Flash player sound solution

[James McNaughton]

The Problem:

Using native Mozilla and
linuxpluginwrapper/linux-flashplugin (on 4.10-stable
et al) to view flash content results in no sound and
occasional Mozilla freezes.

The Solution:

Run esd.

How:

I was searching the web for the solution, and got
nowhere. There didn't seem to be anyone who had gotten
it to work. Linux mailing lists noted a problem with
file permissions on /dev/snd or /dev/pcm* depending on
the sound system drivers installed. My /dev/pcm* file
permissions were all rw to begin with, so this didn't
help.

I wondered what device the plugin was actually trying
to access, so I did "strings 
/usr/local/lib/linux-flashplugin6/libflashplayer.so"
and found /dev/dsp and /dev/mixer. Nearby in the list
I noticed a few lines relating to esd. From a command
line I started esd and went back to view some content
that had previously frozen Mozilla, and there was
sound coming out my speakers and the browser did not
hang.

I had long suspected the browser hangs were related to
sound in the flash content. My results seem to confirm
that suspicion.

Jim