AlienBBC Beta Release Available - includes support forWindows SlimServer users

[Raul da Silva]

I'm installing as fast as my fingers can type. I'll let you know what
transpires. If this works, you guys deserve some renumeration. Setup a
paypal account for donations... I'll be the first to throw in a few $/£.

-raul

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com
[mailto:discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com] On Behalf Of Jules Taplin
Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 3:47 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: [slim] AlienBBC Beta Release Available - includes support for
Windows SlimServer users


Hey folks.

Right. Big news - Triode has been burning the midnight oil, and we're
finally in a position to (rather tentatively) release the first version
of AlienBBC which has support for our Windows brethren.

It's actually quite a major departure for AlienBBC - the transcoder has
been removed altogether, and AlienBBC now adds proper rtsp:// protocol
handling to slimserver. Even better - Triode has managed to make it work
without having to patch mplayer, which is a pretty neat trick.

So... we're not totally sure that this will be a bloodless coup - and
it's a much more pervasive change that we've made in a long time, so
we're releasing a preliminary beta to you lot, to play with if you're
brave enough. But... take this as a warning - If you can't get out going
in the morning without the Bedroom Squeezebox playing Radio 2 at you, or
the wife is going to give you grief if she can't listen to The Archers
tomorrow evening - then for heavens sake stay in the shallow end with
the ole' reliable V0.12. If you fancy seeing how the reckless half live
- then step up and see if you can break it.

OS/X support should also be in this release, although the install
instructions are woefully lacking, and we genuinely haven't tried it at
all (if somebody wants to donate me one of them new fangled Mac Mini
jobs, I could probably write some better docs *grin*). Oh... and mplayer
is now a mandatory choice - v0.90 doesn't support alienstream as a
helper application any more. In just about every other way, though -
it's vastly superior.

AlienBBC is available, as ever from:
http://www.mrtickle.org/alienbbc.html . Look for the 'Beta Releases'
menu item to find it in all it's rough-and-ready glory!


Cheers folks.

-- Jules

[Jules Taplin]

Hehe.

Cheers Raul.

I can't speak for the rest of the team, but to be honest - I'm not in
this for the cash. In fact... given the amount I benefit from other
plugin writers, and the amount of code I borrowed to start the project
in the first place, soliciting for donations just doesn't feel right to me.

Besides... Slim Devices have managed to be generous in my case, anyway.
Given AlienBBC was recognised in the plugins competition, Craig & I are
both a SBG richer than we would be otherwise


-- Jules

Raul da Silva wrote:

>I'm installing as fast as my fingers can type. I'll let you know what
>transpires. If this works, you guys deserve some renumeration. Setup a
>paypal account for donations... I'll be the first to throw in a few $/£.
>
>-raul
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com
>[mailto:discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com] On Behalf Of Jules Taplin
>Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 3:47 PM
>To: Slim Devices Discussion
>Subject: [slim] AlienBBC Beta Release Available - includes support for
>Windows SlimServer users
>
>
>Hey folks.
>
>Right. Big news - Triode has been burning the midnight oil, and we're
>finally in a position to (rather tentatively) release the first version
>of AlienBBC which has support for our Windows brethren.
>
>It's actually quite a major departure for AlienBBC - the transcoder has
>been removed altogether, and AlienBBC now adds proper rtsp:// protocol
>handling to slimserver. Even better - Triode has managed to make it work
>without having to patch mplayer, which is a pretty neat trick.
>
>So... we're not totally sure that this will be a bloodless coup - and
>it's a much more pervasive change that we've made in a long time, so
>we're releasing a preliminary beta to you lot, to play with if you're
>brave enough. But... take this as a warning - If you can't get out going
>in the morning without the Bedroom Squeezebox playing Radio 2 at you, or
>the wife is going to give you grief if she can't listen to The Archers
>tomorrow evening - then for heavens sake stay in the shallow end with
>the ole' reliable V0.12. If you fancy seeing how the reckless half live
>- then step up and see if you can break it.
>
>OS/X support should also be in this release, although the install
>instructions are woefully lacking, and we genuinely haven't tried it at
>all (if somebody wants to donate me one of them new fangled Mac Mini
>jobs, I could probably write some better docs *grin*). Oh... and mplayer
>is now a mandatory choice - v0.90 doesn't support alienstream as a
>helper application any more. In just about every other way, though -
>it's vastly superior.
>
>AlienBBC is available, as ever from:
>http://www.mrtickle.org/alienbbc.html . Look for the 'Beta Releases'
>menu item to find it in all it's rough-and-ready glory!
>
>
>Cheers folks.
>
>-- Jules
>
>

[kdf]

Hi Jules,

mplayer seems to get stuck in a loop trying to deal with The Archiers (first on
the list so I tried it

Reading /etc/mplayer/codecs.conf: 61 audio & 169 video codecs
font: can't open file: /home/fishbone/.mplayer/font/font.desc
font: can't open file: /usr/share/mplayer/font/font.desc
Opening joystick device /dev/input/js0
Can't open joystick device /dev/input/js0 : No such file or directory
mplayer: could not connect to socket
mplayer: No such file or directory
skip_str: 45 bytes skipped
skip_str: 20 bytes skipped
======= WAVE Format =======
Format Tag: 28515 (0x6F63)
Channels: 2
Samplerate: 44100
avg byte/sec: 44100
Block align: 640
bits/sample: 16
cbSize: 26
Unknown extra header dump: [80] [0] [10] [0] [17] [0] [80] [2] [10] [0] [1] [0]
[0] [3] [8] [
0] [0] [25] [0] [0] [0] [0] [0] [2] [0] [4]
===========================
Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook.so.6.0, /usr/lib/win32/cook.so.6.0,
/usr/local/lib/win
32/cook.so.6.0
Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook3260.dll, /usr/lib/win32/cook3260.dll,
/usr/local/lib/w
in32/cook3260.dll
Launching mplayer -vo null -really-quiet -cache 128 -af resample=44100:0:1 -ao
pcm -nowavehea
der -aofile /dev/fd/3 rtsp://rmv8.bbc.net.uk/bbc7/mon0800.ra
MPlayer 1.0pre3-3.3.2 (C) 2000-2003 MPlayer Team

CPU: Advanced Micro Devices Athlon MP/XP Thoroughbred 1660 MHz (Family: 6,
Stepping: 1)
Detected cache-line size is 64 bytes
CPUflags: MMX: 1 MMX2: 1 3DNow: 1 3DNow2: 1 SSE: 1 SSE2: 0
Compiled with Runtime CPU Detection - WARNING - this is not optimal!
To get best performance, recompile MPlayer with --disable-runtime-cpudetection.
Reading config file /etc/mplayer/mplayer.conf
Reading config file /home/fishbone/.mplayer/config
Reading /home/fishbone/.mplayer/codecs.conf: Can't open
'/home/fishbone/.mplayer/codecs.conf'
: No such file or directory
Reading /etc/mplayer/codecs.conf: 61 audio & 169 video codecs

.....and looping.

looks on the surface to be an mplayer problem, refusing to work without a valid
joystick input. I'm wondering if you might already have a quick answer for
this?

playing directly from mplayer:

an't open input config file /home/fishbone/.mplayer/input.conf: No such file or
directory
Input config file /etc/mplayer/input.conf parsed: 53 binds
Opening joystick device /dev/input/js0
Can't open joystick device /dev/input/js0 : No such file or directory
Can't init input joystick
Setting up LIRC support...
mplayer: could not connect to socket
mplayer: No such file or directory
Failed to open LIRC support.
You will not be able to use your remote control.

Playing rtsp://rmv8.bbc.net.uk/bbc7/mon0800.ra.
Resolving rmv8.bbc.net.uk for AF_INET6...
Couldn't resolve name for AF_INET6: rmv8.bbc.net.uk
Resolving rmv8.bbc.net.uk for AF_INET...
Connecting to server rmv8.bbc.net.uk[212.58.240.197]:554 ...
Cache size set to 8192 KBytes
Connected to server: rmv8.bbc.net.uk
Cache fill: 1.76% (147456 bytes)

and the cache fills very slowly...and I give up and kill the process. clearly
it gets further along than slimserver, but I suspect the very slow cache fill
probably means I'm stuck for now.

-kdf

From what

[Craig Eales]

Raul,

I also do it for fun - not money. Thanks for the offer, but not for me.

Obviously I cannot speak for Triode.

CE

On Wed, 12 Jan 2005 07:51:41 +0000, Jules Taplin
<slim-discuss (AT) ourhouse (DOT) org.uk> wrote:
> Hehe.
>
> Cheers Raul.
>
> I can't speak for the rest of the team, but to be honest - I'm not in
> this for the cash. In fact... given the amount I benefit from other
> plugin writers, and the amount of code I borrowed to start the project
> in the first place, soliciting for donations just doesn't feel right to me.
>
> Besides... Slim Devices have managed to be generous in my case, anyway.
> Given AlienBBC was recognised in the plugins competition, Craig & I are
> both a SBG richer than we would be otherwise
>
>
> -- Jules
>
> Raul da Silva wrote:
>
> >I'm installing as fast as my fingers can type. I'll let you know what
> >transpires. If this works, you guys deserve some renumeration. Setup a
> >paypal account for donations... I'll be the first to throw in a few $/£.
> >
> >-raul
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com
> >[mailto:discuss-bounces (AT) lists (DOT) slimdevices.com] On Behalf Of Jules Taplin
> >Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 3:47 PM
> >To: Slim Devices Discussion
> >Subject: [slim] AlienBBC Beta Release Available - includes support for
> >Windows SlimServer users
> >
> >
> >Hey folks.
> >
> >Right. Big news - Triode has been burning the midnight oil, and we're
> >finally in a position to (rather tentatively) release the first version
> >of AlienBBC which has support for our Windows brethren.
> >
> >It's actually quite a major departure for AlienBBC - the transcoder has
> >been removed altogether, and AlienBBC now adds proper rtsp:// protocol
> >handling to slimserver. Even better - Triode has managed to make it work
> >without having to patch mplayer, which is a pretty neat trick.
> >
> >So... we're not totally sure that this will be a bloodless coup - and
> >it's a much more pervasive change that we've made in a long time, so
> >we're releasing a preliminary beta to you lot, to play with if you're
> >brave enough. But... take this as a warning - If you can't get out going
> >in the morning without the Bedroom Squeezebox playing Radio 2 at you, or
> >the wife is going to give you grief if she can't listen to The Archers
> >tomorrow evening - then for heavens sake stay in the shallow end with
> >the ole' reliable V0.12. If you fancy seeing how the reckless half live
> >- then step up and see if you can break it.
> >
> >OS/X support should also be in this release, although the install
> >instructions are woefully lacking, and we genuinely haven't tried it at
> >all (if somebody wants to donate me one of them new fangled Mac Mini
> >jobs, I could probably write some better docs *grin*). Oh... and mplayer
> >is now a mandatory choice - v0.90 doesn't support alienstream as a
> >helper application any more. In just about every other way, though -
> >it's vastly superior.
> >
> >AlienBBC is available, as ever from:
> >http://www.mrtickle.org/alienbbc.html . Look for the 'Beta Releases'
> >menu item to find it in all it's rough-and-ready glory!
> >
> >
> >Cheers folks.
> >
> >-- Jules
> >
> >

[mherger]

I had to install the RealAudio codecs manually to get this working.

[..]
> Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook.so.6.0,
> /usr/lib/win32/cook.so.6.0,
> /usr/local/lib/win
> 32/cook.so.6.0
> Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook3260.dll,
> /usr/lib/win32/cook3260.dll,
> /usr/local/lib/w
> in32/cook3260.dll

On what system are you running this? My mplayer told me exactly where it
wanted those codecs to be:

Opening audio decoder: [realaud] RealAudio decoder
opening shared obj '/usr/lib/RealPlayer9/Codecs/cook.so.6.0'
Error: /usr/lib/RealPlayer9/Codecs/cook.so.6.0: cannot open shared object
file: No such file or directory
opening win32 dll 'cook.so.6.0'
Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook.so.6.0, /usr/lib/win32/cook.so.6.0,
/usr/local/lib/win32/cook.so.6.0
Error loading dll
ERROR: Could not open required DirectShow codec cook.so.6.0.

I then copied contents of
http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/rele...040626.tar.bz2
to /usr/lib/RealPlayer9/Codecs/ and the plugin started singing!

[..]
> Cache size set to 8192 KBytes
> Connected to server: rmv8.bbc.net.uk
> Cache fill: 1.76% (147456 bytes)
>
> and the cache fills very slowly...and I give up and kill the process.

try adding -cache 128 (as does the plugin)

> clearly
> it gets further along than slimserver, but I suspect the very slow cache
> fill
> probably means I'm stuck for now.

--

Michael

-----------------------------------------------------------
Help translate SlimServer by using the
SlimString Translation Helper (http://www.herger.net/slim/)

[kdf]

Quoting Michael Herger <slim (AT) herger (DOT) net>:

> I had to install the RealAudio codecs manually to get this working.
>
> [..]
> > Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook.so.6.0,
> > /usr/lib/win32/cook.so.6.0,
> > /usr/local/lib/win
> > 32/cook.so.6.0
> > Win32 LoadLibrary failed to load: cook3260.dll,
> > /usr/lib/win32/cook3260.dll,
> > /usr/local/lib/w
> > in32/cook3260.dll
>
> On what system are you running this? My mplayer told me exactly where it
> wanted those codecs to be:

Mandrake 10.0. I had installed RA codecs before, but there was no mention from
mplayer.


> I then copied contents of
> http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/rele...040626.tar.bz2
> to /usr/lib/RealPlayer9/Codecs/ and the plugin started singing!

I'll look into this, thanks.

> try adding -cache 128 (as does the plugin)

ah well, that's believable enough. I'll go back to this if I have trouble
with real audio.

cheers,
kdf

[kdf]

Quoting Michael Herger <slim (AT) herger (DOT) net>:


> I then copied contents of
> http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/rele...040626.tar.bz2
> to /usr/lib/RealPlayer9/Codecs/ and the plugin started singing!

Brilliant! more talking than singing, but that's got'er beat.
-kdf