Package in Debian's/Ubuntu's repos

[rmjb]

Hello, I use slimserver for MClient and always found it a bit clunky but see many people sing it's praises. Looking at the Server Settings in the interface I see it can do a lot, but quite a bit never really work out correctly for me. Two examples are the rendevouz support and the transcoding of wma files.

I finally decided to look at the README files in /usr/share/doc/slimserver and see that for the Debian package some things in slimserver were removed for copyright and other non-free reasons. Is there a guide on re-enabling what's missing for this package?

I know that there is a deb available on this site but I like to stick to the official ubuntu repository for straightforward upgrades to new distro releases.

Thanks in advance,
- rmjb

[Diana]

...I finally decided to look at the README files in /usr/share/doc/slimserver and see that for the Debian package some things in slimserver were removed for copyright and other non-free reasons. Is there a guide on re-enabling what's missing for this package?

I know that there is a deb available on this site but I like to stick to the official ubuntu repository for straightforward upgrades to new distro releases.

AFAIK, there's no Ubuntu repo for slimserver. The reliable repo is the debian.slimdevices.com one.

I'd be interested to look at the README you mention, but can't find it. The only things in my /usr/share/doc/slimserver are seven Changelogs, a couple of .gz files and a copyright notice.

The only READMEs I can locate are the following, and are clearly not what you're seeing:

/usr/share/slimserver/MySQL/README
/usr/share/slimserver/lib/README
/usr/share/slimserver/HTML/README.txt

I run SC 6.5.3 on Feisty. Do you have a different set up (e.g. SC7)?

[rmjb]

Here is the contents of the file README.Debian:

Features removed from the Upstream version in Debian.

1) Rendevous support. This relies on the "mDNSResponder" program,
   which us non-free and unavailable in Debian.

2) The default Skin is copyright Slimdevices, and not
   redistributable. Most of the other skins in the SlimDevices distribution
   inherit from the default, to a greater or lesser extent, so they
   are unusable too. The skin supplied in based on "ExBrowse3" by
   Jacob Potter; this inherits only a very small amount from the
   default. I have replaced the Slim devices branding with
   Debian branding, replaced the small amount inherited from Slim
   Devices' copyright HTML, and removed the Help links, which also
   pointed to un-distributable content.

3) Firmware. The Slimdevices firmware is not redistributable and has
   therefore been removed from the package. Facilities to download
   firmware images directly from Slimdevices' webserver have been provided.

4) Fonts. The Slimdevices-supplied fonts are not redistributable. In
   this package they have been cut down to a few graphical glyphs, and
   largely replaced by the bitstream Vera truetype font.

This is the package that is available from the Ubuntu Universe repository.

- rmjb

[Diana]

rmjb wrote:
> Here is the contents of the file README.Debian:

Thanks! (Oddly, this isn't anywhere in my installation AFAICS)

[Mark Lanctot]

Thanks! (Oddly, this isn't anywhere in my installation AFAICS)

That's because the Ubuntu version is a specially-modified 6.3.something...which incidentally has a fair amount of bugs that were resolved long ago.

6.3.x is quite old.

I run Ubuntu and I love it but some packages in the repos are way too old (FLAC is still at 1.1.2 in Feisty, 1.1.4 in Gutsy).

[Diana]

Mark Lanctot wrote:
> That's because the Ubuntu version is a specially-modified
> 6.3.something...which incidentally has a fair amount of bugs that were
> resolved long ago.

Mark >>> Thanks for the explanation. I've only ever used the
slimdevices repo - I didn't even know there was an Ubuntu version, as I
have the slimdevices repo at the top of my source.list, as per the wiki.

BTW, I'm thinking I may upgrade when SC7 is released. Will I need to
remove my SC6.5.3 first (?? with 'sudo aptitude purge' or what), or can
I just install on top? And do I need to do anything in particular about
MIP (which you may recall helping me with ages ago!). Sorry if this is
documented elsewhere - just thought I'd ask you while you were around!

D

[Mark Lanctot]

BTW, I'm thinking I may upgrade when SC7 is released. Will I need to
remove my SC6.5.3 first (?? with 'sudo aptitude purge' or what), or can
I just install on top?

Apparently there is a migration script that will copy your old preferences and then uninstall the old version automatically. I did install a very old SC7 nightly over the 6.5.1 install in my "testing" machine and I can't recall whether the migration of settings worked properly or not, but this was back in September when I received the beta Controller and needed to install SC7. Since then I've installed so many nightlies that the prefs file may have been wiped, I can recall going through the settings a few times. The prefs were definitely wiped with the package name change from "slimserver" to "squeezecenter", but that was with SC7 nightly -> SC7 nightly, not 6.5.x -> SC7.

And do I need to do anything in particular about
MIP (which you may recall helping me with ages ago!). Sorry if this is
documented elsewhere - just thought I'd ask you while you were around!

It's surprising I helped with MIP because I know nothing about it! :-) I'd check the Beta forum, there have been discussions there about it. I believe it has been working for a while now.

[Diana]

Mark Lanctot wrote:
> Apparently there is a migration script that will copy your old
> preferences and then uninstall the old version automatically.

Sounds useful. Any idea what it's called or where I might find it? (Or
will it be available as part of the release?)

> It's surprising I helped with MIP because I know nothing about it! :-)

Actually, now you come to mention it, I think I recall your saying you
were a random play man yourself. You helped with something else -
possibly to do with file permissions - but it's a while ago, and I forget.

Anyway, thanks for your suggestion about the Developer forum. I'll
research the MIP situation when SC7 has been out a bit, and the dust has
settled. At the moment my installation is working just fine for me, and
my experience with SS tells me 'If it ain't broke...'

[Mark Lanctot]

Mark Lanctot wrote:
> Apparently there is a migration script that will copy your old
> preferences and then uninstall the old version automatically.

Sounds useful. Any idea what it's called or where I might find it? (Or
will it be available as part of the release?)
[color=blue]

It's in the release and runs on install.

Anyway, thanks for your suggestion about the Developer forum. I'll
research the MIP situation when SC7 has been out a bit, and the dust has
settled.

Just noticed this today:

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=42274

At the moment my installation is working just fine for me, and
my experience with SS tells me 'If it ain't broke...'

Good policy. However I had a spare machine for playing around with Ubuntu and I put it on that. SC7 has been very trouble-free and stable until yesterday:

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=42242

...but the problem seems to be limited to me and one other user.