Somewhat frustrating: Ubuntu 18.04's default MPD install assumes a system-wide configuration, with attendant systemd service and socket activation files.
It doesn't work. MPD does not play nice with Pulseaudio if running as a different user. You'll tear your hair out trying to get it to work.
I'm not sure why they would distribute it like this. It's kind of dense.
@sullybiker pulse + mpd is super frustrating. Even though I have it "working", it's the one thing that I resort to a reboot for when it breaks.
@CDC Yes, I had it set up on my Slackware box just for my user and it was fine; there is a workaround for Pulse that supposedly allows using 127.0.0.1 as a remote server and this worked until a recent update wherein it is now borked again. Oh well!
@sullybiker yah I went through a similar cycle a while back and gave up and ran mpd as my desktop user
@CDC So far this is my first experience of Pulse being really difficult about something simple, as per its reputation...
Conventional wisdom, and indeed Arch, Slackware or anyone else just recommends running it as yourself.