Thecus N5200Pro

[GlenL]

iletunic, another thank you from me for picking this up and running with it. It is very much appreciated.

I will install this onto my N5200 in the next few days and let you know how it goes.

Lest we forget, I would also like to thank Andreas for all his work he has done in the past on the Thecus modules.
If it weren't for all his ground work I would be the reluctant owner of a Sonos system now (having a PC running to play music was a definite no no for me).

Once again, thanks to both of you.

[iletunic]

iletunic, many thanks for taking the time to do this. Myself (and I suspect a few others) are interested in turning this into a community development such that we are able to patch/rebuild etc. whenever the whim strikes, an annoying bug is dealt with or a major release occurs. To this end, I'd appreciate your thoughts re 1) whether you'd be interested in facilitating this and 2) how this could best be set up.

Once again, many thanks - I'll finally be able to use the Controller (or at least try to) on my full library.

I did plan to keep on providing updates, at least with the major updates of the server... The whole process is quite trivial actually, it just took some time do get the development setup going, setting up separate perl installation and so on. The hardest bits were done by omega already.

So, I will provide the updates in the future, but I'm willing to help in any other way as well.

--
Ivica Letunic

[mherger]

> I did plan to keep on providing updates, at least with the major
> updates of the server...

But shouldn't it be possible to distribute the server package without SC?
So users could update SC themselves (within a branch at least)? You'll do
yourself a big favour, believe me ;-).

The scanner could be covered by Slim::Utils::OS::Custom (as of 7.3). If
that's all there is, this should really be easy.

Michael

[mherger]

> I'll check the module... There isn't much that needs to be done to the
> actual server source. Scanner patch is nothing more than a custom path
> for the perl binary, and an extra entry to the LD_LIBRARY_PATH.

That said - could a user simply untar a SqueezeCenter nightly tarball,
replace the scanner and be done with the update?

Michael

[iletunic]

> I did plan to keep on providing updates, at least with the major
> updates of the server...

But shouldn't it be possible to distribute the server package without SC?
So users could update SC themselves (within a branch at least)? You'll do
yourself a big favour, believe me ;-).

The scanner could be covered by Slim::Utils::OS::Custom (as of 7.3). If
that's all there is, this should really be easy.

Michael

So the Slim::Utils::OS::Custom would have the necessary changes for Thecus already included in the main server package? Or would users have to manually edit it before each upgrade?

If I'd manage to make a server package which would accept the SC tarball, users would still have to make a new gzipped tarball for the complete module. Of course, that assumes the SC tarball has all the necessary modules pre-compiled, or that we have to create a new perl package as well, which would include them.

It would also be fairly simple to make a small shell script which would do the update of an existing installation, but it would require users to use ssh. Not sure how many people do...

[mherger]

> So the Slim::Utils::OS::Custom would have the necessary changes for
> Thecus already included in the main server package? Or would users have
> to manually edit it before each upgrade?

Slim::Utils::OS::* can handle OS specific stuff. ::Custom is intended to
be provided by 3rd parties, like eg. the Thecus community or (if they
decided to support SC officially) Thecus themselves. It offers hooks to SC
to customize some of its behaviour with respect to your system. Eg.
defining file paths, alternative scanner binaries etc.

Please see the wiki page for more details. And ask if you have more
questions :-). I'll be happy to add more hooks if needed and reasonable.

> If I'd manage to make a server package which would accept the SC
> tarball, users would still have to make a new gzipped tarball for the
> complete module.

Why? I don't know the Thecus. But couldn't you drop SC in some share and
have the SC extension load it from that share?

> Of course, that assumes the SC tarball has all the
> necessary modules pre-compiled, or that we have to create a new perl
> package as well, which would include them.

Isn't this exactly what the Thecus Perl/SC module does?

Michael

[egd]

So, I will provide the updates in the future, but I'm willing to help in any other way as well.

Ivica, that's great news

Would you perhaps be prepared to write a Thecus/SC integration HOWTO on the Slimdevices Wiki outlining the process required to configure the development environment, separate Perl installation and changes required to the standard SC module etc? Teach a man to fish...etc. etc.

I've also worked with Andreas/Omega on MusicIP integration and would be happy to integrate that with the module instructions & build.

Ideally I'd like to see things get to the point where what is required is sufficiently documented and understood to enable people to help themselves if they want to install nightlies etc. or can choose to wait for an updated module supported through the efforts of those willing to lend a hand.

[iletunic]

> So the Slim::Utils::OS::Custom would have the necessary changes for[color=blue]

Why? I don't know the Thecus. But couldn't you drop SC in some share and
have the SC extension load it from that share?

No, a Thecus module needs to be completely reinstalled every time, ie. full data wipe and installation of the new version. Unless, of course you are familiar with using bash and can ssh to the box. Again, that's probably not the case for majority of the users.

> Of course, that assumes the SC tarball has all the
> necessary modules pre-compiled, or that we have to create a new perl
> package as well, which would include them.

Isn't this exactly what the Thecus Perl/SC module does?

Michael

omega's existing Thecus perl installation does not have many of the modules required (ie. ones built by Bin/build_perl_modules.pl). So if users want to just drop new SC tarballs somewhere, the missing modules need to pre-compiled and added to the perl installation.

[iletunic]

Ivica, that's great news

Would you perhaps be prepared to write a Thecus/SC integration HOWTO on the Slimdevices Wiki outlining the process required to configure the development environment, separate Perl installation and changes required to the standard SC module etc? Teach a man to fish...etc. etc.

I've also worked with Andreas/Omega on MusicIP integration and would be happy to integrate that with the module instructions & build.

Ideally I'd like to see things get to the point where what is required is sufficiently documented and understood to enable people to help themselves if they want to install nightlies etc. or can choose to wait for an updated module supported through the efforts of those willing to lend a hand.

Sounds like a good idea. Could you create the page at its appropriate location and send me the link? I'll try to fill the info as I find free time...

Just to ensure everyone again, I will be building new modules for myself anyway, now that I set everything up, so I will also post them to onbeat.dk.

[BramWithaar]

iletunic: Thanks man!. you saved me a lot of work ;-) I'll go updating right now.

Would be great if you could share your setup and the steps you took.
Creating a page in the slimDevices wiki would seem logical.
Then we can all think on ways to make it more easy, or, for the brave among us, create modules with beta versions of Squeezecenter.
And it will save us when you, for whatever reason, aren't able to create the module anymore.