Provided by: pulseaudio_16.1+dfsg1-1ubuntu3_amd64 bug

NAME

       pulse-daemon.conf - PulseAudio daemon configuration file

SYNOPSIS

       ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf

       ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf.d/*.conf

       /etc/pulse/daemon.conf

       /etc/pulse/daemon.conf.d/*.conf

DESCRIPTION

       The  PulseAudio  sound  server reads configuration directives from a configuration file on
       startup. If the per-user file ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf exists, it  is  used,  otherwise
       the  system  configuration  file /etc/pulse/daemon.conf is used. In addition to those main
       files,  configuration  directives  can  also   be   put   in   files   under   directories
       ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf.d/ and /etc/pulse/daemon.conf.d/. Those files have to have the
       .conf file name extension, but otherwise the file names can be chosen  freely.  The  files
       under daemon.conf.d are processed in alphabetical order. In case the same option is set in
       multiple files, the last  file  to  set  an  option  overrides  earlier  files.  The  main
       daemon.conf  file is processed first, so options set in files under daemon.conf.d override
       the main file.

       Please  note  that  the  server  also  reads  a  configuration  script  on  startup.   See
       default.pa(5).

       The   configuration  file  is  a  simple  collection  of  variable  declarations.  If  the
       configuration file parser encounters either ; or # it ignores the rest of the  line  until
       its end.

       For  the  settings  that  take  a  boolean  argument  the  values  true, yes, on and 1 are
       equivalent, resp. false, no, off, 0.

GENERAL DIRECTIVES

       daemonize= Daemonize after startup. Takes a boolean value, defaults to no. The --daemonize
       command line option takes precedence.

       fail=  Fail  to  start  up if any of the directives in the configuration script default.pa
       fail. Takes a boolean argument, defaults to yes. The  --fail  command  line  option  takes
       precedence.

       allow-module-loading=  Allow/disallow  module  loading  after  startup. This is a security
       feature that if disabled makes sure that  no  further  modules  may  be  loaded  into  the
       PulseAudio  server after startup completed. It is recommended to disable this when system-
       instance is enabled. Please note that certain features  like  automatic  hot-plug  support
       will  not  work  if this option is enabled. Takes a boolean argument, defaults to yes. The
       --disallow-module-loading command line option takes precedence.

       allow-exit= Allow/disallow exit on user request. Defaults to yes.

       resample-method= The resampling algorithm to use. Use one of  src-sinc-best-quality,  src-
       sinc-medium-quality,  src-sinc-fastest,  src-zero-order-hold,  src-linear, trivial, speex-
       float-N, speex-fixed-N, ffmpeg, soxr-mq,  soxr-hq,  soxr-vhq.  See  the  documentation  of
       libsamplerate  and  speex  for  explanations  of  the  different  src- and speex- methods,
       respectively. The method trivial is the most basic algorithm implemented. If you're  tight
       on  CPU  consider  using this. On the other hand it has the worst quality of them all. The
       Speex resamplers take an integer quality setting in the  range  0..10  (bad...good).  They
       exist  in  two  flavours: fixed and float. The former uses fixed point numbers, the latter
       relies on floating point numbers. On most desktop CPUs the float point resampler is a  lot
       faster,  and  it also offers slightly better quality. The soxr-family methods are based on
       libsoxr, a resampler library from the SoX sound processing utility. The mq variant has the
       best  performance of the three. The hq is more expensive and, according to SoX developers,
       is considered the best choice for audio of up to 16 bits per sample. The vhq  variant  has
       more  precision  than  hq  and  is  more  suitable for larger samples. The Soxr resamplers
       generally offer better quality at less CPU compared to other resamplers,  such  as  speex.
       The  downside is that they can add a significant delay to the output (usually up to around
       20 ms, in rare cases more). See the output of dump-resample-methods for a complete list of
       all  available  resamplers.  Defaults to speex-float-1. The --resample-method command line
       option takes precedence. Note that some modules overwrite  or  allow  overwriting  of  the
       resampler to use.

       avoid-resampling= If set, try to configure the device to avoid resampling. This only works
       on devices which support reconfiguring their rate, and when no other streams  are  already
       playing or capturing audio. The device will also not be configured to a rate less than the
       default and alternate sample rates.

       enable-remixing= If disabled never upmix or downmix channels to  different  channel  maps.
       Instead,  do  a  simple name-based matching only. Defaults to yes. There is no known valid
       use case for setting this option to no, therefore, this option is deprecated  and  may  be
       removed in a future version of PulseAudio.

       remixing-use-all-sink-channels=   If   enabled,  use  all  sink  channels  when  remixing.
       Otherwise, remix to the minimal set of sink channels needed to reproduce all of the source
       channels. (This has no effect on LFE remixing.) Defaults to yes.

       enable-lfe-remixing= This is a way to set remixing-produce-lfe and remixing-consume-lfe to
       the same value at once. This option only exists for  backward  compatibility  and  may  be
       removed in a future version of PulseAudio.

       remixing-produce-lfe=  If  enabled,  and  the  sink  input  does not have the LFE channel,
       synthesize the output LFE channel as a (lowpass-filtered, if lfe-crossover-freq is not  0)
       average  of  all  input  channels.  Also, when lfe-crossover-freq is not 0, filter out low
       frequencies from other channels while producing a synthetic LFE output. If  disabled,  the
       output  LFE channel will only get a signal when an input LFE channel is available as well.
       Defaults to no.

       remixing-consume-lfe= If enabled, and the sink does not have an LFE channel, redirect  the
       input  LFE  channel  (if  any)  to other channels. If disabled, the input LFE channel will
       remain unused unless the sink has the LFE channel as well. Defaults to no.

       lfe-crossover-freq= The crossover frequency (in Hz) for the LFE filter. Set  it  to  0  to
       disable the LFE filter. Defaults to 0.

       use-pid-file=  Create a PID file in the runtime directory ($XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/pulse/pid). If
       this is enabled you may use commands like --kill or --check. If you are planning to  start
       more  than  one  PulseAudio  process  per  user,  you  better disable this option since it
       effectively disables multiple instances. Takes a boolean argument, defaults  to  yes.  The
       --use-pid-file command line option takes precedence.

       cpu-limit=  If disabled do not install the CPU load limiter, even on platforms where it is
       supported. This option is useful when debugging/profiling PulseAudio to disable disturbing
       SIGXCPU signals. Takes a boolean argument, defaults to no. The --no-cpu-limit command line
       argument takes precedence.

       system-instance= Run the daemon as system-wide instance, requires root privileges. Takes a
       boolean argument, defaults to no. The --system command line argument takes precedence.

       local-server-type=  Please  don't  use  this  option  if you don't have to! This option is
       currently only useful when you want D-Bus clients to use a remote server. This option  may
       be  removed in future versions. If you only want to run PulseAudio in the system mode, use
       the system-instance option. This option takes one of user, system or none as the argument.
       This is essentially a duplicate for the system-instance option. The difference is the none
       option, which is useful when you want to use a remote server with D-Bus clients.  If  both
       this  and  system-instance are defined, this option takes precedence. Defaults to whatever
       the system-instance is set.

       enable-shm= Enable data transfer via  POSIX  or  memfd  shared  memory.  Takes  a  boolean
       argument, defaults to yes. The --disable-shm command line argument takes precedence.

       enable-memfd=. Enable memfd shared memory. Takes a boolean argument, defaults to yes.

       shm-size-bytes=  Sets  the  shared  memory  segment size for the daemon, in bytes. If left
       unspecified or is set to 0 it will default to some  system-specific  default,  usually  64
       MiB.  Please  note  that  usually  there  is  no need to change this value, unless you are
       running an OS kernel that does not do memory overcommit.

       lock-memory= Locks the entire PulseAudio process into memory. While  this  might  increase
       drop-out  safety  when used in conjunction with real-time scheduling this takes away a lot
       of memory from other processes  and  might  hence  considerably  slow  down  your  system.
       Defaults to no.

       flat-volumes=  Enable  'flat'  volumes,  i.e. where possible let the sink volume equal the
       maximum of the volumes of the inputs connected to it. Takes a boolean  argument,  defaults
       to no.

       rescue-streams= Enable rescuing of streams if the used sink or source becomes unavailable.
       Takes a boolean argument. If set to yes, pulseaudio will try to move the  streams  from  a
       sink  or  source  that  becomes  unavailable  to the default sink or source. If set to no,
       streams will be killed if the corresponding sink or source disappears. Defaults to yes.

SCHEDULING

       high-priority= Renice the daemon after startup to become a high-priority process.  This  a
       good idea if you experience drop-outs during playback. However, this is a certain security
       issue, since it works when called SUID root only, or RLIMIT_NICE is used. root is  dropped
       immediately  after  gaining  the  nice  level  on startup, thus it is presumably safe. See
       pulseaudio(1) for more information. Takes a boolean argument, defaults to yes. The --high-
       priority command line option takes precedence.

       realtime-scheduling=  Try  to  acquire  SCHED_FIFO scheduling for the IO threads. The same
       security concerns as mentioned above  apply.  However,  if  PA  enters  an  endless  loop,
       realtime  scheduling  causes  a  system  lockup.  Thus, realtime scheduling should only be
       enabled on trusted machines for now. Please note that only the IO  threads  of  PulseAudio
       are  made  real-time.  The  controlling  thread  is left a normally scheduled thread. Thus
       enabling the high-priority option is orthogonal. See pulseaudio(1) for  more  information.
       Takes  a  boolean  argument,  defaults  to  yes.  The --realtime command line option takes
       precedence.

       realtime-priority= The realtime priority to acquire, if  realtime-scheduling  is  enabled.
       Note:  JACK  uses  10  by  default,  9  for  clients. Thus it is recommended to choose the
       PulseAudio real-time priorities lower. Some PulseAudio threads might choose a  priority  a
       little lower or higher than the specified value. Defaults to 5.

       nice-level=  The  nice level to acquire for the daemon, if high-priority is enabled. Note:
       on some distributions X11 uses -10 by default. Defaults to -11.

IDLE TIMES

       exit-idle-time= Terminate the daemon after the last client quit and this time  in  seconds
       passed. Use a negative value to disable this feature. Defaults to 20. The --exit-idle-time
       command line option takes precedence.

              When PulseAudio runs in the per-user mode and detects a  login  session,  then  any
              positive  value will be reset to 0 so that PulseAudio will terminate immediately on
              logout. A positive value therefore has effect only in environments where there's no
              support  for  login session tracking (or if the user is logged in without a session
              spawned, a.k.a. lingering). A negative value can  still  be  used  to  disable  any
              automatic exit.

              When PulseAudio runs in the system mode, automatic exit is always disabled, so this
              option does nothing.

       scache-idle-time= Unload autoloaded sample cache entries after being idle for this time in
       seconds. Defaults to 20. The --scache-idle-time command line option takes precedence.

PATHS

       dl-search-path=  The path where to look for dynamic shared objects (DSOs/plugins). You may
       specify more than one path separated by colons. The default path depends on  compile  time
       settings. The --dl-search-path command line option takes precedence.

       default-script-file=  The  default  configuration  script  file  to load. Specify an empty
       string for  not  loading  a  default  script  file.  The  default  behaviour  is  to  load
       ~/.config/pulse/default.pa,  and  if that file does not exist fall back to the system wide
       installed  version  /etc/pulse/default.pa.  If  run   in   system-wide   mode   the   file
       /etc/pulse/system.pa  is  used  instead.  If  -n is passed on the command line or default-
       script-file= is disabled the default configuration script is ignored.

       load-default-script-file= Load the default  configuration  script  file  as  specified  in
       default-script-file=. Defaults to yes.

LOGGING

       log-target=  The  default log target. Use either stderr, syslog, journal (optional), auto,
       file:PATH or newfile:PATH. On  traditional  systems  auto  is  equivalent  to  syslog.  On
       systemd-enabled  systems, auto is equivalent to journal, in case daemonize is enabled, and
       to stderr otherwise. If set to file:PATH, logging is directed to  the  file  indicated  by
       PATH.  newfile:PATH  is  otherwise  the  same  as  file:PATH, but existing files are never
       overwritten. If the specified file already exists, a suffix is added to the file  name  to
       avoid   overwriting.  Defaults  to  auto.  The  --log-target  command  line  option  takes
       precedence.

       log-level= Log level, one of debug, info, notice, warning,  error.  Log  messages  with  a
       lower  log  level  than specified here are not logged. Defaults to notice. The --log-level
       command line option takes precedence. The -v command line option might alter this setting.

       log-meta= With each logged message log the code location the message was  generated  from.
       Defaults to no.

       log-time= With each logged message log the relative time since startup. Defaults to no.

       log-backtrace= When greater than 0, with each logged message log a code stack trace up the
       specified number of stack frames. Defaults to 0.

RESOURCE LIMITS

       See getrlimit(2) for more information. Set  to  -1  if  PulseAudio  shall  not  touch  the
       resource limit. Not all resource limits are available on all operating systems.

       rlimit-as Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-rss Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-core Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-data Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-fsize Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-nofile Defaults to 256.

       rlimit-stack Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-nproc Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-locks Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-sigpending Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-msgqueue Defaults to -1.

       rlimit-memlock  Defaults to 16 KiB. Please note that the JACK client libraries may require
       more locked memory.

       rlimit-nice Defaults to 31. Please make sure that the default  nice  level  as  configured
       with nice-level fits in this resource limit, if high-priority is enabled.

       rlimit-rtprio Defaults to 9. Please make sure that the default real-time priority level as
       configured with realtime-priority= fits in this resource limit, if realtime-scheduling  is
       enabled. The JACK client libraries require a real-time priority of 9 by default.

       rlimit-rttime Defaults to 1000000.

DEFAULT DEVICE SETTINGS

       Most  drivers try to open the audio device with these settings and then fall back to lower
       settings. The default settings are CD quality: 16bit native endian, 2 channels,  44100  Hz
       sampling.

       default-sample-format=        The        default        sampling        format.        See
       https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/PulseAudio/Documentation/User/SupportedAudioFormats/
       for possible values.

       default-sample-rate= The default sample frequency.

       default-sample-channels The default number of channels.

       default-channel-map The default channel map.

       alternate-sample-rate  The  alternate  sample frequency. Sinks and sources will use either
       the default-sample-rate value or this alternate value, typically 44.1 or 48kHz.  Switching
       between default and alternate values is enabled only when the sinks/sources are suspended.
       This option is ignored in passthrough mode where the stream rate will be used. If  set  to
       the same value as the default sample rate, this feature is disabled.

DEFAULT FRAGMENT SETTINGS

       Some  hardware  drivers require the hardware playback buffer to be subdivided into several
       fragments. It is possible to change these buffer metrics for machines with high scheduling
       latencies.  Not  all  possible  values  that  may  be configured here are available in all
       hardware. The driver will find the nearest setting supported. Modern drivers that  support
       timer-based scheduling ignore these options.

       default-fragments= The default number of fragments. Defaults to 4.

       default-fragment-size-msec=The  duration  of a single fragment. Defaults to 25ms (i.e. the
       total buffer is thus 100ms long).

DEFAULT DEFERRED VOLUME SETTINGS

       With the flat volume feature enabled, the sink HW volume is set to the same level  as  the
       highest  volume  input stream. Any other streams (with lower volumes) have the appropriate
       adjustment applied in SW to bring them to the correct overall level. Sadly hardware  mixer
       changes cannot be timed accurately and thus this change of volumes can sometimes cause the
       resulting output sound to be momentarily too loud or too soft. So  to  ensure  SW  and  HW
       volumes  are  applied  concurrently  without  any  glitches, their application needs to be
       synchronized. The sink implementation needs to support  deferred  volumes.  The  following
       parameters can be used to refine the process.

       enable-deferred-volume= Enable deferred volume for the sinks that support it. This feature
       is enabled by default.

       deferred-volume-safety-margin-usec= The amount of time (in usec) by which  the  HW  volume
       increases are delayed and HW volume decreases are advanced. Defaults to 8000 usec.

       deferred-volume-extra-delay-usec=  The amount of time (in usec) by which HW volume changes
       are delayed. Negative values are also allowed. Defaults to 0.

AUTHORS

       The PulseAudio Developers <pulseaudio-discuss (at) lists  (dot)  freedesktop  (dot)  org>;
       PulseAudio is available from http://pulseaudio.org/

SEE ALSO

       pulse-client.conf(5), default.pa(5), pulseaudio(1), pacmd(1)