HOW TO: MPD + Sonata MPC, - OR - MPD + Xfmpc MPC

[itsanudae]

Hello,

I had a royal pain setting up these three items. That's why I'm writing this HOW TO.

MPD is currently at version 0.13.1 and can be downloaded here, while the develoment or (-dev, -devel) source can be downloaded here.

You should build the libmpdclient library First, then build MPD.

Xfmpc MPC requires a higher version libmpdclient, so it is included at the bottom of the post. The version is 0.15.0.

Here is the link to the Xfmpc 0.5.0 sources. Installation instructions are in the INSTALL file.

Once you have libmpdclient 0.15.0 built, as well as MPD, you can build Xfmpc, which is the "official" MPD client from the Xfce Goodies Project.

So it would go like this: build: libmpdclient-0.15.0, MPD-0.13.1, Xfmpc-0.5.0

I find it to be adequate but less feature-full than Sonata, so I find myself using Sonata alot and waiting for Xfmpc to "catch up" as I would prefer a pure Xfce environment, but hey, I'm not "discriminating here" I just have a "discriminating ear" and boy, I'm impressed by my speakers when hooked up to MPD.

If you are confused, let me point out that the MPC of your choice is JUST a FRONTEND to the CLI MPD daemon. It's akin to a graphical Remote Control, that said, lets focus on Sonata...

Sonata is a very feature-full, configurable, and nicely laid out MPC, or MPD Client, if you will. It is located here and instructions are in the INSTALL file.

You would first build libmpc-0.15.0, then MPD-0.13.1, then Sonata.

If any of this is obtuse, please post to this Discussion or send me a message at:
itsanudae at gmail dot com. Pls. Thx.

Setting up MPD via the mpd.conf file can be quite tricky, and convoluted to a novice. I've included my mpd.conf file which lists the defaults commented out with a "#" character at the beginning of the line, and below the option I've chosen which does NOT have the "#" character... that would mean it is "uncommented".

So pick up the files, which I have aggregated in a tarball here or Download them below. I _DO NOT_ yet know how to properly package files so you will need to go into the terminal, navigate by "cd /path/to/your/download/file.tar" and perform a chown (change owner) command.

to chown properly follow this syntax:

$ chown "/path/to/your/download" "username":"username-group" "file.tar"

SO, if you have downloaded your files to the Desktop, you would input this into the terminal:

$ chown -hR ~/Desktop/file.tar username:username file.tar

That should allow you to recursively change the permissions for the file and group to your username which you would substitute.

Then you would do the same for each of the included files if I am wrong about chown -hR working on files in the .tar archive.

Please don't hate me, its my first how to, and I'm still "new".

From there, you would extract the files to wherever you like to build files from source. For me it is ~/Applications/applicationname/...

Then enter the directory containing the sourcecode. i.e. ~/Applications/libmpd/libmpd-0.15.0 and perform the required commands, which should be ./configure && make && sudo make install

Now we can move on to building MPD. you will do the same, navigate in the terminal to the directory containing the sourcecode. i.e. ~/Applications/mpd/mpd-0.13.1 and perform the requred commands which should be ./configure && make && sudo make install

Once those are built, build your MusicPlayerClients.

For Xfmpc:

navigate in the terminal to the directory containing the sourcecode. i.e. ~/Applications/xfmpc/xfmpc-0.5.0 and perform the requred commands which should be ./configure && make && sudo make install

for Sonata:

navigate in the terminal to the directory containing the sourcecode. i.e. ~/Applications/sonata/sonata-1.5.0 and perform the requred commands which should be ./configure && make && sudo make install

Now on to themeing Sonata to be "prettier."

Download the icons from below, and extract them as root to /usr/share/pixmaps Make sure you chown them as root. i.e. chown -hR root:root /usr/share/pixmaps after extracting. BE VERY CAREFUL while using the root account so you don't DAMAGE YOUR SYSTEM. That said, you are changing the read-only icon files that control what Sonata displays for its main icon and the icons in the system tray.

I hope you find Sonata to be "prettier" when you're all done, and Xfmpc to be more functional as it has jumped a point release since I have installed it, to 0.5.0 as of 04/11/2008 while I have 0.4.0 installed ATM.

OK. We've made it this far. Let's finish up by configuring the file mpd.conf it is located at /etc/mpd.conf and you should go into it and change a few things such as: the user who will be using it, and the driver if you AREN'T using PulseAudio, which is how my mpd.conf is set up. All you should have to do is change the uncommented paths in the top Path section, the username (change it to your username) and that should be it.

If it doesn't work for you, post here and eMail me or send a message and I will help you out.

The reason it's set up for PulseAudio was in anticipation of the Hardy release which uses PulseAudio by default. It sounds good to me. And that's with the default options (I don't know what to change yet to "improve" sound quality so I'm using whatever defaults PulseAudio chose for my harware) sound good to this audiophile.

Best, and look for info at the MPD site for more info on setting up MPD with Pulse Audio, Alsa, ESD (I have set my Pulse Audio, a drop-in replacement for ESD to use the ESD driver), OSS, JACK, etc.

I hope this gets the ball rolling for you and I will also include my scripts to start and stop both Sonata and MPD at the same time.