu-touch-session/changing-config-allow-volume-per-role/+merge/235563
* https://code.launchpad.net/~rsalveti/telepathy-ofono/remove-initial-voice-volume/+merge/235564

And all available at silo 18 (https://launchpad.net/~ci-train-ppa-service/+archive/ubuntu/landing-018).

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

This requires changes to the indicator-sound package, which is present not only on touch images but also on the desktop. This should therefore go through the FFe process, and be reviewed to ensure there's no risk to the desktop.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

<slangasek> rsalveti: so the idea here is that the sink-input-by-media-role:$foo are only present if we're on touch?
<rsalveti> slangasek: they can be part of the desktop, but the dbus module that export that interface to the indicator is only available on touch
<rsalveti> the stream can have basically any role, as the app is responsible for setting that up, we just have a small set of supported ones on touch
<rsalveti> and this additional work was to enable this extra dbus interface so it can be used to change volume per roles
<rsalveti> so if the dbus interface and the needed roles are not available in the stream-restore internal database, it'll act like today (only controlling the main sink)
<rsalveti> if the dbus interface is available, and the required set of roles are available in stream-restore, then the volume will reflect on the current active role (or alert by default)
<slangasek> ok. what package provides this new dbus interface?
<rsalveti> slangasek: pulse itself, but that's disabled by default, and the config enabling that is part of ubuntu-touch-session

FFe approved.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package indicator-sound - 12.10.2+14.10.20141001-0ubuntu2

---------------
indicator-sound (12.10.2+14.10.20141001-0ubuntu2) utopic; urgency=medium

  * debian/control: adjusting libpulse-dev version deps
  * Support for volumes per role covered by FFe LP: #1368827
 -- Ricardo Salveti de Araujo <email address hidden> Wed, 01 Oct 2014 23:57:15 -0300