Media playing software - do they all build their own indexes or what?
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers. One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things. How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what? Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still? -- Chris Green
On 13 March 2011 13:57, Chris G <cl@isbd.net> wrote:
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
I'd go for XMMS, modeled after Winamp 2.x series.. or similar. I used to have all my music organised in a neat hierarchy of folders and just right-click on a folder, open with XMMS and it'll playlist those files, all the ID3 information is kept on the files. I hate what iTunes does to music libraries but I can kind of see why they do it - although your average user doesn't understand the "library" method of organising files and usually winds up with tonnes of duplicates etc. -Simon
On 13 March 2011 17:01, Simon Elliott <alug@sionide.net> wrote:
On 13 March 2011 13:57, Chris G <cl@isbd.net> wrote:
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
I'd go for XMMS, modeled after Winamp 2.x series.. or similar. I used
XMMS is ancient. You could use XMMS2 or Audacious2 or equivalent. -Srdjan
On 13 March 2011 17:09, Srdjan Todorovic <todorovic.s@googlemail.com> wrote:
On 13 March 2011 17:01, Simon Elliott <alug@sionide.net> wrote:
On 13 March 2011 13:57, Chris G <cl@isbd.net> wrote:
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
I'd go for XMMS, modeled after Winamp 2.x series.. or similar. I used
XMMS is ancient. You could use XMMS2 or Audacious2 or equivalent.
Gah. That's the one I meant...! I don't use a local player any more, generally just stream from Grooveshark or Hypem. -Si
On 13/03/11 13:57, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
I tried various things until I settled on mpd + client of choice Also unlike others such as Amarok (which will do what you want as long as you tell it to not reorganise files) it isn't a resource hog and if you grow tired of the user interface you just use a different one without having to rebuild indexes, hell you can even have multiple interfaces connected at the same time. For the client side I would say that Ario is probably the best GUI client and ncmpcpp is the best text mode one, I pretty much always use ncmpcpp as I can just tuck it away somewhere in a terminal window and once you have memorised the key commands it is just lovely to use.
How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what?
Yes that's generally how they work, most of them won't reorganise the file structure unless you tell them to
On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 08:39:07AM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 13/03/11 13:57, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
I tried various things until I settled on mpd + client of choice
Also unlike others such as Amarok (which will do what you want as long as you tell it to not reorganise files) it isn't a resource hog and if you grow tired of the user interface you just use a different one without having to rebuild indexes, hell you can even have multiple interfaces connected at the same time.
For the client side I would say that Ario is probably the best GUI client and ncmpcpp is the best text mode one, I pretty much always use ncmpcpp as I can just tuck it away somewhere in a terminal window and once you have memorised the key commands it is just lovely to use.
How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what?
Yes that's generally how they work, most of them won't reorganise the file structure unless you tell them to
Thanks for all that information, at the very least it gives me somewhere to start and the mpd + client approach sounds a good idea to me. -- Chris Green
On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 08:39:07AM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 13/03/11 13:57, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
I tried various things until I settled on mpd + client of choice
I'm trying mpd+ario+ncmpcpp, all looks fairly good to me. One question occurs however - how do you get music into the mdp default directory (/var/lib/mpd) without being root? Do you simply change its default music directory to somewhere more accessible or do you play clever games with permissions so an ordinary user can put music there, or what? I've no real problem with using root to do some things but I'd prefer not to have to be root just to store music files. -- Chris Green
On 16/03/11 18:24, Chris G wrote:
I'm trying mpd+ario+ncmpcpp, all looks fairly good to me. One question occurs however - how do you get music into the mdp default directory (/var/lib/mpd) without being root? Do you simply change its default music directory to somewhere more accessible or do you play clever games with permissions so an ordinary user can put music there, or what?
No you change that to some more logical place for music, in my case it happens to be a nfs volume on a media server. No idea why it defaults there. Take care to learn all the magic keypresses in ncmpcpp it really is very very good
On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 10:14:04PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 16/03/11 18:24, Chris G wrote:
I'm trying mpd+ario+ncmpcpp, all looks fairly good to me. One question occurs however - how do you get music into the mdp default directory (/var/lib/mpd) without being root? Do you simply change its default music directory to somewhere more accessible or do you play clever games with permissions so an ordinary user can put music there, or what?
No you change that to some more logical place for music, in my case it happens to be a nfs volume on a media server. No idea why it defaults there.
OK, thanks. Next silly question, it seems that one has to open up all sorts of network permissions to allow access to mpd from other computers on the LAN. Is this really so? The information I've found about this seems to suggest it's fairly "edit the configuration files" sort of stuff which is OK by me but it feels as if it shouldn't really be this difficult.
Take care to learn all the magic keypresses in ncmpcpp it really is very very good
Yes, OK, I like the idea of command line access to my music. -- Chris Green
On 17 Mar 09:40, Chris G wrote:
On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 10:14:04PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 16/03/11 18:24, Chris G wrote:
I'm trying mpd+ario+ncmpcpp, all looks fairly good to me. One question occurs however - how do you get music into the mdp default directory (/var/lib/mpd) without being root? Do you simply change its default music directory to somewhere more accessible or do you play clever games with permissions so an ordinary user can put music there, or what?
No you change that to some more logical place for music, in my case it happens to be a nfs volume on a media server. No idea why it defaults there.
OK, thanks.
Next silly question, it seems that one has to open up all sorts of network permissions to allow access to mpd from other computers on the LAN. Is this really so? The information I've found about this seems to suggest it's fairly "edit the configuration files" sort of stuff which is OK by me but it feels as if it shouldn't really be this difficult.
Looks like just the one port, to me, and by default 6600, tcp. So, erm, what exact "network permissions" are you meaning?
Take care to learn all the magic keypresses in ncmpcpp it really is very very good
Yes, OK, I like the idea of command line access to my music.
:) -- Brett Parker http://www.sommitrealweird.co.uk/ PGP Fingerprint 1A9E C066 EDEE 6746 36CB BD7F 479E C24F 95C7 1D61
On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 11:17:39AM +0000, Brett Parker wrote:
On 17 Mar 09:40, Chris G wrote:
On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 10:14:04PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 16/03/11 18:24, Chris G wrote:
I'm trying mpd+ario+ncmpcpp, all looks fairly good to me. One question occurs however - how do you get music into the mdp default directory (/var/lib/mpd) without being root? Do you simply change its default music directory to somewhere more accessible or do you play clever games with permissions so an ordinary user can put music there, or what?
No you change that to some more logical place for music, in my case it happens to be a nfs volume on a media server. No idea why it defaults there.
OK, thanks.
Next silly question, it seems that one has to open up all sorts of network permissions to allow access to mpd from other computers on the LAN. Is this really so? The information I've found about this seems to suggest it's fairly "edit the configuration files" sort of stuff which is OK by me but it feels as if it shouldn't really be this difficult.
Looks like just the one port, to me, and by default 6600, tcp. So, erm, what exact "network permissions" are you meaning?
When I try to connect to my mpd server from another computer on the LAN I get "connection refused", but exactly the same connection from the computer where mpd is running works fine. I googled for this issue and found a howto/tutorial that went through a whole lot of different ways of getting it to work (to do with pulseadio service permissions and network port permissions and such). Here's the link:- http://mpd.wikia.com/wiki/PulseAudio -- Chris Green
On 17/03/11 11:53, Chris G wrote:
I googled for this issue and found a howto/tutorial that went through a whole lot of different ways of getting it to work (to do with pulseadio service permissions and network port permissions and such).
That would only apply if you wanted to play music *from* the other machine. i.e. the client has the speakers. Mine is set up so the box with the speakers attached is the one running mpd and then I happen to run mpc from that as well but it appears to work from elsewhere without effort (well I think you have to tell mpd to respond to client requests from somewhere other than localhost in a config file somewhere) If you are going to set it up with network sound sinks in pulse that forward the audio to other clients that then control the mpd server then I would consider just running mpd at each host and attaching via nfs as I dunno if it can handle multiple client instances playing different music at the same time.
On Sun, 2011-03-13 at 13:57 +0000, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what?
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
My approach is that I organise the files in the library by putting them there myself rather than importing them with a music player, hence the directory structure of the library is of my choosing. Most players then go on to ignore the directory structure and present an interface based on a database they have created by reading the tags from the files (ID3tags (MP3) and Vorbis Comments (Ogg/Vorbis and FLAC). To support this I make sure files are have at least the basic tags correct at the time they go into the library. With this approach I know where to find something if I need it for some other reason, can play files from the command line or from a graphical shell and the squeezeboxes also allow me to browse by my directory structure as well as the usual Artist, Album, Song, Genre, Year routes. I can't recommend a Linux music player at the moment as I usually listen on the squeezebox as the sound quality is rather better than the sound card in my home PC and is always accessible even when the home PC is switched off. In the past I used xmms and more recently I have used mpd and rhythmbox and, in each case, I have pointed the player at the existing library. In the case of mpd by editing the config file and in the case of rhythmbox by specifying it in the preferences. Steve.
On Mon, Mar 21, 2011 at 11:13:39PM +0000, Steve Fosdick wrote:
On Sun, 2011-03-13 at 13:57 +0000, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what?
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
My approach is that I organise the files in the library by putting them there myself rather than importing them with a music player, hence the directory structure of the library is of my choosing.
Yes, that's what I'm aiming to do.
Most players then go on to ignore the directory structure and present an interface based on a database they have created by reading the tags from the files (ID3tags (MP3) and Vorbis Comments (Ogg/Vorbis and FLAC). To support this I make sure files are have at least the basic tags correct at the time they go into the library.
OK.
With this approach I know where to find something if I need it for some other reason, can play files from the command line or from a graphical shell and the squeezeboxes also allow me to browse by my directory structure as well as the usual Artist, Album, Song, Genre, Year routes.
I can't recommend a Linux music player at the moment as I usually listen on the squeezebox as the sound quality is rather better than the sound card in my home PC and is always accessible even when the home PC is switched off.
I'll probably go that way eventually but a squeezebox is relatively expensive. When you say "the sound quality is rather better than the sound card in my home PC", what are you comparing? I.e. I'm driving a decent hi-fi system from the line output on a PC, how will that compare with a squeezebox? While I'm about it are some sound cards/hardware known to be better than others for quality, noise levels, etc.?
In the past I used xmms and more recently I have used mpd and rhythmbox and, in each case, I have pointed the player at the existing library. In the case of mpd by editing the config file and in the case of rhythmbox by specifying it in the preferences.
Thanks for all this, very useful. -- Chris Green
On 22/03/11 10:11, Chris G wrote:
On Mon, Mar 21, 2011 at 11:13:39PM +0000, Steve Fosdick wrote:
On Sun, 2011-03-13 at 13:57 +0000, Chris G wrote:
I'm just beginning to dip my toe(s) into moving recorded music and other such things (e.g. radio programmes) onto a computer or computers.
One thing I'd prefer is to be able to keep all the files in a directory hierarchy of my own making rather than using a media player's own way of doing things.
How does most media player type software handle this? If you point them at a hierarchy full of sound files do they build their own indexes from the shape of the hierarchy and the content (as in genre information etc.) of the files or what?
Are there any (all?) that work like Digikam with images for instance where you can tell it to keep *all* of the information in the image files (as well as building its own index) so that if you move the hierarchy or want to access it with other software everything works still?
My approach is that I organise the files in the library by putting them there myself rather than importing them with a music player, hence the directory structure of the library is of my choosing.
Yes, that's what I'm aiming to do.
Most players then go on to ignore the directory structure and present an interface based on a database they have created by reading the tags from the files (ID3tags (MP3) and Vorbis Comments (Ogg/Vorbis and FLAC). To support this I make sure files are have at least the basic tags correct at the time they go into the library.
OK.
With this approach I know where to find something if I need it for some other reason, can play files from the command line or from a graphical shell and the squeezeboxes also allow me to browse by my directory structure as well as the usual Artist, Album, Song, Genre, Year routes.
I can't recommend a Linux music player at the moment as I usually listen on the squeezebox as the sound quality is rather better than the sound card in my home PC and is always accessible even when the home PC is switched off.
I'll probably go that way eventually but a squeezebox is relatively expensive. When you say "the sound quality is rather better than the sound card in my home PC", what are you comparing? I.e. I'm driving a decent hi-fi system from the line output on a PC, how will that compare with a squeezebox?
While I'm about it are some sound cards/hardware known to be better than others for quality, noise levels, etc.?
Can I point you to this site? http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Linux/Sound1/SoundComputing.html Jim Lesurf (the site's author) used to be a designer for Armstrong Audio and so knows a bit about audio reproduction. This section might also be of interest to some of the readers here - http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Linux/Sound3/TimeForChange.html
In the past I used xmms and more recently I have used mpd and rhythmbox and, in each case, I have pointed the player at the existing library. In the case of mpd by editing the config file and in the case of rhythmbox by specifying it in the preferences.
Thanks for all this, very useful.
-- __ __| |_ __ __ .----------------------------------------------. / _/ _` \ V V / | mailto:cdw_alug@the-walker-household.co.uk | \__\__,_|\_/\_/ |______________________________________________|
On 22/03/11 12:43, Chris Walker wrote:
Can I point you to this site? http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Linux/Sound1/SoundComputing.html
Jim Lesurf (the site's author) used to be a designer for Armstrong Audio and so knows a bit about audio reproduction.
This section might also be of interest to some of the readers here - http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Linux/Sound3/TimeForChange.html
Thanks for that Chris, very interesting stuff. Even more so when you have a healthy respect for Armstrong kit (I do, I used to service it for a living)
On 22/03/11 10:11, Chris G wrote:
While I'm about it are some sound cards/hardware known to be better than others for quality, noise levels, etc.?
Well generalising a bit but most often external usb sound adaptors will sound better than most internal soundcards. Then if you really cared you would power the USB adaptor from a nice stable 5V source rather than using bus power. The problem with PC's is that inside that nice Faraday cage of a box there is all sorts of EMI going on, then the SMPSU supply rails themselves are full of nasty transients, not only generated by the power supply itself but reflected back up the rails from switching regulators on the mainboard. None of this is going to help sound quality at all.
On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 08:27:48PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On 22/03/11 10:11, Chris G wrote:
While I'm about it are some sound cards/hardware known to be better than others for quality, noise levels, etc.?
Well generalising a bit but most often external usb sound adaptors will sound better than most internal soundcards. Then if you really cared you would power the USB adaptor from a nice stable 5V source rather than using bus power.
The problem with PC's is that inside that nice Faraday cage of a box there is all sorts of EMI going on, then the SMPSU supply rails themselves are full of nasty transients, not only generated by the power supply itself but reflected back up the rails from switching regulators on the mainboard. None of this is going to help sound quality at all.
Neither is it going to have any effect at all while the sound is digital, the noise can only affect things once it's back to analogue surely. (OK, in extreme cases it could, but it's unlikely) -- Chris Green
On 22/03/11 20:31, Chris G wrote:
On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 08:27:48PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
Neither is it going to have any effect at all while the sound is digital, the noise can only affect things once it's back to analogue surely. (OK, in extreme cases it could, but it's unlikely)
Oh yeh if you run a digital signal out to an offboard DAC then most of your problems go away....that would be the best way. But as soon as you use an analogue output from an internal card everything after the DAC on the soundcard is going to suffer. Oh and another quick tip that can make a huge difference. If you have a machine with integrated audio based on the old AC97 headphone jack standard (rather than the newer HDaudio standard) and you have front mounted headphone/mic sockets. Then a free upgrade is to get those front sockets disconnected and jumper out the AC97 header (as if you had no front sockets as described in your mainboard manual) Otherwise all your audio (to the rear socket) is routed up to the front jack, through the contacts, back down to the mainboard and then out again via the rear socket. All done generally on nasty screened cable strung across the inside that faraday cage of EMI. I did that to my home machine and even on (admittedly better than average) PC speakers the difference was immediately obvious. HDaudio fixes this as the soundcard detects the presence of headphones or whatever electrically and switches outputs, AC97 style relies on contacts in the headphone jack opening when you plug something in, a quick test therefore is to plug an empty 3.5mm to 1/4" adaptor in and if you lose output to the rear audio then you need to be running the lobotomy pronto.
participants (7)
-
Brett Parker -
Chris G -
Chris Walker -
Simon Elliott -
Srdjan Todorovic -
Steve Fosdick -
Wayne Stallwood