903 webradio / wifi radio: proof of concept

[review]

Forkosigan:

Quote:

No, and it probably won't be possible in the future ... To hear a web radio, you usually need Flash Player, which in the browser to a reader is not possible.

http://translate.google.com/translat...6postcount%3D8

Did I mention that I like those challenges? Well, of course as Forkosigan mentioned, flash on the ebook is not to be expected anytime soon. And I think we also don't need it. But was there no web radio before we got youtube and co? Of course and many flash web players still use the same protocol, they just wrap around the flash container. If you know the url you can very well play any webradio station you like... and there are databases of thousands and thousands of webstations. Not to mention shoutcast.

So I thought, let's port a network enables media player. Preferrentially one which has support for the various windows codecs.

Well, I ported mplayer and it works. Well, sort of. What can you expect in less than 8 hours?

What you get is alpha stage: proof-of-concept. To make a nice user frontend around it is not that much of a challenge. Sure it'll take a bit of time but there is no dead-end to be expected as the crucial part works already.

It was a bit of challenge as initially I got some Permission denied errors. (arrg. /dev/dsp (the linux sound card) had the wrong permissions) but in the end I found a way around it.

But speaking of a frontend: Do we really need a frontend for a radio? It should run in the background anyway, shouldn't it? And there is not much what you could do with a radio anyway apart from volume control. Unfortunately the volume control with the buttons doesn't work so accordingly it is fairly loud... but I guess we should be able to sort this somehow as well.

Installation
1) create in system a folder called mplayer and in mplayer a folder called bin
2) extract and copy mplayer to system\mplayer\bin
3) copy classic.app somewhere
4) copy all-music-off.app somewhere

If you want to turn it off just run the all-music-off app.

There is something to say about codecs but I will do this in another post. Also if you have a look in the classic.app you will see how simple it will be to create an almost infinite library of webradios within no time.


EDIT:
progress update: managed to get volume under control as well. What this means that it is really only the work left to make a nice and shiny user interface. Wifi, streams, decoding, audio output, volume control ... it all works already. (the attached version is the initial release without volume control)

EDIT:
uploaded vers. 1b which has a typing mistake correct. Thanks to all who reported it.

[snipenekkid]

whoever stated that one needs Flash for listening to most web radio streams needs a new crack dealer. Of all things out there for Linux there are about a zillion media players any of which can be ported to the PB OS but the right developers. Not sure about battery life or it running in the background but it's not something which would be difficult.

BTW, good work on the start of your app.

[review]

Originally Posted by snipenekkid

there are about a zillion media players any of which can be ported to the PB OS but the right developers. Not sure about battery life or it running in the background but it's not something which would be difficult.

I'm sorry but from your statement I get the impression that you haven't followed the whole story. Excuse me if my judgement was too swift but I can tell you that there are about a million things which are easier than porting software to a platform were there is

1) no official SDK
2) no documentation
3) no source code
4) no root permission

When trying to port anything you will run a million times against a brick wall because as a good developer you know the solution (e.g. chmod +w /dev/dsp ) but alas you don't have root access or something else from the list above is lacking.

I don't mean to offend you but I have tried to port a good number of programs and make improvements to the pocketbook and I have seen many frustrations, which were not limited by my knowledge as a developer.

So I can assure you:

With the above mentioned set of boundary conditions it is extremely painful to port anything.

However, you're very welcome to proof me wrong.
Maybe, you could port Xournal.

(Just kidding, I'm sure the above four points were new to you)

[kacir]

Originally Posted by review

1) no official SDK
2) no documentation
3) no source code
4) no root permission

I am shocked that you managed to do anything at all.
Once you receive the above things, you will be unstoppable.

[paola]

Originally Posted by kacir

I am shocked that you managed to do anything at all.
Once you receive the above things, you will be unstoppable.

I am betting on that

Thanks review, you are just great!

[snipenekkid]

Originally Posted by review

I'm sorry but from your statement I get the impression that you haven't followed the whole story. Excuse me if my judgement was too swift but I can tell you that there are about a million things which are easier than porting software to a platform were there is

1) no official SDK
2) no documentation
3) no source code
4) no root permission

When trying to port anything you will run a million times against a brick wall because as a good developer you know the solution (e.g. chmod +w /dev/dsp ) but alas you don't have root access or something else from the list above is lacking.

I don't mean to offend you but I have tried to port a good number of programs and make improvements to the pocketbook and I have seen many frustrations, which were not limited by my knowledge as a developer.

So I can assure you:

With the above mentioned set of boundary conditions it is extremely painful to port anything.

However, you're very welcome to proof me wrong.
Maybe, you could port Xournal.

(Just kidding, I'm sure the above four points were new to you)

well, given I have been employed as a developer for nearly four decades I might have some insight. It is amazing how any of us ever ported apps between OS's in decades gone by without any of the above stuff. Roll your own if there is no SDK. Are you a programmer or a mouse?

[review]

This is just getting silly and I'm greatly tempted not to reply at all. I`ve never meant to offend you but from you reply I understand that you took offence. However, it seems to me that you think that I don't know what I'm talking about.

So please be so kind and answer me one simple question:

How do you do

chmod o+w /dev/dsp

without being root?

(Point number 4 in the list above)

I trust that your fourty years of programming experience will allow you to understand that without those permissions set properly you will not hear any sound of your ported program. It will be a great failure.

[snipenekkid]

exactly why the whole Linsux world is never going to really gain popular acceptance, too many stud field mice with chips on their shoulder. Struggle away and whine here for the attention you get the kudos you seek.

[review]

@snipenekkid
Thank you for your reply.

I take this discussion as closed then as you failed to answer my question. And it simply proves that you don't have that extra knowledge/experience you claim to possess.

[paola]

can't wait to run it, but I won't have wifi for another two weeks - really keen to test how much battery it consumes, but just for info, as to me this application is really a valuable addition.

[Henri2all]

Hello, I am quit new to this kind of things.
I installed the three files.
But no radio.
My Wifi connection is allright, no problems with the internet, but when i start the classic.app from my applications, I just get a refesh of the application nothing more.

Please help.

[review]

Hi Henri2all,
thank you for your feedback. The same issue has been reported on the german forum. The good news is that there is a simple reason for this behaviour. The program classic.app will look in exactly one place to find the mplayer file. The mplayer file is, if you like, the heart of the program. The classic.app is just the file which contains the url. However, if you have extracted and copied all files in the same directory it won't work.

My guess is that you have all files in the same directory. Is this correct?

Installation
1) create in system a folder called mplayer and in mplayer a folder called bin on the internal memory
2) extract and copy mplayer to system\mplayer\bin on the internal memory.
3) copy classic.app somewhere
4) copy all-music-off.app somewhere

If this is correct please make sure that you follow precisely steps 1 and 2 from the installation procedure.

If you've done all this and it still doesn't work please feel free to report it again. Also if it works it would be nice to have a feedback that it is solved. The Pro series is very similar so I won't really expect any issues between those devices. If it works on my 903 it should work on your 602 as well.

[sarkash]

same behavior as Henri2alls on my 902...

[Sirius67]

Have the same issue with my 903... (have followed your readme exactly)

[troll05]

Do you use "Profiles"? There was a problem with another .app that didn't work for readers with activated profiles because it needed another folder. Maybe review can have a look