Changing Settings w/out web access

[pendletone55]

I have been a member for a few years now and have never posted a question before today. Mostly because I read and learn and find most answers to questions that way. Have not been able to locate an answer to this question. I'm stuck because I want to change settings on the Touch's USB Server that cannot be changed via the remote. Specifically I want to change the number of songs that can be added to a playlist and right now the Touch has no intuitive method for doing that. I am Windows literate, but not SSH literate and have no idea how to connect that way. Right now it tops out at 100 songs and I cannot add any more to a playlist. I have no idea how to change that on the Server. Any suggestions? Furthermore, I have no idea how to add plugins to the Touch either. Thanks.

[erland]

Specifically I want to change the number of songs that can be added to a playlist and right now the Touch has no intuitive method for doing that. I am Windows literate, but not SSH literate and have no idea how to connect that way. Right now it tops out at 100 songs and I cannot add any more to a playlist.

At the moment, I think SSH or possibly the CLI interface via telnet is the only way to change this. I'm sure someone will soon get tired and implement a third party applet that solves issues like this, it has already been discussed a bit among a few third party developers.



I have no idea how to change that on the Server. Any suggestions? Furthermore, I have no idea how to add plugins to the Touch either. Thanks.
The built-in server on the Touch doesn't support third party plugins, theoretically you can manually install them through SSH but it's not recommended as it easily can make the Touch crash because it gets out of memory.

However, the Touch supports third party applets, mainly to enhance the user interface, these are installed through the Settings/Advanced/Applet Installer menu on the Touch.

[pendletone55]

Thanks for your response. Are there any good threads or links or manuals for teaching myself how to use ssh or cli via telnet - specifically for this situation. At least to make this one change to the settings?

[Mnyb]

Thanks for your response. Are there any good threads or links or manuals for teaching myself how to use ssh or cli via telnet - specifically for this situation. At least to make this one change to the settings?

SSH is a tool to get shell acces remotely a "command terminal" like CMD in windows.

So SSH opens a Terminal remotely.

Touch runs Linux of some kind.

So the shell responds to most common Linux commands all bells and whistles are not there as the OS is as slim as possible.

And the only text editor installed is "vi" which is horrible but one learns that one eventually ;)

So to get further.

Learn about Linux shell (Terminal)

Get a suitable Terminal.

If your PC is a MAC or Linux you already got the tool you want the Terminal.

If your are on win "putty" is usually recommended.

Learn the vi text editor.

If you want to copy files from the Touch you use scp (on win download winscp)

about vi

http://www.cs.rit.edu/~cslab/vi.html

Linux shell commands ? google or get a good book, like Linux bible or similar .

it is also so that you can not wreck it completely the small button above the power inlet if held for a longer time it factory resets the Touch.
Then you can wreck it again

[JJZolx]

Right now it tops out at 100 songs and I cannot add any more to a playlist. I have no idea how to change that on the Server. Any suggestions?

If it's set to a max of 100 then it's probably for a reason. The Touch is a little underpowered for even the limited number of things that it's being asked to do. Increasing the 100 song limit could render it unusable.


Furthermore, I have no idea how to add plugins to the Touch either. Thanks.

The server on the Touch does not support plugins. There's too little memory and not enough CPU power.

Sounds like you'd be better served by running Squeezebox Server on a PC. The server on the Touch is intended as a lightweight solution for relatively undemanding setups.

[Mnyb]

Jim is right:

Follow my problems with >100 playlist and Touch on an external server

http://bugs.slimdevices.com/show_bug.cgi?id=16089
(http://bugs.slimdevices.com/show_bug.cgi?id=10889)

The solution to this problem is to run an external server

With the Dynamic Playlist plugin, Thankyou Erland .

This spoon feeds the Touch with chunks of files it can handle, the pl itself can be very big.

[pendletone55]

Then tell me something. What good is the touch? If it cannot serve as the SBServer, then to me it is absolutely no better than my Classic, Duet, or Boom. Furthermore, the primary reason I was convinced to make this purchase was for its server capabilities. That I would no longer have to be PC dependant. I would be able to hook up a USB drivewith all my tunes on it and not have to worry about keeping my computer on day and night.

[erland]

Then tell me something. What good is the touch? If it cannot serve as the SBServer, then to me it is absolutely no better than my Classic, Duet, or Boom.

For many people it's still better than the old devices even if you don't use the server, for example:
- Color screen
- Better sound quality



Furthermore, the primary reason I was convinced to make this purchase was for its server capabilities. That I would no longer have to be PC dependant. I would be able to hook up a USB drivewith all my tunes on it and not have to worry about keeping my computer on day and night.

I can understand your frustration.

Before someone tries to solve this problem, would you be satisfied with a solution like Dynamic Playlist plugin where only a small part of the playlist is shown in the current playlist.

When you play a playlist it will only add a few tracks but it will automatically add more tracks from the large playlist when needed and remove already played tracks from the beginning to avoid that the current playlist get too large and cause performance problems ?
It's the same principle as the Random Mix plugin offers.

Would a solution like this be an acceptable solution ?
(Logitech might of course solve the performance problems permanently some time in the future making a dynamic solution unnecessary)

Are there other things on the Touch that makes it unacceptable to use as a server anyway, so even if we solve the playlist problem you won't be able to use it ?

Is the problem ONLY when playing the playlist or do you also have unacceptable problems when browsing a playlist through the menus ?

As JJZolx says, I don't think increasing the max playlist length will solve anything, it will just cause performance problems instead. The limit is there for a reason and I strongly suspect that the reason is limited memory on the device and poor performance with large playlists.

[pfarrell]

pendletone55 wrote:
> Then tell me something. What good is the touch? If it cannot serve as
> the SBServer

Er, its a fine, limited SBServer.
Its not a full blown PC/mac running SBServer, its too small in RAM and
the CPU is too slow.

Its called TinySC for a reason. I've never seen any claim that it will
replace the real SqueezeBoxServer in all cases.

I expect that over time, the TinySC will grow and be more capable, but
its never going to be as capable as a old discarded desktop PC with real
memory and real CPU.

Its good as a replacement for your ancient Classic, and for folks with
limited requirements the bundled TinySC is fine.

For years, folks have bought SqueezeBoxen and then complained that they
had to run a server. So the TinySC solves the problem for a lot of
folks. But not for all.

If I were King, I might have released the Touch last year without
TinySC, because its a nice player. But I'm not King.

--
Pat Farrell
http://www.pfarrell.com/