hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr0320.txt

Episode: 320
Title: HPR0320: Audacious
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0320/hpr0320.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-07 16:14:29

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Hi, my name is Gordon Syncler. My handle on the IRC is Thistleweb. In this episode
of our Republic Radio, I'm going to do a lightweight application called Audacious.
Now, for those that don't know about Audacious, it's a music player. If you have used Winamp
or XMMS, it's along the same lines. I believe Audacious is a successor to XMMS.
Certainly, the similarities with Winamp, it's more than just cosmetic. Each of these
programs, they have three magnetic windows. They've got a little player window and they've
got a playlist window and an EQ, an equalizer window, which are all independent. They can be
toggled on and off. They're magnetic in the fact that you can move them so that they're
lined up next to each other. When you move one of them, it moves the other one as
well. They move together. It also remembers where it is on the screen as well, which is
handy if you just want it away out the road, you know, out the way somewhere.
There are other elements to make it similar to Winamp as well. You've got, for a
start, the skins, there are something like five or maybe six skins that come with Audacious
by default. That may vary depending on the distribution you use, I'm not sure. But the
skins, that's not your only choice for skins. Winamp skins are compatible with Audacious.
You can drop Winamp skins into the Audacious skins folder and they'll show up in the menu
and the preferences to allow you to select them. Now, there are two different types of Winamp
skins. There's modern and there's classic. I believe the classic ones work, but the modern
ones don't. There are two different file formats as well. There's dot wall WAL
and there's dot WSZ, I think. One of these is in modern skins and one of these is the
classic skins. The reason I'm a bit vague on that is because I actually prefer the default
1.3 classic skin that comes with Audacious. I've not used any of these extensions for quite a
while. The other thing that makes it very similar to Winamp is the fact that you can have it
as a system tree icon as well. You can minimize it to the system tree and control it
from there. You know, a right click on that can then give your play, pause, whatever.
Or you can have it set up to your keys to have a multimedia keys to play or pause when
the phone goes. But these are done. In Winamp, they are done just by ticking an option in the
preferences. In Audacious, you have to install the plugins to do that. Now, the plugins are,
it's a single plugins file that's in the repos. I usually install them both at the same time.
The player and the plugins, if you search for Audacious in your package manager, you should
see both. That collection of plugins under one program should have status icon which gives
you your icon in the system tree and allows you to right click and just open a file from there.
It also gives you, you should have global hotkeys in there which lets you assign your play, pause,
and your skip track, volume up, whatever, to keys on your keyboard. And then the one I use in addition to
that is audio compressor which is sort of a, it can look forward a bit in the track and make sure
that it's all more or less the same volume which is not very good for music but it's handy
for podcasts and audio books which is the main reason that I use the main things I'll listen to
which is why I have that particular one.
So when, why would you want a small, a little lightweight player as opposed to one of the bigger ones?
Well, for me, I've got an older computer so I need to count every megabyte.
I don't want something that's going to take up for a 50, 60 meg just to just it one and get in my road.
I don't need that, I don't want that. So I need something lightweight and resources.
Now, the big dogs, the big programs like Exail and Banshee and Amarok and Rhythmbox, they're great
but they've got far too much that I don't need. They're all tend to be multi-section windows
or with different lists of different things and you know, built in pod catchers
and built in connections to last FM and you know, any time you add a new album
that wants to synchronize that and import into your library and have all these different playlists
and I don't need all that. There's a lot of people who don't want all that complexity.
So audacious fits the bill just very nicely in my opinion.
If you have a lot of spare space, that's fine, you can go with whatever you want.
If you're trying to, if you don't need all that complexity and you just want to throw a folder into the player
and say it right, play, minimize it to the system tree and just do whatever you need to do.
That way you're not, the sound's coming out, you've got control with the keyboard
and it's not taking up any space on the panel.
So that's audacious, basically. I mean, there's a lot more to it than that, but that's basically an intro to audacious.
So if you've been looking for a little music player that will play in an older computer
and doesn't take up much space, either in real estate and the screen or in resources to run,
definitely check audacious out, you could do a lot of wash.
So that's been another hacker-public radio and I'll call a data app.
So my name is Gordon Sinclair. My handle on the IRC is Thistleweb.
If you want to contact me via email, Thistle.webcast at googlemail.com.
Until next time, goodbye.
Thank you for listening to hacker-public radio.
This VR is sponsored by Carol.net, so head on over to C-A-R-O dot N-E-T for all of her TV.