To be quite honest, the summary of this post is that I'm just too old for this shit. Gone are the days where I had all the time in the world to faff around with customising builds to my heart's content.

![Source: [Reddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/howtonotgiveafuck/comments/78pe0r/behold_the_field_in_which_i_grow_my_fucks/)](barren.jpg)

## The problems

The matter with [configuring audio over Xrdp](/2020/12/23/configure-audio-over-xrdp-centos) was one hurdle. Annoying, but not a show-stopper.

But other things that cropped up included:

### Limited export formats on DaVinci Resolve

I couldn't export H.264 MP4 with AAC audio which is what I was using on macOS. I had to use LinearPCM which would fail to successfully upload on more than one platform I needed it on. I tried a variety of other combinations of audio and video to no avail. Some combinations even failed to play back in QuickTime or VLC let alone get anywhere online.

The only option in these cases was to transcode them with `ffmpeg` or Handbrake after the initial render. But, why.

### Audio over Xrdp was fragile

Even after all that setup, things just didn't quite work, but only sometimes? Audio would cut out or not be in sync over remote. If I wanted to switch to working from the box directly, audio would not transfer back. Restarting services sometimes worked, but most of the time I'd have to restart the box entirely. I'm sure if I had figured out the right combination of services to restart it would have done the thing, but then I'd have to restart the services every time I needed to do that. Again, why.

### Laggy interface

This one perplexes me. I noticed the DaVinci Resolve UI was particularly laggy. I thought perhaps it was because I was using it remotely, but even on local it was janky if marginally better. Resources weren't being unusually taxed, other things were working fine, it was just kind of rubbish even when it was the only thing actively running. It was sort of tolerable in the way you're alright with the sound of dripping water for a little while, but not for extended periods of editing. No workaround.

## The last straw

But really the big one was the codec issue. I was not going to sit through two extended periods of rendering just to get the file in the format I wanted. One render in DaVinci Resolve run already took 1.5-2 times the length of the video to be rendered on its own let alone what I'd have to do with it using `ffmpeg` or Handbrake. Just, no.

Given I am comfortable and familiar with macOS, I did briefly entertain the idea of a hackintosh. But, just, no. If my field of fucks was barren for CentOS, it would not be less barren for a hackintosh.

And this is why I tapped out and went to Windows.


How do I regret thee, let me count the ways.

CentOS regret

These are the steps I took to configure Xrdp on CentOS to allow me to hear audio over Microsoft Remote Desktop on OSX. YMMV.

Install the [pulseaudio-module-xrdp](https://github.com/neutrinolabs/pulseaudio-module-xrdp) module using the instructions based on those provided by [neutrinolabs](https://github.com/neutrinolabs/pulseaudio-module-xrdp/wiki/README) with modifications that I needed to make it work on my install.

## CentOS 8

### **Prerequisites**

Xrdp needs to have been installed.

Some build tools and package development tools are required. Make sure you install the tools.

```bash
yum groupinstall "Development Tools"
yum install rpmdevtools yum-utils
rpmdev-setuptree
```

### **Prepare & build**

Install pulseaudio and requisite packages to build pulseaudio.

**Note:** The *powertools* and *okay* repos needed to be added for `yum-builddep`. The *okay* repo was current at time of writing, you may need to update this.

```bash
yum install pulseaudio pulseaudio-libs pulseaudio-libs-devel
yum config-manager --set-enabled powertools
rpm -ivh http://repo.okay.com.mx/centos/8/x86_64/release/okay-release-1-3.el8.noarch.rpm?
yum-builddep pulseaudio
```

Fetch the pulseaudio source and extract. You'll see `~/rpmbuild/BUILD/`

```bash
yumdownloader --source pulseaudio
rpm --install pulseaudio*.src.rpm
```

If the source download fails due to being unavailable, manually download the source rpm. Use the name that it says it failed to find and have a dig around for the source. I found the version I needed here, but you can dig further up the tree to see if you can find yours:

[https://vault.centos.org/8.3.2011/AppStream/Source/SPackages/pulseaudio-13.99.1-1.el8.src.rpm](https://vault.centos.org/8.3.2011/AppStream/Source/SPackages/pulseaudio-13.99.1-1.el8.src.rpm)

When executing `rpm --install` you might see:

```bash
warning: user mockbuild does not exist - using root
warning: group mockbuild does not exist - using root
```

It's okay, these are just warnings, it probably worked. You'll find out shortly.

Build the pulseaudio source. In this phase, pulseaudio is not necessarily needed to be built but configured however there's no way to do only configure.

```bash
rpmbuild -bb --noclean ~/rpmbuild/SPECS/pulseaudio.spec
```

Finally, let's build Xrdp source / sink modules. You'll have two .so files `module-xrdp-sink.so` and `module-xrdp-source.so`.

```bash
git clone https://github.com/neutrinolabs/pulseaudio-module-xrdp.git
cd pulseaudio-module-xrdp
./bootstrap && ./configure PULSE_DIR=~/rpmbuild/BUILD/pulseaudio-[YOUR VERSION]
make
```

## **Install**

Just `make install` should install built modules to the correct directory.

You can confirm if the modules properly installed by following command:

```bash
ls $(pkg-config --variable=modlibexecdir libpulse)
```

If you can see lots of `module-*.so` and `module-xrdp-sink.so`, `module-xrdp-source.so`, PulseAudio modules should be properly built and installed.

`module-xrdp-sink.la` and `module-xrdp-source.so` may be installed to the target directory, these files are not necessary and you can remove them safely.

Enjoy!

## **See if it works**

To see if it works, run `pavumeter` in the xrdp session. Playback any YouTube video in Firefox. You'll see "Showing signal levels of **xrdp sink**" and volume meter moving.

## Troubleshooting

* Audio pitch is lower than it should be

    Modify `/etc/pulse/daemon.conf`, uncomment or add `default-sample-rate = 44100`

* Choppy audio

    No actual solution set, unfortunately. YouTube playback is choppy, but straight audio playback is fine.


## Additional Sources

* [https://okay.network/blog-news/rpm-repositories-for-centos-6-and-7.html](https://okay.network/blog-news/rpm-repositories-for-centos-6-and-7.html)


Configuring Xrdp on CentOS for use over Microsoft Remote Desktop.

2 posts tagged “cent-os”

CentOS regret

Configure audio over Xrdp on CentOS