[alsa-devel] S/PDIF and track markers (echo3g)

[Mark Hills]

Hi,

Is there any provision in ALSA (either within the kernel or libasound) for 
extracting track marker information from S/PDIF?

I have a large number of MiniDisc recordings to preserve as FLAC format.

Losing track markers would be a huge inconvenience, though I don't care 
for the rest of the metadata (track names etc..)

There's enough recordings to be worth developing specific software for the 
archival if it can access this information.

I don't really know which path is likely to be successful:

* An ALSA API to access the information; though I can't see anything
  specific to track markers

* Whether a timecode could be used to detect track change; but I can't see 
  any in /proc/asound/Layla3G/status

* Does ALSA provide access to raw AES streams, so I could decode it in 
  userland? I'm un-sure if this relates to hardware AC3 decoding.

* Maybe this sort of status is only available to the firmware of the 
  interface and never makes it to userland (in my case, echo3g); though I 
  can see some constants relating to 'non audio' S/PDIF.

The hardware I have here is Echo Layla 3G (snd-echo3g) and a Pioneer 
MJ-D707 MiniDisc recorder.

Any advice appreciated -- many thanks.

-- 
Mark