Bounty!

Yet another problem with running an only Linux shop - Transcend Jetflash mem sticks. Don't mount on Linux due to some sort of super-floppy partition, it seems. This problem has been around for quite a few years now. Anybody ready to fix it? I can give a 128 MB Transcend Jetflash mem stick + equivalent amount in cash as bounty!

backup script

Made some simple backup scripts for the Postgres database with

pg_dump sgh > sghdbdump

and an sftp script in cron to copy it to krishna.

The dump file is plain text and currently around 50 MB.

For some reason, the method given in this earlier post for automatic ssh login is not working for another account in krishna. I wonder why. Somewhere some typo or something?

sssihl.edu.in mail problem solved

It was because of external hosting, I suppose - mailboxes were not working, but forwarding works fine. So, most probably, that will be what we will do. (With reference to this post...)

places to upload

Interesting link from A - list of places to upload files like rapidshare.de - the link is
http://digital-binary-review.blogspot.com/2006/02/where-to-upload-your-files.html

mail server problems

spent a lot of time trying to configure mail for sssihl.edu.in with 1and1.com - the user interface is somewhat restrictive. Have configured the mx record to point to the records given by
host -t MX sssihl.edu.in ns41.1and1.com

(also host -a sssihl.edu.in ns41.1and1.com)

so the mail servers are mx00.1and1.com and mx01. Pointing from Plesk to these mail servers, still mails to the account I created are bouncing with 550 won't relay to xxxxx@sssihl.edu.in

Maybe the mail servers need time?

Software KM switch?

PB sent me this nice link to Synergy - To share a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers with different operating systems. May have been useful in the days of working on Dharma and Saispace, but now with Saispace2 most of the time, not so relevant to me. But interesting concept.

PB is changing over krishna.radiosai.org to a new machine, migration work going on. Checked the new one with Nessus yesterday.

LiveSupport

Interesting link sent in by PB - LiveSupport.

Runs a radio station in a way similar to ours, but with the SW running on the playout server also. Searches etc are based on mp3 metadata in the files.

AutoGK's niche

Finally AutoGK finds its niche - where there are read errors, tho DVDDecrypter can make iso files, FairUse Wizard hangs at the point where there are CRC errors. AutoGK carries on just fine, using the IFO mode and extracting to VOB files with DVDDecrypter.

Podcast solution with asp?

This script seems a good solution for audio on demand with downloading instead of streaming.

Fair Use Wizard seems to have a bug? Split Chapters

Fair Use Wizard seems to have a bug: a DVD with a single program chain of duration 2:08 with three chapters of roughly 40 minutes each, when ripped with the option 'Split chapters' and total filesize 540 MB, gave 2 files of 180 MB and one of 70 MB, and also the 3 files were of 37 minutes duration! Doing the rip without the 'Split chapters' option => proper file, no more problems.

Fair Use Wiz timing

Seeing its logs, Fair Use Wizard has taken roughly 1.5 times real time for approx 700 kbits per sec video encoding with the internal XvidD codec. From ISO file. The indexing was done earlier, approx 5 min per 2 hour DVD.

http://www.drs2006.com/manuals/faq/plsasx.html gives info about pls and asx files in one place. But the pls files' titles are still not being reflected on Xmms, and the filenames are being shown. Probably since Xmms doesn't support Version 2 pls files? Maybe I have to tweak the server settings to not show the filenames?

Server being a relay automatically shows the origin server's title setting. If it is not a relay? Have to try out and see locally.

asx files working with shoutcast

Finally! asx playlists for shoutcast on demand files are working even for mp3s with spaces in filename.

The actual problem was not that the filename had spaces in it, but WMplayer can't play mp3s of size below 4 seconds! Tests with larger files are working.

added counter

Added a counter to this, from Webstats4U

for printing mails

Or in general for exporting mails from KMail - make a folder, make it an mbox folder, copy the required mails to it. If the folder is made in the top level, it is seen directly in ~/.Mail

Eudora can open the mbox file directly as it is its native format - just copy it to Eudora's Mail folder.

Or use MHonArc to convert to html first.

Just an aside - tho these posts only talk about the exciting stuff, most of the time is spent in audio processing, making playlists etc...

changed line in /etc/sysconfig/clock (in Mandrake 10) to read

UTC=false

so that the clock shows correct time in IST in XP (dual boot) also.

easier way to make Windows Media Player play shoutcast streams

In case you can host your own files and just need to point those with Windows Media players to a shoutcast stream, making an asx file works:

and the syntax of the asx file is simply

<asx version="3.0">
<entry>
<ref href="http://stream.radiosai.org:8000/">
</entry>
</asx>

Unfortunately I've lost the link which showed multiple files.
Now when I try these asx files with links to files
(Shoutcast streaming on demand)
it works with filenames with no spaces,
but not for filenames with spaces...

Experimenting with audio on demand

Both Shoutcast and Icecast do audio on demand. Shoutcast even makes a pls file on the fly. But we would like to have our own pls files, with more than one file in the playlist, since we would like to have the announcement and then the programme. Following the pls file format,
[playlist]
NumberOfEntries=2
File1=http://stream.radiosai.org:8000/content/file1.mp3
File2=http://stream.radiosai.org:8000/content/file2.mp3

Is working. But content has to be a folder, can't be a shortcut. What about soft links and hard links? Googling
found this google answer
and searching sysinternals got junction


And that works!

Does not allow downloading using right-click and save-as with browsers, either.

But playing in Windows Media Player? Googling
gave this nice link.

But it has two problems: Plays only the first file for files without spaces in them, (of course, that's what it's coded for!) and doesn't play files with spaces (%20) in them since WMP converts the %20 to spaces!

Tried from command-line with
wmplayer "filename with spaces.mp3"
wmplayer "filename%20with%20spaces.mp3"
wmplayer filenamewithoutspaces.mp3
wmplayer "filenamewithoutspaces.mp3"

Only the last two work.

Provisional requirements for Web Schedule display

1. Display earlier days' schedule using clickable calendar - so, having a MySQL backend instead of the current Access mdb file makes sense - otherwise the mdb file will become bigger and bigger...
2. Update with an uploadable csv file, automagically delete entries older than a month old (if necessary).
3. Look and feel of current site, but tables could look better.


Other fancy ideas
1. Linking to audio on demand?? Ideas on implementing??
2. Automagically linking to relevant Prasanthi Bulletin page
3. Better way of presenting the categories than the current method?
4. Does the BBC look good?

Hyperscore

Wired News has an interesting story about Hyperscore - interesting midi creation tool. Free version can make songs 30 sec long for use as ringtones etc. Of course, when we have Yamahas and Korgs with midi cables and skilled players, why bother....