In my game I have music that plays independent of sound effects. However, I need to the ability start and stop each on their own channel. I'm trying to set up mixers, but for some reason the sound effects don't work most of the time. It's just silent. Also if I monkey with things all of the sudden my music stops working as well. The example code is kind of big, so I'll post it to a pastebin.

It just seem way over kill to load up samples, set every one to an instance and then hook every one to a mixer. Can you tell me why my audio just stops working. Do I have to hook up all these mixers? (I want a separate volume control for music and sound)

also it looks like I have to make a stop routine for each sound effect? I think I made this very over complicated and there has to be an easier way...

The pastebin example is here
https://pastebin.com/yayDRCFB

The function order in main(is the order things are called in the code. I don't have control over function names or call order because I'm writing a allegro wrapper for these functions.

music_mixer is created in SoundInit() line 192
sfx_mixer created in SoundInit() line 193
master_mixer is created in SoundInit() line 194
voice created in SoundInit() line 195
master_mixer is attached to voice in SoundInit() line 196

This music_mixer is attached to master_mixer at MusicInit() line 95
The sfx_mixer is attached master_mixer at the bottom of LoadSound() line 266

sample instances are attached when they are loaded. The order appears to be exactly how you described.

My biggest complaint about Allegro 5 was how the sound was set up. It was far simpler in Allegro 4.

yup You can see the function order under main()

The reason why they are stretched out between different functions is because the game I'm porting calls these functions. I'm replacing the soundblaster library with one that uses allegro calls in it's place.

I could gradually change the pitch in Allegro 4 with minimal fuss. It is FAR more complicated in Allegro 5.

In my Deluxe Pacman 1 game (Allegro 4), listen to the siren in the background. As you eat the dots, the pitch gradually goes up. Because it was simple to code.

Now listen to the same sound in Deluxe Pacman 2 (Allegro 5). You will hear the pitch suddenly change, because I could not gradually change it over time without a whole lot of headache. So instead I change it every so many pills which was easier to do.

I could do more with Allegro 4, at least what I wanted to do. Allegro 5 seemed to forget that the library was supposed to make life easier, and for the most part is does, but the sound system is horribad. The function to change the pitch in Allegro 4 is straight forward: adjust_sample() You can't do that in Allegro 5.

Really. I had this conversation years ago when working on DP2 and it was more complicated. There's more to it than just that one function, but hey, have at it. I'm not working on my Allegro games anymore anyhow. Maybe they have improved it since then, I certainly hope so because it used to be a pain in the ass, and still looks like it is, at least with the audio.

I was able to play music and sound samples and do periodic speed changes, but gradual changes while you played was more involved. I don't recall how now, and the problem wasn't resolved in these forums at the time. I really don't care to revisit it except to agree with the original poster.

Telling people they are wrong about it being overly complicated when you have several that tell you that it is, is burying your head in the sand and ignoring the problem.

You're living in the past. A lot has happened in Allegro 5 in the last few years.

Well that was then and this is now. One function is all it takes to change the speed of the sample instance.

Allegro 4 has MIDI. That's about all that Allegro 5 doesn't have. Allegro 4 had one mixer and one voice. Allegro 5 lets you create your own mixer setup.

Allegro 5 is more flexible and gives you both a simple API and a complicated API for those who need to exercise more control over their sound.

Audio init aside, it's the same as it was in allegro 4. If all you want is normal sound then you call load sample and play sample. This is not complicated.

If you need control over your sound, you use an ALLEGRO_SAMPLE_INSTANCE*. That's the only difference.

I'm just going to quote Elias's sig and Evert here.

Do you really need 7 channel sound? What, 5 isn't enough? I doubt you could tell the difference between the two. What is your target audience? If you really need 7 (or more?) channels, your best bed is FMOD, which is non-free.

There are few active devs left these days, and I doubt an overhaul of the audio API is something they want to spend their time on. If you have valid concerns other than just "omg its so complicated" then by all means start a discussion on the mailing list. And if you think the docs are lacking important information then make a patch and submit it.

I've barely used the sound API in Allegro at all, but it didn't take me very long to get a working example. As for why I can't create a voice I'm going to debug that now. Had to rebuild Allegro so I could hack on it. Took me two hours to get all the dumb dependencies built. Did I mention how much I hate autotools? CMake is far superior and much easier to work with.

I'm not whining, I am agreeing with the original poster. He finds it overly complicated as well as others.

I could care less anymore as I can do what I want with SDL2. You may not like to hear that, and I hate to have to convert to another library when I have always loved Allegro, but after years of being told to put up or shut up by people like you, I have had it.

If I could program it myself, I wouldn't be using this or any library (actually,. I have done it myself with some straight Windows programming and no libraries), so expecting people to "help out or shut up" is very rude and is what drives people away.

It's more than that one simple function to change it as I recall it from the past, but you need more before you use it in place which is where the pain the buttocks comes into play. I don't have time to reprogram a library and debate this, if it doesn't work easy for me, like Allegro 4 could, than I will find a library that will do it. And I am not alone in this thinking.

But hey, keep telling everyone they are wrong about this. I liked the simplicity of Allegro 4, that's what attracted most people to it. And I like most of Allegro 5, and yes, I can play sounds with it and music via OGG files which is fine. Most of the time that is enough, but for a few things, it can be a pain where Allegro 4 was not. I feel that Allegro 5 provides more flexibility to do things that the vast majority don't want or need while sacrificing the ease of use where it is important.

The example worked "YAAAAAAAY!"

I changed my settings to ALLEGRO_AUDIO_DEPTH_INT16, bit the sounds were still hit and miss though.

Sigh.

I also think that A4 had some very user-friendly shortcuts that I don't see in A5.
For example I would use release_voice()(*) as soon as a game element gets destroyed/de-allocated, and A4 would take care of not cutting any remaining sound it was emitting ("Aaaaarggg-")
I don't see any equivalent in A5, and I think re-implementing it outside allegro is more than a few lines of code :
- Keeping track of 'to be deleted resources' in a collection that allows removal in any order (doubly linked list)
- Periodically check for completed sounds to clean up their resources. It can be implemented by a timer and its own event queue, but host program still has to call the cleanup function a few times per second.

(*) https://www.allegro.cc/manual/4/api/digital-sample-routines/voice-control/release_voice

A good compiler would have told you "unknown escape sequence '\h'"
(My first compiler was not gcc-based, and I made the same mistake several times)