[mikewhy]

I was playing Spider-Man with a dual sense and got wondering. That game puts out audio to your speakers, a separate audio stream to the speaker in the controller, and _another_ stream of audio for the haptics. Is this any bit possible with any Linux audio solution?

[jeroenhd]

I don't see why that wouldn't be possible with Pipewire. The system will provision your application with the default audio output but through the Pipewire API you can send any audio stream(s) you want to any device(s) you want.

I've played around with patchbay software to manage existing audio streams. I've sent audio to both my headset and streaming software, adding a block of effects inbetween through JACK audio software, and used a similar JACK audio interface to put audio from a voice chat app to the front left and then piped it into my headphones.

I don't know the API for creating audio streams directly but as long as you can introduce enough sources and expose every audio output as a separate sink (i.e. one for your controller) it's all relatively easy.

I doubt game developers will make use of this any time soon, though. Maybe if the success of the Steam Deck brings a new life to Steam Machines?

[mikewhy]

Hmm, I suppose that could work, didn't think about targeting the Pipewire api.

I didn't play around with it much, but the controller did appear as a 5.1 (or was it 7.1?) in Linux.

Oh, and I forgot, the controller itself also has a headphone jack. The controller itself can take 3 audio streams, two of which can be used for sound.