alsa and sox questions

[Gregory Nowak]

Hi all,

I've been reading here recently that people have been installing alsa 0.90 beta 11. Where did all of you get that from? The newest thing on the alsa-project.org ftp site is still 0.90 beta 9.

I also have a sox question. As we know, most audio tapes are recorded to play through both left and right speakers. I think this is defined as left and right channels, but if this isn't correct, please assume that it is throughout this post. Based on reading the sox man page, I think I can do the following, but I need someone to reassure me. 

Say again that I have a standard audio tape recorded with left and right channels. Is there a way for me to strip one of the channels from a wave file recording of that tape using sox? What I'm asking is if I record this tape as a wave file, can I then strip either the left or right channels from this recording?

Alternatively, let's say that I already have a wave recording where one of the channels has already been stripped, which leaves me with a left channel only from the original tape. Can I use sox to mix the data on that left channel into both a left and right channels? 

Please forgive the weirdness of theese questions. However, I really do not care to elaborate why I'm asking them. Yes, it is for a purpose, and depending on what answers I get, I may or may not do what I'm planning, it really is a long story. Thanks for bearing with me, and for any help in advance.
Greg