net-im/skype* vs. linux-c6-*:

[Jerry]

On Sun, 23 Nov 2014 02:20:36 +0100, Felix Palmen stated:

>Hello,
>
>Am Dienstag, 11. November 2014, 15:23:12 schrieben Sie:
>> a) as far as I know Microsoft doesn't allow any client before 4.3, that
>> would block net-im/skype and net-im/skype-devel. If you test, and find it
>> works, can you let me know please?
>> 
>> b) we're still lacking the syscalls required by Skype 4.3 in 11.0-CURRENT,
>> although dchagin@ is making good progress.
>
>for a), it's possible to circumvent that by once connecting with 4.3, then 
>downgrading to 4.2. It can be patched to report the same version string as 
>4.3, but I didn't test, whether this is strictly required. Given the fact
>that 11-CURRENT can obviously run skype 4.3 just fine now, but still has
>problems with the linux pulseaudio libs (thus, rendering a skype version
>that supports sound only through pulseaudio pointless), I came up with the
>following workaround for getting a fully working skype at the moment, as
>long as there are things missing for linux-pulseaudio:
>
>1.) Get hold of an earlier version of net-im/skype4 still installing skype 
>4.2, place it in net-im/skype42 for convenience
>
>2.) remove the broken flag and the pulseaudio dependency from net-im/skype4 
>Makefile
>
>3.) install net-im/skype4, run it, log on making sure you check the checkbox 
>for automatic logon (important!).
>
>4.) exit skype, make sure no process is left over (use kill -9 if necessary)
>
>5.) uninstall net-im/skype4, install net-im/skype42
>
>6.) This MIGHT be unneccesary, not sure about this -- patch skype 4.2 to 
>report 4.3 version string:
># gsed -i 
>"s/\x34\x2E\x32\x2E\x30\x2E\x31\x33/\x34\x2E\x33\x2E\x30\x2E\x33\x37/g" 
>/usr/local/share/skype/skype
>
>Skype should now work. This assumes running a system recent enough to run 
>skype 4.3 (obviously, without the pulseaudio stuff), having chosen the -c6 
>linux ports as default and having a working setup for alsa shim in 
>/compat/linux/etc/alsa/pcm/pcm-oss.conf

It never ceases to amaze me how much effort people will put into trying to
hack something to get it to work, when if the same effort were put into making
the system truly compliant it would reward the end user with far more benefits
and reduce future problems. In the long run, it would most likely be easier
to do too.

-- 
Jerry