Selecting audio device from command line

[Padowan]

I am trying to start VLC from the command line on a Raspberry Pi and play on a bluetooth speaker. I have tried using this:
vlc music.mp3 --aout="My Speaker"

Unfortunately it doesn't work but is playing on the analog output. Inside the VLC GUI I can see My Speaker in the Audio|Audio Device menu. And it works if I select the speaker in the menu, but I want to select it from the command line.

I now realize that I might have misunderstood the --aout argument, as it seems to specify module and not device. But I cannot figure out how to specify the device from the command line.

[Rémi Denis-Courmont]

Whether it's possible and how, depends on the audio output plugin.

[kmf31]

If the different devices correspond to alsa devices the correct command line is:

vlc music.mp3 --aout=alsa --alsa-audio-device="alsa device"

where "alsa device" may be a typical alsa hardware device or some virtual alsa device a user may have defined in ~/.asoundrc (google: "asoundrc" for some information how this works).

If you want to you use pulse audio you can use:

vlc music.mp3 --aout=pulse

and then afterwards "pavucontrol" to select different devices within pulse (which may be more convenient). The "--aout" option may be omitted if the corresponding audio module is selected as default in the preferences (typically either alsa or pulse).

[Padowan]

Thanks a lot for the answer, kmf31. My knowledge about this is very limited, but it looks like alsa does not work with the bluetooth stack.

Selecting the speaker inside pavucontrol seems to work. Do you know how to do this from the command line? I need to do this from a script running on the Raspberry Pi without mouse or keyboard.

[kmf31]

You can try to get some ideas from here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1132200

Apart from this you need to search how bluetooth speakers are accessed/configured inside pluse-audio. Apparently this is possible and there seems to be some information, tutorials on the net.

[Padowan]

Thanks for the help. I ended up disabling the internal analog output with pavucontrol. This made vlc always use the bluetooth speaker.

[aitte]

Hi! have the same problem but on windows!
I got a multichannel audiocard, it works through DirectX if i choose manually, but how could i do it in command line? I write somithing like

Code: Select all

vlc --aout "directsound" --directx-audio-device="Realtek Digital Output" 1.avi

in different combinations? but it does not seem to work.
How can i get a list of correct values for these options?
The command "adev" on rc interface should give some devices, but it does not (returned 0 it said)

[mrblue1234]

Did you ever get this working to select the audio device?