Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Same media player for maemo that includes support for A2DP bluetooth audio and support for maemoscrobbler is back! You can download it here:
http://maemo.org/downloads/product/kagu/

This new 1.0.2 release includes:
* Many performance enhancements
* Lower RAM usage
* Fixed a few bugs in the theme engine
* Switched to using mplayer's ffmp3 instead of libmp3 for a2dp playback.
ffmp3 is more efficient on ARM.

Everyone currently running 1.0 or 1.0.1 should upgrade as this release is an all around better performer.

Thanks!

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Should we uninstall the old version before installing the new one, and if so, will all A2DP settings still remain intact, or do those have to be redone?

Thanks for the update, I really think Kagu has quite a bit of potential. I prefer the sequential and numbered order of song lists, all in one column, compared to the way UKMP lists songs.

Too bad there is no way to enable a portrait mode for Kagu, it would be much better for long lists than landscape, plus it would make the N800 easier to hold while browsing songs. Plus, the song info and album cover info while playing could be larger and easier to read in portrait mode.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

They should remain intact. no uninstall necessary.

It's planned. Probably won't make release for a while, but I agree and it is planned.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Nice! So portrait is possible, I had no idea. Definitely would make the N800 easier to pick up and operate with one hand while driving, like an iPod. Plus, being an iPhone user, I can tell you it is much easier to use the 'flick-scroll' method in this orientation.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Maybe I missed something but why isn't ogg support available ?
Thanks
Fred

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Simply because:
1.) I don't have any OGGs
2.) I'm not sure how to handle the OGG equivalent of the ID3 tag.

Most of the functionality to support OGG is present, but it hasn't been tested so it's probably broken. If anyone wants to submit a patch that enables OGG, then please do so. Otherwise, it'll have to wait until I get some more pressing features finished.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

awesome, can't wait to test it out once i get home

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Why not joining force with UKMP, since both are in python?

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

This is a common question, so I'll attempt to explain:

Originally, I wanted to help the UKMP project, but as I got into it, I realized that UKMP's code is too messy to service. The entire application is crammed into a single massive file, among other things. In addition, UKMP's author didn't want to move to python 2.5 and sqlite3 for a database backend. I believe that step is necessary for good performance and clean code.

Therefore, Kagu is a complete rewrite of UKMP from the ground up with a clean, highly object oriented, design. It isn't perfect, and we're still playing catch-up to UKMP's feature set (though we already have a number of features that UKMP lacks), but we think Kagu is a lot easier to maintain and extend than UKMP.

Both projects are GPL, so UKMP is free to take from Kagu any code that it finds useful. (In particular, I think UKMP's author might like the Screen/Battery awareness code, and maybe the OSSOPlayer code, as we found GStreamer less than reliable) We've already taken a ton of code from UKMP and rewritten it for Kagu's object model. So it's not like the two projects can't benefit each other. This is, after all, open source.

Of course, if UKMP's author wants to join the Kagu project, we'll welcome him. We're always looking for new programmers to help out.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Tangent....
I loaded 1.0.2 but do not have the latest firmware. It scanned my card just fine, but when starting the application it blacks the screen and then dies. I have the latest python, and installed the app from the install button. I don't need the a2dp stuff, so I wanted to check out what this app looked like. Does this app require the latest firmware update? What is the command to run from the command line so that I maybe I can see why it would be dying?

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Interesting problem. I've never seen that before.

No, the latest firmware shouldn't be necessary. The only real requirement is python 2.5 which can be downloaded from http://pymaemo.garage.maemo.org/.

Assuming that you have python 2.5 installed, I recommend that you SSH into the tablet from a desktop machine as 'user' and run the command `kagu`. Or perhaps `/usr/bin/kagu`. Paste the backtrace you see there into this thread and we'll help you solve the problem.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

OK, ran the command from the xterm and the last line of the traceback is (at line 70 in main:
globals.albumcache = pygame.image.load(os.path.join(db.get_db_dir(), "album_cache.tga")).convert()
pygame.error: Couldn't open /home/user/MyDocs/.sounds/album_cache.tga

I looked there and sure enough its not there (DOH!). Thinking this gets created by the kagu-scanner I re-ran the scan program. The file is still not there.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

What I'm about to ask you might sound silly, but please bear with me:

1.) Do you have wifi access on the tablet when you are running kagu-scanner? It pulls album cover art from the internet, so you need wifi when running the scanner.

2.) Do you have any mp3s on the memory card? And do those mp3s have ID3 tags? Kagu currently requires at least one mp3 with a proper ID3 tag to function properly.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I do have wifi access and confirmed it was connected. The scanner certainly appears to be pulling something down. And for #2 I have an 8gig SDHC card that has about 312 songs on it and I believe they all have tags. I guess it might be possible that there is a song or two that doesn't have tags.

I will run the scanner from the command line and see if it bombs out prior to finishing (?maybe it crashed and didn't write the file?)

OK, sure enough, kagu-scanner errors out with:
...line 257 in __load_image
image = pygame.image.load(self.art_path)
pygame.error:Unsupported image format

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Just out of curiosity, is the UI going to get any love soon? I know that the code is what's important, and getting features/bugfixes out the door is of prime concern, but I personally can't stand the UI. It's what's keeping me from using it. Any plans to address that?

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I'm going to help Nanocore debug his problem off thread.

What don't you like about the UI, exactly? If you're more specific, perhaps we can improve it.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

TBH, the UI is a bit of a turn-off. It makes UKMP's look good (which I still think is a bit bare bones).

It's little things like having graduations scroll as well as items, but then not line up; elements without a visible bounding box or button (e.g. the "OK") etc.

Short version: look at iTunes, the iPhone or Canola (but keep the album art in the listing view, which hopefully the next version of Canola will get).

Long version: I'm not a good UI designer; I just know what's usable when I see it :)

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

What do you mean by "graduations"? And not lining up?

I understand what you mean with the OK button and the bounding boxes. I think we can fix that easily enough.

We would appreciate some help in this area. Unlike canola, kagu is open source. If you want to help improve it, you can. I'm a programmer, so I have very little interest in making things pretty. I deal with usable, and in my opinion the UI might not be very pretty, but it's quite usable. If you want pretty, help us out.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I've opened a ticket for this. That's the first step. Now we need someone to do the work: https://www.guardiani.us/projects/kagu/ticket/23

I don't mind doing it, but my time is limited and I have higher priority items on the list currently, so it will probably be a while before I can get to it. Perhaps someone from the community will step up and help out?

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I like the ui ok. The only thing I don't like is that I can't do anything in other programs while running Kagu.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Are you running 1.0.2? In 1.0.2, Kagu goes into a low CPU state when it loses focus (i.e. goes into the background). You should be able to multi-task with Kagu in the background so long as you aren't running A2DP. If you're referring to A2DP playback, then yes, sorry, but A2DP requires a lot of CPU currently. That isn't Kagu's fault and there isn't a whole lot Kagu can do about it. At least you *can* run A2DP. :) Kagu is the first media player for maemo to include a UI for A2DP playback after all.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

trevarthan - kagu.py consumes 15-25% CPU even when the UI is inactive, is this the pygame main thread issue you touched on in a previous thread?

If Kagu is minimised, kagu.py doesn't appear to use any significant amount of CPU but when Kagu is the active/focused application the UI uses far too much CPU when idle. And when audio is being played (a2dp or otherwise) the UI continues to consume CPU cycles at the rate of 15-25%.

Is there any way to eliminate this UI CPU consumption when Kagu is active/focused?

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Yes. PyGame is intended for games, not applications. It's a bit of a hog. Normally, it uses 100% CPU, so at least we've got it down to 20%. :) BTW, UKMP and Canola have the same issue as they both use PyGame.

Turning off the screen (Power button then center dpad button is a quick way to do this) also forces Kagu into low CPU mode. UKMP doesn't do this yet, but I talked to Konttori just this morning about it and he seemed interested in Kagu's code for doing this.

We can't really reduce the normal (i.e. screen state = on) CPU usage any further without increasing screen response latency. What does that mean? It means that if we increase CPU savings, then it'll take longer for Kagu's scroll widget to respond when you try to interact with it.

We should probably allow the user to tune this value from kagu-scanner or gconf. I've opened a ticket to remind us to do that in the future: https://www.guardiani.us/projects/kagu/ticket/28

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

ack

My kagu-scanner is bailing with the following:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 691, in <module>
if __name__ == '__main__': main()
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 689, in main
Scanner()
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 660, in __init__
self.sp.get_album_covers(os.path.join(self.db_dir, 'album_cache.tga'))
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 397, in get_album_covers
album_art = Art(album,width,height,art_path)
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 253, in __init__
self.__load_image()
File "./kagu-scanner.py", line 257, in __load_image
image = pygame.image.load(self.art_path)
pygame.error: Unsupported image format

As a result the player will not launch ?

pygame.error: Couldn't open /home/user/MyDocs/.sounds/album_cache.tga

Any solution to this yet ?

Ta

Dave

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

it's fixed in svn (ticket link) so it'll be in the next release (scheduled for sunday)

if you like you can try downloading the development snapshot of kagu via svn, there are some instructions on the project page.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Groovy, thanks for the prompt response.

I may have a crack at the svn install. I do so wanna scrobble :)

Thanks again

Dave

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I'd love to see a "shuffle" button added. I'm using this in my car, and have a bunch of single songs (not albums) to play. I have to back out and pick another song to play each time, which is kind of dangerous while driving. Is there any way to shuffle that I'm missing? If i hit the dpad to the right, it just plays the same song again. thanks, and I love the work you're doing. I'm streaming the music with a2dp to my pioneer deck, and it's awesome.
Rob

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

You'll see a shuffle button in the next release (probably available this Sunday or early next week). However, it will only meet half of your need. The other part is that you seem to be asking for playlist add/remove buttons on a per song basis (since the songs aren't in the same album). This functionality is planned, but will not be in the next release. Perhaps the one after.

BTW, please stop pushing buttons while in the car! That's dangerous! :)

I don't want to be on the news for making software that had something to do with an automobile accident. :(

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

it just can not work, same as 1.0.1.

1. media scan can not finish cover downloading.

2. kagu media player can not startup. it display starting and then exit without any other user interface displayed.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Lots of things have changed since 1.0.1. I can't think of anything that would cause what you're seeing though. I'll private message you and see if we can debug the problem.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I don't think I need playlist capability, all my songs are just at the root level of the External card, and I just want to be able to skip ahead and back between all songs. thanks for the speedy reply, I look forward to the next release!
Rob

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Kagu is the equivalent of the "Artist" view in an ipod. You could trick it into playing all of your songs if you changed the ID3 tag of each song to have an identical Artist. iTunes might be able to do that. I use Amarok to do it under Linux. You should be able to select multiple songs at once and change their Artist tag at the same time.

I think that's the only way you're going to get what you want from Kagu at this time.

In the future, we plan to have individual song add/remove playlist support, and you'll be able to do it that way too, hopefully with an m3u file too. But I don't know when that will happen.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

OK, I'll give that a go.
thanks,
Rob

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

OK, I know everyone hates the current theme, so what do you all think of this?

http://www.guardiani.us/newtheme-songs.png

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

i think i would prefer the original theme

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I like the look of the new theme much better, it makes the titles easier to read than they are on the current gradient bars.

Is there any reason that the playback controls can't be laid out horizontally?

<< || >>

Two more nice features would be an 'Exit' icon without confirmation instead of having to back out each level, and a 'screen off' button that doesn't lock the screen. Just a tap would turn it back on.

Just suggestions, hope I'm not sounding too picky :) But, I do use Kagu exclusively now, I like the features, and it doesn't seem to create any problems with the SD cards.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Kagu lacks layout support in 1.0.2 and probably won't get it until 1.0.4 or later. It's important to me though, so I've opened a ticket: https://www.guardiani.us/projects/kagu/ticket/51

that's a fine idea. ticket: https://www.guardiani.us/projects/kagu/ticket/52

No, great suggestions.

BTW, from my perspective, you're about the 3rd person I know of using Kagu regularly, including me. :) I'm sure there are a few more, but all I see are the complaints. I can't tell you how nice it is to know that you like it. It'll keep getting better, I promise.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

Glad to see you open those new tickets, trevarthan...hopefully these features are not hard to add, and don't come at the expense of something else.

As for the three users of Kagu, we can't help it if we're that much further ahead than everyone else, right? ;)

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I'm still not 100% sure how to actually turn the screen off from python, but I'm working on it. It didn't make 1.0.4 (released today), but I'm fairly confident that it'll be in the next release. I found myself wishing for this functionality myself last night while listening to an audio book before going to sleep. Screen's brightness kept annoying my wife.

Re: Kagu Media Player Released 1.0.2!
 

I solve that using the softpoweroff feature in mce. need to edit mce.ini for that though.