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Troubleshooting / Diagnostics Wizard-Sound - Your votes Pls

Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2013 11:04 pm
by anandrkris
Requesting your views and votes posted here.
Here it is...Today's Eureka Moment - Yes, I got an idea ;-)

Most would agree on the diversity and choice (read freedom) of Audio related applications (ALSA, Pulseaudio,etc) in Linux.
Audio issues is an oft repeated complaint by newbies, perhaps due to lack of awareness of configuration options available in Linux. Typical issues such as Sound not working in Speakers, Headphones, HDMI, etc could perhaps be addressed by tweaking some of the basic settings. However, an easy to use diagnostics tool that guides this process would be of great help to users.

My suggestion for Linux Mint Desktop is to build a Step-by-Step wizard which helps users solve their hardware related issues. This can have a series of questions and based on user responses, wizard should guide the users to naviagate to the various settings - recommended intelligently by Mint based on available applications in the system. (Alsmaixer, Kmix / Phonon / Pavucontrol, etc in case of Audio)
For instance, Audio Diagnostic Wizard (Sample Questions hence trivial in nature) questions could be of the nature -
1) Are you sure you are not muted?
2) Are sound levels properly set in Alsamixer?
3) Are you sure Sound card drivers are properly installed etc.

Possible Solutions could be - Restart Pulseaudio, Re-install drivers, Switch Audio Channel to Built-in Audio Analog Stereo, etc

Frankly, I *could not* visualize all the aspects, so if am making sense and if you consent to the basic idea - please cast your vote. :-). Also provide your inputs as comments and I will try to incorporate your comments and articulate the idea in a better manner. Else, feel free to shoot it down, which is expected of the community moderators.

To start with, this could probably be first implemented in Cinnamon dekstop.

This could also be implemented in a more generic fashion to solve any hardware related issue - My Wi-Fi / my printer / my graphics card / my webcam / my mice not working, etc. Atleast such a wizard will help in solving simple issues and restrict the flow of trivial questions to forums. Also thinking if it is implemented, whether this can work both offline as well as online. Think of the wizard as a context sensitive help feature.

Edit - Finetuned the idea.

Re: Troubeshooting wizard - Sound ( et al)

Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2013 11:18 pm
by catweazel
anandrkris wrote:Atleast such a wizard will solve simple issues and restrict the flow of trivial questions to forums.
No it will not. Not even the mighty google can do that. Nearly every issue under the sun can be solved by judicious searching but many people's first reaction is to hit the forums, where people who provide support are expected to do the searching for them.

That isn't a criticism of users in this forum, by the way. It's a generalised observation of an internet-wide problem.

Re: Troubeshooting wizard - Sound ( et al)

Posted: Sun Mar 03, 2013 9:20 am
by anandrkris
TehGhodTrole wrote:
anandrkris wrote:Atleast such a wizard will solve simple issues and restrict the flow of trivial questions to forums.
No it will not. Not even the mighty google can do that. Nearly every issue under the sun can be solved by judicious searching but many people's first reaction is to hit the forums, where people who provide support are expected to do the searching for them.

That isn't a criticism of users in this forum, by the way. It's a generalised observation of an internet-wide problem.
I tend to agree and have personally seen posts which look like forums are first resort for OP's. But what do you think of the idea, per se, does a wizard look like a viable solution? I am not even sure what questions should feature if it were to be built but somehow an inkling that wizard should help structure our own thinking to problems faced by users.

Re: Troubeshooting / Diagnostics Wizard - Sound (Other I/O)

Posted: Mon Mar 25, 2013 11:46 pm
by anandrkris
11 votes so far. 8) Lobbying here for more votes / views / refinements on this :idea: . Thanks!

Re: Troubeshooting / Diagnostics Wizard - Sound

Posted: Sun Mar 31, 2013 10:48 pm
by anandrkris
Status change. Progressed to next level. :) Requesting here for more votes / views / refinements on this :idea:. Hope am not spamming. :wink:
Status:Under dev. review
Score: 16 out of 21 votes

Re: Troubeshooting / Diagnostics Wizard - Sound

Posted: Mon Jun 03, 2013 2:05 am
by anandrkris
Requesting here for more votes / views / refinements on this :idea:. Hope am not spamming. :wink: Will appreciate if viewers of this post have a look at the idea.
Status:Under dev. review
Score: 18 out of 23 votes

Re: Troubleshooting / Diagnostics Wizard-Sound - Your votes

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2014 12:27 pm
by Wirezfree
When looking for a distro, I evaluated Zorin.
Not sure which section(System).?
There was a Tool that went through all areas of PC doing tests
From displays, Audio, keyboards, plugging in media, plugging power in/out if laptop.
It even did a power sleep, wake after 60secs test
You answered YES/NO and N/A and it guided you through testing what appeared to be everything

Yes, a Mint Tool would be useful +1 for me
I think it should prompt to run this tool on 1st run.

Dave

Re: Troubleshooting / Diagnostics Wizard-Sound - Your votes

Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 1:43 am
by anandrkris
Wirezfree wrote:When looking for a distro, I evaluated Zorin.
Not sure which section(System).?
There was a Tool that went through all areas of PC doing tests
From displays, Audio, keyboards, plugging in media, plugging power in/out if laptop.
It even did a power sleep, wake after 60secs test
You answered YES/NO and N/A and it guided you through testing what appeared to be everything
Oh! Thats Interesting.
Wirezfree wrote:Yes, a Mint Tool would be useful +1 for me
I think it should prompt to run this tool on 1st run.

Dave
Could you take a couple of minutes and cast your vote on the community site as well perhaps with the comment on implementation in Zorin.

Re: Troubleshooting / Diagnostics Wizard-Sound - Your votes

Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 1:32 pm
by xenopeek
Wirezfree wrote:There was a Tool that went through all areas of PC doing tests
From displays, Audio, keyboards, plugging in media, plugging power in/out if laptop.
It even did a power sleep, wake after 60secs test
You answered YES/NO and N/A and it guided you through testing what appeared to be everything
That's Ubuntu's checkbox application (I just booted ZorinOS 8 ISO to check), and you can install checkbox on Linux Mint also. It's in the repositories for all current versions of Linux Mint. Install checkbox-gtk if you want the Gtk interface, checkbox-qt for Qt, or checkbox-cli for command line.

Re: Troubleshooting / Diagnostics Wizard-Sound - Your votes

Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 1:57 pm
by anandrkris
@xenopeek - Thanks. Will give it a shot. :D Is there something you *don't* know? :wink: 8)