Special Edition Using Linux®, Sixth Edition

Open Sound System for Linux

Linux was once a rather serious infant when it came to multimedia. Now, however, many of the same multimedia features that are found with other operating systems are available to Linux as well. The ones that have garnered the most enthusiasm have been the applications that operate over networks such as the Internet. Streaming audio and video and multimedia documentation distribution have almost become standard in today's Internet.

Linux kernels use two versions of the sound driver system. One is free (included with the kernel source code) and must be compiled manually and linked into the Linux kernel itself (this is done for you by most distributions). The other is a commercial product that offers more functionality, ...