I don't know about a HOWTO, but here's the minimal set of things you
can do to get Speak Freely working with another user over the 'net. I
hope this isn't illegal or something -- if it is, you guys better chip
in for my defense fund :)
Using Speak Freely to Voice Chat over the Internet
Speak Freely is a peer-to-peer voice transmission and receiving
program for Linux/Unix and Windows. While Speak Freely has advanced
features like answering machine, conference mode and busy signals,
this document discusses only the basic voice chat functionality using
a Linux system.
In order to use Speak Freely you need to do the following:
1. Test your sound hardware
2. Download the software
3. Test with an echo server
4. Chat with your friend/relative/business associate/etc.
1. Test your sound hardware
You already have your speakers going, don't you? If not, do that
first. Now plug your mike into the appropriate socket on your sound
card (usually the 3rd or the 4th socket on the card). Test your mike
by giving the following commands:
rec junk.au
[say something into the mike and then press ^C]
play rec.au
You should hear a weird voice (yours :-) repeating what you'd said.
If you don't, make sure that your speakers are on, the volume setting
is high enough and that the mike is enabled as the input device (in a
mixer like gmix, select the Rec button under the mike panel, and put
the gain control slider up to maximum). Make sure that the Mute
button under the mike is NOT checked.
2. Download and install the software
I downloaded Speak Freely source code from the URL given under for
Speak Freely for Unix. I compiled it with the following commands:
tar zxof speak_freely-7.2.tar.gz
cd speak_freely-7.2
edit Makefile and change the following in the Linux section:
CCFLAGS = -DAUDIO_BLOCKING -DLINUX -DM_LITTLE_ENDIAN -DNEEDED_LINEAR
CC = gcc -O3 # for GNU's gcc compiler
LFLAGS = -lncurses -lm
make
make install
It may also be a good idea to download and install xspeakfree, the
Tcl/Tk front-end to Speak Freely. I downloaded
xspeakfree-0.8.2.tar.gz and installed it with:
sh install.sh /usr/local
This will install the software in /usr/local/{bin,lib}.
Installing the Windows version is trivial: download the installer
executable from the URL given below and run it. I tried it in Wine
and it ran first shot.
If you have problems with compiling or installing the software, I'll
be glad to do it for you for a small fee. [The usual small fee is
half your kingdom and your daughter's hand in marriage.]
3. Test with an echo server
Load up xspeakfree and right-click on echo.fourmilab.ch in the Host
List. Select Connect to Host from the menu. Now select Push Button 2
To Talk from the microphone checkboxes on top.
The echo server should send anything you send it back after 10
seconds. First you can try sending the built-in ring file.
Right-click on the echo server host name and select Send ring from the
menu. You should get a ring sound back after 10 seconds. Now click
the middle mouse button anywhere in the window and speak something
into the microphone. That should play on your speaker too after 10
seconds.
4. Chat
Now that you have got your sound hardware going and installed and
tested the software, this part is easy. Close any open connections
and select New from the Connection menu in xspeakfree. Enter the IP
address or domain name of the host your friend is on and press Enter
-- voila! you are online with your friend.
Of couse, your friend also has to do the complementary operation at
her end: connect to your computer. If you don't know your friends IP
or if your friend is a Windows weenie and can't figure out her IP
address, give her your IP address (ifconfig), let her connect to your
computer and send some sound to you. Your session status window will
then show you her IP/domain address, and you can connect to that.
Press Mouse-button-2 whenever you want to talk. Receiving is
asynchronous.
Regards,
-- Raju
>>>>> "Cool" == solvecool <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Cool> Hello Raju It will be great help for others , if you send a
Cool> HOWTO and the problems u faced while doing this to the
Cool> mailing list,People like me can get much help out of it
Cool> expecting a posting from u soon Thanks Cool
Cool> Raju Mathur wrote:
>> Thanks for all the tips, folks. I finally ended up downloading
>> Speak Freely for Linux, getting my brother to get the Windows
>> version and tried out chatting. We chatted for about an hour,
>> with no major problems. The issues I noticed were:
>>
>> - Voice is delayed by something like 2-3 seconds each way. I
>> wonder why, since the packet ping time is quite low (by dial-up
>> standards)
>>
>> - My bro's computer wasn't able to handle full duplex very well
>> when both of us were speaking simultaneously. Well, it's
>> Windows and who knows what the driver for the card is written
>> to do? Apart from that we could keep our mikes open with no
>> noticeable loss of quality.
>>
>> - Whenever fetchmail would start up to download my mail the
>> remote voice would start breaking up -- contention for
>> bandwidth on the link. I solved the problem by either not
>> listening at that time <g> or, if it was important, telling him
>> to hold on for a few seconds.
>>
>> Connecting was a breeze: just give the IP/hostname of the
>> remote computer and Speak Freely will start transmitting. You
>> have to run the receiver program seperately on the Linux
>> command line (or automatically through the GUI -- see under) to
>> play recieved voice. I haven't yet investigated a way to
>> receive from only one host at a time, though I think that
>> should be possible with the Busy Signal option.
>>
>> In summary, Speak Freely with the default GSM encoding works
>> quite well for informal chatting over a dial-up link. I've
>> tried it to the US and to Canada (at early mornings/late
>> evenings) and faced no significant issues.
>>
>> Speak Freely also support conferencing, a user database and
>> data encryption (if you're likely to be discussing state
>> secrets over the 'net... I was chatting about my niece's
>> birthday, etc, so didn't feel the need for encryption ;-) I've
>> tried IDEA encryption and the CPU bar on my PIII/500MHz/512MB
>> secondary cache didn't even blink with both encryption and GSM
>> encoding going on simultaneously.
>>
>> Speak Freely is available for Windows from:
>> http://www.speakfreely.org/ and for Linux/Unix from:
>> http://www.fourmilab.ch/speakfree/unix . Apart from the
>> features above, it also supports an answering machine, echo
>> mode (for testing -- there's an echo server in Switzerland too
>> which you can use to test your setup) and ICQ interoperability
>> on Windows.
>>
>> The Linux version is command-line, but there's a contributed
>> Tcl/Tk GUI wrapper (xspeakfree) which is what I use.
>>
>> Anyone who wants to chat at non-peak-traffic times can send me
>> a mail, or a Yahoo message to kandalaya. If I don't reply to
>> the message, it means I'm on SMS (message coming to the phone),
>> so either wait or try later :-)
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> -- Raju
>>
>>
>>>>>>> "Raju" == Raju Mathur <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>>>>>>>
>>
Raju> Anyone tried doing voice over a slow (28.8) dialup? Is it
Raju> possible, and if yes, what encoding should one be using?
>>
--
Raju Mathur [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://kandalaya.org/
It is the mind that moves
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