PA requires manual selection of USB mic as input source when that mic is plugged in

[jensck]

When I plug in my USB webcam (Logitech Quickcam Pro for Notebooks), PA recognizes its built-in mic just fine, but I am forced to go into GNOME's sound properties, and manually select the radio button for the mic, even though there is no other input source listed in the Input tab.

(The system has another input -- the sound card's mic input -- but I disabled that in the Hardware tab in hopes that PA would get the clue about using the USB mic.)

I read the "Canned Response" about defaults/fallbacks, but does PA really need to be told what to do when a new input source shows up... when there weren't any others to choose from previously?

For reference, I'm running the Fedora 13 beta, on this PC: http://www.smolts.org/client/show/pub_c1d09a26-ca94-4f7b-89c7-d984afd521ce

[coling]

Hmm, right. I suspect that there is a "default" already but it's hidden from normal view. All audio outputs (which I presume you have - if not you'll have a dummy output anyway and the same logic applies) have a corresponding "Monitor Source" this acts just like a Mic for all intent purposes but is generally hidden from view in the GUIs.

What has happened is that this monitor source will have been set as the default and when the mic comes along it doesn't change the default, even tho' common sense dictates that it should.

To be honest this just another example of where I think the routing rules in PA are lacking and I believe my proposal to implement a more robust routing system would solve this problem (short answer is that when a new device comes along it gets inserted at the end of a priority list of devices. It would make sense that the input priority list would always insert new devices not at the end, but below the last non-monitor device. If there are no non-monitor devices, then it would go at the top of the list and thus take over as "default").