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by dimsuz 697 days ago
Is this planned to be addressed/fixed? (single-client model) Maybe there were previous attempts?
1 comments

No, because there's nothing to fix (at the system side).

Apps should use the right API from the right layer; when they skip something, no wonder they will miss whatever the skipped layer provides. When they do not need exclusive access to the device and want to play nice with the other apps, they should use pipewire/pulseaudio.

For 99% of apps, using ALSA directly is the wrong approach. You don't use IOKit directly in Mac apps either.

Pipewire/Pulseaudio install a plugin for ALSA library so that ALSA applications audio is rerouted to audio daemon. So apps using ALSA can work at both systems with and without an audio daemon.
At this day and age there should not be a system without an audio daemon. At least not one, that is not broken. Apps should not certainly accommodate for broken systems, and forcing workarounds for the correct ones.