Archive for the ‘Gmu’ Category

Gmu 0.7.0_BETA8 – First Gmu Open Source Release (Update)

Friday, February 26th, 2010

Gmu has been around for quite some time now and previous versions of Gmu always have been released as Freeware. Today I release another version of Gmu. It is another beta release of the 0.7.0 series and hopefully the last beta release until the final 0.7.0 release.
Over the past few years, people have frequently asked me if I would release the source code of the Gmu music player, but until today I didn’t. Although I had planned to release Gmu as open source software, I always wanted to make Gmu somewhat feature-complete, first. Now Gmu is very close to such a state. Of course there will always be features worth adding and bugs that need to be fixed, but (in my opinion) it is in a very usable state.
Actually, I had planned to release Version 0.7.0 as Gmu’s first open source release. The reason for doing it earlier with this 0.7.0_BETA8 version, are the guys at sharism.cc who develop open source hardware like the Ben NanoNote which I have mentioned a few posts earlier. They would like to ship those NanoNote devices with Gmu as the device’s music player.

What’s new in this release? Actually not that much considering new features, but there still has been a notable change. I’ve improved Gmu’s theme engine such that it will be possible to use Gmu on devices with screen resolutions other than the good old 320×240 resolution used on the GP2X, Wiz and Dingoo. This is not of much use for those devices but allows for easier porting of Gmu to other devices. Unfortunately, this change also means that you cannot use your old Gmu skins, but it is rather simple to create your own new themes with the new theme engine. Just have a look at the new “default-modern” theme, which comes with this Gmu release.

So here it is. The Gmu Open Source Edition released under the GPLv2 (GNU General Public License version 2). Also, for your convenience, there are binary builds for the GP2X, GP2X Wiz and the Dingoo A320.

gmu-0.7.0_BETA8B-GP2X.zip (GP2X and Wiz release, 707 KB)

gmu-0.7.0_BETA8B-DINGOO.zip (Dingux release, 671 KB)

gmu-0.7.0_BETA8B.tar.gz (GPL’d source code, 163 KB)

When trying to build Gmu please have a look at the BUILD.txt file first. There are important information on how to build Gmu binaries for different targets.
Also, new users should have a look at the README.txt file that comes with every Gmu release.

Update: Right after the release a minor bug has been discovered, which I have already fixed. So here is an updated BETA8B release.

Posted in Ben NanoNote, Dingoo A320, Dingux, GP2X, GP2X Wiz, Gmu | 1 Comment »

Gmu on the Ben NanoNote

Monday, January 11th, 2010

The Ben NanoNote is a handheld device with hardware similar to the Dingoo A320. It runs Linux as its operating system (OpenWRT). Instead of gaming controls it has a qwerty keyboard. Probably the most interesting aspect about this device is its open hardware design.

Here is a photo of a Ben NanoNote running the Gmu music player. The Gmu port for the Ben NanoNote is not finished yet, so there is no public release yet.


I do not currently own a Ben NanoNote myself. That is why the photo has been taken by zear of the Dingoo community, who has been helping with testing Gmu on the device.

Posted in Ben NanoNote, Gmu | No Comments »

Gmu 0.7.0_BETA7 released

Thursday, December 31st, 2009

Here is another Gmu release for the GP2X (Open2X), the GP2X Wiz and the Dingoo A320 (Dingux). It is the last Gmu release for this year. ;)
It comes with some new features and bugfixes.

The new features include:

  • A shutdown timer: Gmu can be configured such that it shuts itself down after a number of minutes or after the last track has been played. Gmu can also execute a command to shut down the entire device, so you can use this feature as a “sleep timer”. This obviously won’t work on the GP2X-F100/F200 because of the device’s mechanical power switch.
  • A log bot: Gmu is now able to keep track of the played tracks by writing them to a text file. This can be used for various purposes. It might be useful for feeding those data into the last.fm system for example.
  • Faster seeking: When seeking through a song Gmu now increases the seeking speed
  • An increased number of playlist slots: Gmu can now handle up to 32 playlists (instead of 8).

Besides those new features there are some bugfixes, e.g. the auto-play feature has been fixed. That was previously broken in the 0.7.0 series of Gmu.

Gmu for the GP2X and the GP2X Wiz:
gmu-0.7.0_BETA7-GP2X.zip (850 kB)

Gmu for the Dingoo A320:
gmu-0.7.0_BETA7-DINGOO.zip (780 kB)

Please have a look at the README.txt file that comes with Gmu. There are lots of useful information and configuration hints.

Posted in Dingoo A320, Dingux, GP2X, GP2X Wiz, Gmu | 4 Comments »

Updated key mapping for Gmu (Dingux version)

Monday, November 30th, 2009

Here is an updated keymap file for the Dingux version of Gmu, with only a minor, but useful change. Almost all usable button combinations have already been used, except the SELECT + DOWN combination. I’ve mapped the page down action there, so you can navigate faster in large playlists and directories.

dingoo-keymap.zip (739 bytes)

To use that file just extract the zip file and replace the .keymap file in your Gmu folder.

Posted in Dingoo A320, Dingux, Gmu | No Comments »

Yet another Gmu release for Dingoo, GP2X & Wiz (0.7.0_BETA6)

Tuesday, September 15th, 2009

Here is another Gmu release for all supported systems. It is mostly a bugfix release.
The most important bugs that have been fixed with this release are the backlight-power-off issue and the volume issue, both only occuring on the Wiz. There are a few other changes which are applicable for all systems, though.

Grab the new Gmu release for your device here:

gmu-0.7.0_BETA6-GP2X.zip (0.8 MB)
gmu-0.7.0_BETA6-DINGOO.zip (0.8 MB)

Please note, that you will need the Open2X firmware to run this release on your GP2X. On the Wiz it runs with the default firmware. On the Dingoo you’ll need the latest Dingux firmware release.

Posted in Dingoo A320, Dingux, GP2X, GP2X Wiz, Gmu | 25 Comments »

Gmu 0.7.0_BETA5 for Dingoo A320, GP2X and GP2X Wiz

Tuesday, August 18th, 2009

Here is a new Gmu release. It is available for the Dingoo A320 running Dingux, the GP2X running Open2X and the GP2X Wiz.

Gmu on Dingoo and GP2X-F100

This release comes with several new* features:

  • Module decoder plugin (using MikMod) for playing tracker modules (such as MOD, STM, S3M, IT, XM, …)
  • Improved MP3 playback performance on GP2X and Wiz (MP3 @ 85 MHz on the GP2X) due to improved ARM assembly in mpg123
  • Hardware and software volume control which should allow better volume control on the Wiz and might reduce background noise
  • Lyrics support (text files and lyrics from ID3v2 tags are supported)
  • Cover artwork support
  • Display-off feature on the Wiz
  • Various bugfixes

* At least they are new for the 0.7.0 branch. Some might have been available in the old 0.6.X branch already.

Grab your copy of the latest Gmu release here:

gmu-0.7.0_BETA5-GP2X.zip (GP2X and Wiz release, 820 kB)

gmu-0.7.0_BETA5-DINGOO.zip (Dingoo release, 750 kB)

Posted in Dingoo A320, Dingux, GP2X, GP2X Wiz, Gmu | 8 Comments »

New Dingux released – Gmu update required

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009

A new Dingux version has been released, which comes with a new rootfs. An EXT3 partition on the SD card is no longer needed. Actually EXT3 support has been dropped from the Dingux kernel in favor of FAT to make installing Dingux from Windows easier and reduce the kernel size. Due to other changes dynamically linked programs need to be recompiled for this Dingux version.
Here is a new Gmu release which is compatible with the latest Dingux release.

gmu_dingoo

To run Gmu extract the zip file to your SD card and execute gmu.goo in the Gmu directory.

gmu-0.7.0_BETA4-DINGOO-newdingux.zip (0.8 MB)

Posted in Dingoo A320, Gmu | 7 Comments »

Gmu 0.7.0_BETA4 for the GP2X Wiz released

Sunday, July 19th, 2009

Here is another Gmu release of the upcoming Gmu 0.7.0! This time it is a version for the GP2X Wiz. It also runs on the GP2X F100/F200 with the Open2X firmware installed. Beware that this is a very experimental release. Unfortunately I currently do not own a Wiz myself, so I was not able to test it on the Wiz.

gmu-0.7.0_BETA4-GP2X.zip (0.6 MB)

On the Wiz use gmu-wiz.gpu to run Gmu. On the GP2X use gmu-gp2x.gpu instead.

Posted in GP2X, GP2X Wiz, Gmu | 6 Comments »

Gmu 0.7.0_BETA4 for Dingux released

Saturday, July 18th, 2009

Here is another Gmu release for the Dingoo. Most notably it fixes an annoying bug where the backlight would not turn back on after a while when the hold mode had been enabled.

gmu-0.7.0_BETA4-DINGOO.zip (0.9 MB)

You need Dingux with a uclibc-based rootfs to run Gmu.

Posted in Dingoo A320, Gmu | No Comments »

New Gmu beta release for the Dingoo (0.7.0 BETA3)

Friday, July 10th, 2009

Here is a new Gmu Beta release for the Dingoo A320. This release comes with some major improvements and bugfixes including:

  • Backlight power-off is now functional on the Dingoo (backlight will be turned off when the hold mode is enabled as well as after a configurable amount of time without pressing a button)
  • FLAC decoder now comes with meta data tag support
  • MP3 decoder does no longer crash Gmu with broken/invalid files

Gmu is highly configurable. It is always worth it to have a look at the README.txt file. Especially if you are having trouble running Gmu, make sure you have read the “Installation” section of the README.txt file.

gmu-0.7.0_BETA3-DINGOO.zip (1.0 MB)

I have added a script called gmu.goo to the archive, which makes it easier to run Gmu on Dingux. It does all the annoying stuff you had to do manually before. You can run that script from the command line or execute it from a file browser.

For those of you using dmenu on the Dingoo, you can easily add a Gmu menu entry to dmenu, by editing dmenu.cfg. Simply add a section like this to the appropriate section of the file:

MenuItem Gmu
{
    Icon = "res/explorer.png"
    Name = "Gmu Music Player"
    Executable = "/root/gmu-0.7.0_BETA3-DINGOO/gmu.goo"
    WorkDir = "/root/gmu-0.7.0_BETA3-DINGOO"
    Selector = no
}

In case you’ve extracted the Gmu zip file to some other location, you need to adjust the path accordingly.

Please make sure you are using the latest Dingux kernel. Otherwise the backlight power-off function won’t work.

Posted in Dingoo A320, Gmu | 4 Comments »