Moonlight Sonata

With help from the project wiki, I succeeded in configuring MPD on my server. Then I installed the Sonata client on my laptop. However, it refused to connect. When I ran it from a terminal, I saw this message:

[Errno 111] Connection refused

I guessed there was a problem with my server configuration, but I didn't know what it was. Luckily the troubleshooting section of the wiki pointed out that bind_to_address should not be set to "localhost" if you want to connect from a client on another host. I commented out that line and got a connection the next time I started Sonata.

Little Debbie

About a week ago, I noticed that the music I have on my second 80GB hard drive doesn't fill even half the space. So I did what any self-respecting geek would do; I installed Debian in the free space. As usual, I had a couple of false starts before I got going.

Debian proved to be challenging to install and configure. This may have been due, in part, to the quirks of my Dell GX270. (Linux has historically had trouble handling the USB controllers in certain Dell machines.)

Initially I installed the 2.4 kernel. But when I discovered I could have chosen the 2.6 kernel instead, I decided to try it. It didn't work so well. Every time it reached a certain point in the boot sequence—presumably the point at which the USB controllers are probed—it would encounter a "control timeout on ep0in". The Xserver wouldn't start. I searched all over the Internet but was unable to find any information on this error. I found more users with the same problem, but no one had a solution. Frustrated, I decided it wasn't worth the trouble. The earlier kernel didn't support a hardware abstraction layer (HAL), but at least it didn't break my Xserver.

Having finally settled on the 2.4 kernel, I realized Debian doesn't have the same set of packages as Ubuntu does. This wasn't a huge surprise per se, but I was annoyed to find that many of the packages I easily installed via Synaptic in Ubuntu 5.10 were nowhere to be found. In particular, the NVIDIA drivers were absent. Luckily Andrew Schulman, a statistician and programmer at the EPA, wrote step-by-step instructions for installing the drivers in Debian. The key point I gleaned from reading them was that the drivers aren't available in the same kind of monolithic package found in the Ubuntu repositories. With Ubuntu, I didn't have to choose between different kernel modules; there was one package called "nvidia-glx" and that was what I installed. Debian has a different package for each kernel (e.g. nvidia-kernel-2.4.27-2-386 for the 2.4 kernel on the Intel 386 architecture) plus the nvidia-kernel-common package. Once I realized that, I had no problem installing the drivers.

Maybe this is just my machine, but sometimes the Xserver doesn't seem to start with the correct display settings. It happened in Ubuntu as well. I hear the sound telling me the login screen has loaded, but I see only a blank screen. When that happens, pressing Ctrl+Alt+Backspace to restart the Xserver usually fixes it.

I should have mentioned this right up front, but installing playback support for proprietary multimedia formats is a pain in the rear in Debian. Either rip all your music in Ogg Vorbis—or FLAC, if you have a small collection or a large hard drive—or get used to the idea of installing a ton of unstable and/or experimental packages from unofficial sources such as Christian Marillat and RareWares. Getting AAC support in XMMS was, by far, the most difficult task. It seems I've almost completely repressed the unpleasant memories. I do recall the necessary plugin being in a package called something like "xmms-aac" or "xmms-faad".

After fussing with the AAC plugin, I didn't feel like doing much else. I downloaded a Debian wallpaper I like better than the default one. Now I'm eyeing a different one, though. But these decisions are hardly momentous.

I'm impressed with Debian, but I don't think I'd give up Ubuntu for it. Ubuntu makes it easier to add the features I want without jumping through a lot of hoops. Even so, I imagine there's a reason so many university CS labs use Debian systems—I just haven't found it yet.

XMMS INXS

Enabling Ogg Vorbis and MP3 Playback in XMMS

I finally overcame my aversion to the unattractive XMMS interface long enough to install it and discover it doesn't work. I can add songs to the playlist, but as soon as I hit play the application stops responding. I opened the Terminal and tried running it from there. It greeted me with an error message.

libmikmod.so.2: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Apparently XMMS couldn't find one of the libraries it needs. I went into Synaptic and searched for "mikmod". I didn't find an exact match, so I decided to consult the Unofficial Ubuntu 5.04 Starter Guide. The guide includes a long list of multimedia codecs in a section appropriately titled, "Q: How to install Multimedia Codecs?" I located the gstreamer0.8-plugins package in Synaptic and installed it. This could also be done in the Terminal.

sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.8-plugins

The error message didn't appear, but XMMS still refuses to play anything. Perhaps it's time to consult Ubuntu Forums. One poster suggests changing the XMMS output plugin. I pared his instructions down to three easy steps.

1. Options -> Preferences (Ctrl+P)
2. Audio I/O Plugins
3. Select a different output plugin from the list.
   

With gstreamer0.8-plugins and the output plugin set to ESD, I can play Ogg Vorbis and MP3 files. For AAC files, I'll need additional plugins not found in the default repositories. So I must add the necessary repositories.

Adding Repositories

Before I start, I should back up the file I'll be editing.

sudo cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.bak
sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Now I edit the file.

[…]

deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary universe
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary universe

deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary-security main restricted
deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary-security main restricted

deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary-security universe
deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary-security universe

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary multiverse
deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hoary multiverse

## Backports
deb http://ubuntu-backports.mirrormax.net/ hoary-backports main universe multiverse restricted
deb http://ubuntu-backports.mirrormax.net/ hoary-extras main universe multiverse restricted

I save the edited file and update the package lists.

sudo apt-get update

AAC Playback

To play AAC files, I installed the gstreamer0.8-faad package. I used Synaptic again, but if you prefer you can use the Terminal.

sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.8-faad

Ironically, after all the time I spent getting XMMS working, it turns out gstreamer0.8-faad provides an AAC decoder for Rhythmbox but not XMMS. I checked several forums, and they all seemed to indicate that AAC playback in XMMS has yet to be perfected. Oh, well. I'll use Rhythmbox as I originally intended. Now I can listen to music while I fiddle with Ubuntu. I call that a major victory.



Our Next Episode

This weekend Live Gnude Girls will reveal the secrets of Direct Memory Access (DMA) and Advanced Linux Sound Architecture (ALSA). In other words, I'm going to get my CD-RW/DVD running faster than ever and make it possible for multiple applications to play sound at once. I'm looking forward to it.

Woe is me, MP3.

Today I've been working to import my music collection. It has involved some painful decisions.

After reading several compelling arguments in favor of the Ogg Vorbis format, I resolved to import my music in said format. Unfortunately, I stored much of my music in MP3 or AAC format. Sound Juicer and similar applications are strictly CD rippers—that is, they can only extract digital audio stored in the CDDA format. The only way to get the music already in MP3 or AAC format into Vorbis format would be to burn it to CD (in CDDA format) and rip it again. This isn't a good solution because MP3, AAC and Vorbis are all lossy formats. The process I just described would further degrade the audio quality, largely defeating the purpose of the Vorbis format. I'm left with little choice but to rip what I can using Sound Juicer and import the rest as is. Now there's still the difficulty of organizing all my music.

When I last checked, I had nearly 9GB of music on my PowerBook. And that's not even all of it. There's more at my parents' house in Philly. On the PowerBook, iTunes organizes my music for me. In Ubuntu, Sound Juicer will organize whatever it rips according to the user's instructions. Beyond that, there's no easy way to put music in directories with the structure Artist Name/Album Name/Track Number - Track Name. It looks like I'll be doing it manually. I suppose this is the price I pay for being so particular about how my music is organized. My life is so hard. Cry, cry.