LANCommander.Redistributables.OpenALSoft

Automatically built LANCommander redistributable import package (.LCX) for OpenAL Soft.

OpenAL Soft is a software implementation of the OpenAL 3D audio API. It is a drop-in replacement for the original Creative OpenAL runtime, which a great many early-2000s titles require and which no longer installs cleanly on modern Windows. Installing it per game is usually enough to bring sound back.

Install it

Download redistributable.lcx from the latest release and import it through your LANCommander server's Redistributables page, or from the CLI:

LANCommander.Launcher.CLI Import --Path redistributable.lcx --Type Redistributable

Then assign it to the games that need it, from either the game's Redistributables field or this redistributable's Games field.

Re-importing a newer release updates the existing entry rather than creating a second one, because the identifiers in redistributable.yml are stable across releases. You can also import once and leave it alone: the package ships a Package script that a LANCommander server runs on a schedule to pull new versions straight from this repository's releases.

What it installs

The runtime is deployed into the game's own directory, not into System32. Replacing the system-wide OpenAL would affect every application on the machine, which is both riskier and broader than a per-game redistributable should be.

File
OpenAL32.dll	The runtime, which upstream ships as soft_oal.dll
alsoft.ini	The default configuration, written from the option schema
OpenAL-COPYING.txt	The upstream LGPL text

The Install script reads the PE header of the game's primary executable and deploys the matching 32- or 64-bit build. A mismatched DLL does not error — it simply fails to load, and the game falls back to silence.

Options

The schema is generated from OpenAL Soft's own alsoftrc.sample, so it covers every documented option — 89 of them across 12 groups — and picks up new ones automatically as upstream adds them.

Group
Output	Channel configuration, sample type, sample rate, stereo mode and encoding
Hrtf	Head-related transfer function, for positional audio over headphones
Performance	Buffer sizing, resampler, source and slot limits
General	Everything else global, including crossfeed and backend order
Decoder	Ambisonic decoder configuration
Uhj, Tsme	Stereo-compatible surround encoding
Reverb, Eax	Environmental audio extensions
Wasapi, Wave	Windows backend tuning and wave-file output
Game_compat	Per-title compatibility quirks

Linux and BSD backend groups (PipeWire, PulseAudio, ALSA, OSS, Solaris, JACK, PortAudio) are excluded — 26 options a Windows game will never reach.

Administrators can override any option per game from the game's Redistributables page. Values resolve as schema default, then per-game value, then per-action override.

How this repository works

File	Purpose
redistributable.yml	Identity, payload source, config paths, stable script GUIDs
source.ps1	Downloads the upstream release and the matching alsoftrc.sample
Schema.Overlay.yml	Hand-written curation: names, descriptions, choices, grouping
OptionSchema.yml	Generated from alsoft.ini, then curated. Do not edit by hand
Scripts/*.ps1	DetectInstall, Install, Uninstall and the server-side Package updater

OptionSchema.yml is generated, and the build fails if the committed copy does not match what the upstream config produces. To regenerate it locally:

Import-Module <hub>/module/LANCommander.Redistributables
Invoke-RedistributableBuild -RepositoryPath . -UpdateSchema

Edit Schema.Overlay.yml to change how an option is presented; never edit OptionSchema.yml, since the next rebuild overwrites it.

Staying current

A scheduled workflow watches kcat/openal-soft for new releases. When one appears it downloads the new alsoftrc.sample, regenerates the option schema through the overlay, and opens a pull request listing exactly which options were added, removed, or had their defaults change. Merging it publishes the release.

Because the parser enumerates whatever keys the sample config contains, an option OpenAL Soft adds is picked up with no change to any script here. It ships with the description upstream wrote for it, and the pull request flags it so a friendlier name can be added if it needs one.

Licensing

The scripts and workflows here are MIT licensed. OpenAL Soft itself is LGPL v2 and is not ours — see LICENSES/NOTICE.md for attribution, the obligations we carry, and where to obtain the corresponding source.