Unmuting device does not work

[chrissound]

Not too sure how I could give additional information. When unmuting via volumeicon it does not unmute the device.

Volume Icon 0.5.1
pulseaudio 9.0

[nils-eilers]

I can confirm this issue.

Volume icon 0.5.1, pulseaudio 7.1

[nkoep]

Just hit this issue myself, and remembered this bug report. Oddly enough, this is the same behavior as in alsamixer. Muting the Master channel mutes all channels, but unmuting Master only unmutes Master, not PCM, etc. This behavior seems to be related to pulseaudio though, and therefore isn't an issue of ALSA or volumeicon for that matter (see https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/alsa-utils/+bug/1026331 and https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pulseaudio/+bug/878986). A simple workaround which solves the issue for me is to set the channel in volumeicon to PCM rather than Master as muting PCM does not affect any other channels, and therefore doesn't mute Master which in turn would cause all other channels to be muted.

Alternatively, making the virtual "pulse" device the default device in ~/.asoundrc works as well for me:

pcm.pulse {
    type pulse
}

ctl.pulse {
    type pulse
}

pcm.default pulse
ctl.default pulse

[milahu]

A simple workaround which solves the issue for me is to set the channel in volumeicon to PCM

yes, this works at first sight.
the problem is, when i seek in audio/video files, then i hear loud clipping noises,
with PCM channel set to 100% volume,
and both Master and Headphone channel set to 20% volume.

pcm.default pulse
ctl.default pulse

syntax error:
ALSA lib conf.c:1207:(parse_value) default is not a string

this is valid:

#!/bin/bash

cat >>~/.asoundrc <<'EOF'

# redirect ALSA to PulseAudio

pcm.pulse {
    type pulse
}

ctl.pulse {
    type pulse
}

pcm.!default {
    type pulse
}

ctl.!default {
    type pulse
}

EOF

but this dont solve "the unmute problem" for me.

i need both channels, Master and Headphone.

mute and unmute is working in the pavucontrol program,
so there must be something wrong in the volumeicon code.

workarounds:

use xfce4-pulseaudio-plugin with "Enable keyboard shortcuts for volume control" (default),

or use pa-applet (as icon) and xfce4-volumed-pulse (to bind hotkeys)

or bind key XF86AudioMute to command "amixer set Master toggle"
... or to command "pactl set-sink-mute @DEFAULT_SINK@ toggle"
(with the Xbindkeys program)

[daviewales]

On MX fluxbox, my workaround is:

Comment out the mute options in ~/.config/volumeicon/volumeicon

#mute_enabled=true
#mute=XF86AudioMute

Add toggle command in ~/.fluxbox/keys:

XF86AudioMute :Exec pactl set-sink-mute 0 toggle