Linux Audio: A Guide For Beginner and Beyond/Preface

= About This Book =

As a matter of fact, Linux doesn't have any decent documentation about plethora of different audio API and approaches for working with sound on this platform. Any book covering this topic to a sufficient detail will serve as a great asset to Linux community (and a great helping hand for new users). With your help, this book can become this asset. It is open for everybody interested in audio on the Linux platform for read and write. From people interested to use Linux as a home media center to pro-audio folks and game developers. Hopefully, it can also become an introduction into pro-audio world with Linux.

There are many reasons for using Linux for audio work. One of them - it is ubiquitous - you can find it everywhere - from the musician's home studio, PC at university, in tablets and Android phones to studios with some of the biggest names in the music and film industry. Whether you are looking for an alternative to proprietary implementation in your home studio, or just for a more cost effective solution for your post production department, Linux has already established itself as a free (as in free software), stable, fast, and secure platform even for the most demanding uses.

= A Word From the Contributors =

The scope of audio topics can be very broad regardless of the platform, so it is ok if information is too professional or specific. However, feel free to provide a good explanation for whatever you find appropriate if you can. In the end - we've all been there - unable to get something, either because of too advanced concepts, ot a bad English. Let's make a handy guide.

Linux is a moving target and many newcomers become frustrated in search of information. Even some well-known online sources have very outdated FAQ's and guides (some of them have not been updated for over ten years). So it is important to keep this book here updated with current changes and tendencies.

As this book is meant as a collaborative effort by and for the community, feel free to enhance it and add yourself to this list. A small bio or message is also welcome!

Justin Towson
I started this book in hopes to consolidate a lot of information available around the internet on the topic, as well as share my experiences (and failures) for those who may be interested in linux and audio, but who are having trouble finding where to start, or how to keep going. I do not consider myself an expert on the subject, but I at least hope to start something that others will want to add their own experiences to, and help bring linux audio more into the mainstream. As both a musician and a programmer, I have been following the development of this niche for quite a few years, and (while in some fields it already has) I feel a lot of things have come together and the time has come for linux to really show how far it has come. As free software continues to grow, I wish to dedicate this book to all who have brought it to where it is today, and hope this book will help newcomers to bring it that much further.

anatoly techtonik
I just need to know the best cross-platform API to use with Linux for playback and the only source we have is this 4 year old (but very good) overview at http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/guide-to-sound-apis by Lennart Poettering. It would be nice if this book served the same purpose, but had more dynamic and diverse content.