Description: BoomBox is an audio player with built-in database for easy browsing of local music files. It has no playlist, instead it simply plays songs from current search results. These queries can be saved to give you something like "dynamic playlists". It also has support for queing up songs to be played, replacing much of the need for a playlist. If you keep your music files well organised, or if you want to listen to songs just downloaded to a temporary folder, you can use the filesystem view (powered by the KIO library from KDE). BoomBox can also keep track of internet radio stations for you. And it can edit id3 tags in a very convenient way. And it can be controlled from another program using MPRIS2. It does not play video and has no equaliser. Audio players are a matter of taste, maybe this one suits you?
Full source code available from: git clone git://boombox.git.sourceforge.net/gitroot/boombox/boomboxLast changelog:
2014-01-29, version 0.4.4: Bug fix release. - Optimization: use kdeinit for faster app startup - Alternating background colors in filesystem view. - Bug fix: now showing track length and current position correctly on mpris2 remote control apps.
2012-12-25, version 0.4.3: Bug fix release. - Bug fix: application crash at startup if shuffle was active when you quit before. - Bug fix: should not be able to edit or enqueue albums in resultview.
2012-10-27, version 0.4.2: Bug fix release. - Fix for loading a new song when clicking "play" first thing after application startup, wasn't working with vlc and gStreamer phonon backends. - Fix for automatically playing next song in playlist when using gStreamer phonon backend. - Only update "current song" label once playback of next song actually starts, before this fix it was updated a few seconds before. - Fix 15-20 second delay in startup if kde-telepathy is installed, was causing a dbus-deadlock with the kded daemon. - Remove icons on song position and volume sliders in main user interface, looks cleaner. 2012-01-27, version 0.4.1: Bug fix release. - The "Now Playing" plasma applet now supports Mpris2 dbus interface so I could finally test support for this in BoomBox. Found a couple of issues and fixed those. - I switched to a dark colour theme and found two places where it was always showing text in black colour. Fixed to follow system palette.
Besides those small problems BoomBox is still working just fine, no problems with the xine and GStreamer phonon backends. VLC backend seems to have issues.. many annoying behaviors when using that. 2011-04-01, version 0.4: New release with minor fixes: - Added a Help entry to the BoomBox menu and wrote documentation. - Added titles to the toolbars, shown when right-clicking on a dockwidget. - Renamed some actions to sound better - Added the actions for the collection tab to the shortcuts editor - Changed the function of "New Playlist" now saves current settings under new name instead of starting a new blank one. - Compile fix for ubuntu 10.04 This is not a joke!
2011-03-25, version 0.4rc1: Finally I have something good enough for a release! Took some two years... but during those two years I have also quite happily used it full time for myself. So now I'm hoping to get some feedback on how this works for everybody else, hopefully it can reach more people thanks to the excellent build service that opensuse provides! Also big thanks to lubos lunak for the nice kde-obs-generator! Please comment below for any feedback/questions, much appreciated! There is no documentation yet, hoping to have time for that soon (and also hoping that it isn't really needed!)
2009-05-03: Development on a complete rewrite has started, today I pushed this work into a git repo on the sourceforge project space. Feel free to try it, but remember that it is work in progress. Not yet suitable for everyday usage. Added a screenshot of this new version as a teaser! The rewrite uses KDE4 libraries, phonon, sqlite and taglib.
0.3.1: Small bugfix release.
0.3: So... it's been over a year since last release. Sorry for that. But at least now a much improved release is available. Most important changes:
changed to sqlite 3. This means you will need to remove the old database file ($HOME/.boombox/music.db) before starting the new version.
Added tag editing. Quite nice to use, imo.
Added playlist support. Uses a combobox in the main window.
Switched to taglib - Cleaner and makes mp3s get length field filled out.
Lots of fixes with character encodings. Should work now.
General cleanup and restrucuring of alot of code.
Now able to read pls files.
Added tooltips to display meta info in playlist.
Fixed the equalizer. Can actually be used now... =)
Small fixes Scroll to song playing when pressing "Add & play" Make browser refresh after db update. Make mainbar buttons toggle. Use path in playlists, making them work through db updates. Fix esc on button in browser. Show video window when playing video, keep track of user's setting. URLs should have all their fields filled out. Install a .desktop file. use fromUtf8 in bbbackend, xine_get_meta_info
When I tried to compile 0.4rc1 I got this error:
boombox-0.4rc1 $ make
[ 2%] Built target doc-handbook
[ 2%] Built target boombox_automoc
[ 5%] Building CXX object src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/boombox_automoc.o
In file included from /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/boombox_automoc.cpp:5:0:
/home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp: In member function ‘virtual int BBResultView::qt_metacall(QMetaObject::Call, int, void**)’:
/home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp:84:72: error: invalid use of incomplete type ‘struct QModelIndex’
/home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/../../src/bbresultview.h:28:7: error: forward declaration of ‘struct QModelIndex’
/home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp:84:72: error: initializing argument 1 of ‘void BBResultView::itemClicked(QModelIndex)’
make[2]: *** [src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/boombox_automoc.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/all] Error 2
make: *** [all] Error 2
When I added
#include <QModelIndex>
in src/bbresultview.h boombox compiled.
This was on Kubuntu Natty.
I'd like to try this out, largely since Amarok 2 currently lacks support for visualizations, but the Ubuntu package appears to be outdated; it depends on libtag1c2, which has been replaced by libtag1c2a (as of 9.04, maybe earlier). Anyway, keep up the good work!
Nice to hear there is still interest! If you just want to try it you can still install it with 'dpkg -i boombox-blah-blah.deb', it will complain about libxine but still it will be installed and work fine. You probably have the dependancies installed already, I know I did on a fresh kubuntu jaunty system.
I will see if I can provide a fixed deb file soon, most of my interest now is in developing the new kde4 version and being outside in the nice weather! =)
I've tried Boombox, and then i've got some problems:
1. I played Boombox in an afternoon. And then i stopped it, and run XINE to play some VCD, but xine didn't work well (frame too slow). But when i killed Boombox, Xine will run normally just like before. I know that both Boombox and Xine are using Xine-lib as the engine. But this kind of thing is not happened when i use amarok which using Xine as engine too. Is this a bug of Boombox?
2. I do shuffle my playlist. But everytime i play Boombox, the first track played is always the same track. Is this another bug of Boombox?
3. The loading time is long enough. Is this Boombox thing, or Sqlite thing?
Thanks.
Awesome, can't wait to try it out! From your changes listed, at least a couple of my points from a year ago are addressed :) Amarok is a but too much of a jumble for me, boombox is a great winamp/xmms replacement in Qt.
couple bugs: It is hard to write anything in the input boxes in the database browser. Clicking on one with the mouse won't let you write in it, you have to click on the list above it first. In other words, to type in the 'genre' text area, I have to first click on a genre in the 'genre' list. Boombox also crashed the first couple times I tried to add a song to the playlist. The last directory I had added a song from no longer existed. Had to edit ie: will make boombox crash when trying to add a file. Doesn't happen often I guess, but happened to me :) The equalizer certainly does something: it makes everything very quiet. Is normal volume at the top instead of in the middle? I like the new icon theme. Nothing like crystal and makes no bones about it.
Heheh... yeah actually quite satisfied with the icons, first time I've played with vector graphics.
I will have a look at the bug, sounds very simple.
The app in general has been designed to be easy to use with the keyboard. As a way to reduce number tab-presses needed to change between the lists in the browser I removed the ability to focus the filter boxes. (quick and easy implementation...) Will think about if it can be solved in some other way. Thanks for the feedback! Glad the app is appreciated.
my comment doesn't look like it did when I wrote it (probably from the xml pasted from boombox's config file). The second bug (if you couldn't figure it out from my truncated post) was ~/boombox/config option key="LastDir" value="/dir/that/no/longer/exists" causes a crash when trying to add a file to the playlist. I see what you mean about making it easier to use with the keyboard. Does make it a tad harder to use with a mouse though, hope you can come up with something for that. One would imagine there is a way to specify certain widgets be skipped when tabbing through, I might have a look at that.
Heheh... thanks.
I wanted to try amarok some weeks ago, just for reference. But sadly I never got 1.2.x or 1.3.x working. Tried both xine and gstreamer backends too. So I still live in blissful ignorance... =)
Well, hmm... the support is very basic at this moment, a menu for playlists is planned. For now you'll have to run some command from the commandline:
boombox path/playlist.m3u
boomboxctl add playlist.m3u
boomboxctl set playlist.m3u
or you could paste the path to it in the "add URL" dialog.
I really like this :)
Stuff I'd love to see:
1) drag and drop (from the library to the main window, from a file browser to the main window)
2) It would be nice if the vuisualization window opened automatically when you play a video
3) toggle buttons. When the equalizer is displayed, it would be cool if the equalizer button appeared depressed. same for vis, playlist etc.
4) easy way to UNselect a year/album in the media library so all artists can be displayed again
Why is the stop button gone? To make room for the visualization button I assume, but I rather miss it :) True, it really doesn't do mucht hat the pause button doesn't, but it doesn't feel like a full fledged media player without it :D
Library is interesting.. in winamp you select an artist, get a list of his albums. select one, get all the songs but all the artsists remain in the list. In BB, selecting an album shows all the artists on that album (soundtrack or tribute album say), which is cool. Same with the year, select 2003, you get all artists who did something in that year. BUT you then can't select other artists without pressing 'reset all.' It is kinda cool to be able to sort this way, but different from how winamp does it and could be confusing. Point 4 could remedy that
well, I creatd a patch for 3. the buttons now look as though they are toggle buttons, I guess I will mail it.. I see no way to attach here and it is a bit too long for a comment
This version compiles and works ok, the database can be updated and the only problem seems to be that if you select and artist and then a song, the artists list only displays that particular artist and noone else. You have to click on an empty field from the albums group in order for the whole artist list to appear again.
I must say that this app is very good and probably after another 2 or 3 revisions will be my default player. Thanks
When running make, i get the following.
Building dependencies. cmake.depends...
cmake.depends is up-to-date
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/sqlite: building default_target
Building dependencies. cmake.depends...
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/src: building default_target
Building dependencies. cmake.depends...
Building object file bbanimator.o...
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp: In member function `virtual
bool BBBouncyAnimator::Animate(int)':
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: `sin' undeclared
(first use this function)
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: (Each undeclared
identifier is reported only once for each function it appears in.)
/home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: `exp' undeclared
(first use this function)
make[3]: *** [bbanimator.o] Error 1
make[2]: *** [default_target] Error 2
make[1]: *** [default_target_src] Error 2
make: *** [default_target] Error 2
Any help?
You could try adding "#include <math.h> to the top of bbanimator.cpp or possibly main.cpp.
I'm no coder and haven't had this problem, so I don't know if it would help, but i still believe it would make some kind of difference.
I've also heard humors about having to include stdlib.h, but I'm not sure about it.
Please post here if when you get it to work and let us know what you did :)
It's in /usr/lib/qt3 (afair), but it really ought to be able to find it itself...
Does boombox use the standard KDE admin dir, or does it carry it's own?
after trying every single playlist plugin for noatun and the very promising amarok, I'd say this is a really nice interface.
by the way, is that kicker I'm seeing on the right side of the screen? or some ultramodified gkrellm theme? Could you give me some hint on that?
Ratings & Comments
36 Comments
When I tried to compile 0.4rc1 I got this error: boombox-0.4rc1 $ make [ 2%] Built target doc-handbook [ 2%] Built target boombox_automoc [ 5%] Building CXX object src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/boombox_automoc.o In file included from /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/boombox_automoc.cpp:5:0: /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp: In member function ‘virtual int BBResultView::qt_metacall(QMetaObject::Call, int, void**)’: /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp:84:72: error: invalid use of incomplete type ‘struct QModelIndex’ /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/../../src/bbresultview.h:28:7: error: forward declaration of ‘struct QModelIndex’ /home/boerre/Dokumenter/src/boombox-0.4rc1/boombox-0.4rc1/src/moc_bbresultview.cpp:84:72: error: initializing argument 1 of ‘void BBResultView::itemClicked(QModelIndex)’ make[2]: *** [src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/boombox_automoc.o] Error 1 make[1]: *** [src/CMakeFiles/boombox.dir/all] Error 2 make: *** [all] Error 2 When I added #include <QModelIndex> in src/bbresultview.h boombox compiled. This was on Kubuntu Natty.
Ok, thanks!
I'd like to try this out, largely since Amarok 2 currently lacks support for visualizations, but the Ubuntu package appears to be outdated; it depends on libtag1c2, which has been replaced by libtag1c2a (as of 9.04, maybe earlier). Anyway, keep up the good work!
Nice to hear there is still interest! If you just want to try it you can still install it with 'dpkg -i boombox-blah-blah.deb', it will complain about libxine but still it will be installed and work fine. You probably have the dependancies installed already, I know I did on a fresh kubuntu jaunty system. I will see if I can provide a fixed deb file soon, most of my interest now is in developing the new kde4 version and being outside in the nice weather! =)
I've tried Boombox, and then i've got some problems: 1. I played Boombox in an afternoon. And then i stopped it, and run XINE to play some VCD, but xine didn't work well (frame too slow). But when i killed Boombox, Xine will run normally just like before. I know that both Boombox and Xine are using Xine-lib as the engine. But this kind of thing is not happened when i use amarok which using Xine as engine too. Is this a bug of Boombox? 2. I do shuffle my playlist. But everytime i play Boombox, the first track played is always the same track. Is this another bug of Boombox? 3. The loading time is long enough. Is this Boombox thing, or Sqlite thing? Thanks.
Awesome, can't wait to try it out! From your changes listed, at least a couple of my points from a year ago are addressed :) Amarok is a but too much of a jumble for me, boombox is a great winamp/xmms replacement in Qt.
couple bugs: It is hard to write anything in the input boxes in the database browser. Clicking on one with the mouse won't let you write in it, you have to click on the list above it first. In other words, to type in the 'genre' text area, I have to first click on a genre in the 'genre' list. Boombox also crashed the first couple times I tried to add a song to the playlist. The last directory I had added a song from no longer existed. Had to edit ie: will make boombox crash when trying to add a file. Doesn't happen often I guess, but happened to me :) The equalizer certainly does something: it makes everything very quiet. Is normal volume at the top instead of in the middle? I like the new icon theme. Nothing like crystal and makes no bones about it.
Heheh... yeah actually quite satisfied with the icons, first time I've played with vector graphics. I will have a look at the bug, sounds very simple. The app in general has been designed to be easy to use with the keyboard. As a way to reduce number tab-presses needed to change between the lists in the browser I removed the ability to focus the filter boxes. (quick and easy implementation...) Will think about if it can be solved in some other way. Thanks for the feedback! Glad the app is appreciated.
my comment doesn't look like it did when I wrote it (probably from the xml pasted from boombox's config file). The second bug (if you couldn't figure it out from my truncated post) was ~/boombox/config option key="LastDir" value="/dir/that/no/longer/exists" causes a crash when trying to add a file to the playlist. I see what you mean about making it easier to use with the keyboard. Does make it a tad harder to use with a mouse though, hope you can come up with something for that. One would imagine there is a way to specify certain widgets be skipped when tabbing through, I might have a look at that.
It's a very nice application, but amarok still ownz it by miles, but keep up the good work, your doing good things :)
Heheh... thanks. I wanted to try amarok some weeks ago, just for reference. But sadly I never got 1.2.x or 1.3.x working. Tried both xine and gstreamer backends too. So I still live in blissful ignorance... =)
hopefully i'm just missing something obvious, but i can't figure out how to load playlists. help please? thanks.
Well, hmm... the support is very basic at this moment, a menu for playlists is planned. For now you'll have to run some command from the commandline: boombox path/playlist.m3u boomboxctl add playlist.m3u boomboxctl set playlist.m3u or you could paste the path to it in the "add URL" dialog.
I really like this :) Stuff I'd love to see: 1) drag and drop (from the library to the main window, from a file browser to the main window) 2) It would be nice if the vuisualization window opened automatically when you play a video 3) toggle buttons. When the equalizer is displayed, it would be cool if the equalizer button appeared depressed. same for vis, playlist etc. 4) easy way to UNselect a year/album in the media library so all artists can be displayed again Why is the stop button gone? To make room for the visualization button I assume, but I rather miss it :) True, it really doesn't do mucht hat the pause button doesn't, but it doesn't feel like a full fledged media player without it :D Library is interesting.. in winamp you select an artist, get a list of his albums. select one, get all the songs but all the artsists remain in the list. In BB, selecting an album shows all the artists on that album (soundtrack or tribute album say), which is cool. Same with the year, select 2003, you get all artists who did something in that year. BUT you then can't select other artists without pressing 'reset all.' It is kinda cool to be able to sort this way, but different from how winamp does it and could be confusing. Point 4 could remedy that
well, I creatd a patch for 3. the buttons now look as though they are toggle buttons, I guess I will mail it.. I see no way to attach here and it is a bit too long for a comment
To unselect you either press right mouse button, press space or click the "editbox clear buttton" Not entirely discoverable, but hey.
Tried to compile it but failed, didn't knew if you wanted the report here or on your SF page. http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1089832&forum_id=370697
This version compiles and works ok, the database can be updated and the only problem seems to be that if you select and artist and then a song, the artists list only displays that particular artist and noone else. You have to click on an empty field from the albums group in order for the whole artist list to appear again. I must say that this app is very good and probably after another 2 or 3 revisions will be my default player. Thanks
When running make, i get the following. Building dependencies. cmake.depends... cmake.depends is up-to-date /home/leog/downloads/boombox/sqlite: building default_target Building dependencies. cmake.depends... /home/leog/downloads/boombox/src: building default_target Building dependencies. cmake.depends... Building object file bbanimator.o... /home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp: In member function `virtual bool BBBouncyAnimator::Animate(int)': /home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: `sin' undeclared (first use this function) /home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once for each function it appears in.) /home/leog/downloads/boombox/src/bbanimator.cpp:165: error: `exp' undeclared (first use this function) make[3]: *** [bbanimator.o] Error 1 make[2]: *** [default_target] Error 2 make[1]: *** [default_target_src] Error 2 make: *** [default_target] Error 2 Any help?
You could try adding "#include <math.h> to the top of bbanimator.cpp or possibly main.cpp. I'm no coder and haven't had this problem, so I don't know if it would help, but i still believe it would make some kind of difference. I've also heard humors about having to include stdlib.h, but I'm not sure about it. Please post here if when you get it to work and let us know what you did :)
#include should help. This is better than including math.h because your are not mixing c and c++ headers
Qt not found, try specifying manually. wtf? Yes, I have qt installed, but where? =P Mandrake 10.0 Official (/usr/bin?)
It's in /usr/lib/qt3 (afair), but it really ought to be able to find it itself... Does boombox use the standard KDE admin dir, or does it carry it's own?
after trying every single playlist plugin for noatun and the very promising amarok, I'd say this is a really nice interface. by the way, is that kicker I'm seeing on the right side of the screen? or some ultramodified gkrellm theme? Could you give me some hint on that?
the panel looks like XFCE... have a look at http://xfce.org/