[SOLVED - workaround ]Mga3 - Quirks with Amarok

[Myles]

Amarok problems:

Cannot navigate to my USB attached external hard drive anymore on the left-hand pane – it worked in Mageia # 2, what has changed, or do I have to change something???? I used to navigate to a folder on my drive and R click on it and select “Add to Playlist” for Amarok which would add all the songs in the folder to the Playlist. Now even if I go directly to my External drive, navigate to a folder in Dolphin,I don’t have that option, I have to select individulal or groups of songs from a folder and select “Add to Playlist” for Amarok, which is annoying. Navigating and adding within Amarok was far superior.

If I have music on my Playlist when my PC dies/sleeps/can’t be woken up (see other problems with my upg/install of Mageia#3 in this forum); when I re-boot the Playlist is still populated but is greyed out and the songs are unable to be played. I have to clear the Playlist and re-select all the songs again!
Is there something I can do to rectify these problems?
As alwayus,any help/assistance greatly appreciated.

[Myles]

Another weird thing since upgrading/installing Mageia #3. when I am navigating in Amarok via the L-hand panel and select "Files. Browse your local hard drives for content." I get 8 weird entries in the list. See screen dump: http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmarokshowingweirdiconsinFilesListing_zps25f12199.png

What are these? When I click on them nothing happens (L or R click).

Any idea of how to get rid of them?

[benmc]

Hi Myles.

I have just checked my amarok and you are correct about the eight weird entries- they are your partitions that amarok does not have permission to access.
this is why your playlist is greyed out as well when you restart your system, permission has been forgotten.
you can access them through the "root" path under places, again, root access permission will have to be given.

if your playlist is on an internal drive, you can change its access permissions in MCC / local disks / manage disk partitions / toggle to expert mode / options.
take note of which options are currently set, then:
select "user ": allow ordinary user to mount the system.

try this and let us know if it improves things.

Cheers

Benmc

[doktor5000]

if your playlist is on an internal drive, you can change its access permissions in MCC / local disks / manage disk partitions / toggle to expert mode / options.
take note of which options are currently set, then:
select "user ": allow ordinary user to mount the system.

Probably won't help for partitions that aren't mounted via fstab ... Maybe check viewtopic.php?f=41&t=5148

[Myles]

Benmc and doktor5000,
I'm not sure whether any of this will help. Let me explain further. I don't have a "saved" playlist that I load into Amarok, I used to just navigate to my external drive via Amarok, just select a folder and R-Click select "Add to Playlist". I'd load up a couple folders or more and just listen to the songs. In Mga #2 I could see my external drive (My Book) under both root > media http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmarokshowingMyBookinmedia_zps26c2ba11.png and root > Places http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmarokfromMga2showingMyBook_zps38aca6c8.png. In Mga #3 in Amarok, there is no "Places" icon or anywhere I can see/access it. This image shows all but one of the partitions - I don't know why it doesn't show 8. And I have just realised after booting into my Mga #2 system - once loading an album onto the Playlist and playing a song in Amarok, then re-booting again into it later, that the Playlist wasn't retained like I thought it was. (I very rarely shut my system down!), but in Mga #3 it does retain the entries I just can't play them.

As far as the 8 entries go, I indeed do have 8 partitions visible, 7 spread across 2 internal drives and one showing as 394Gb on my 3Tb external hardrive - for some reason unknown to me I have no idea why it only shows as 394Gb in MCC!
Also, I forgot to mention that Amarok can see my Windows drives in the L-Hand navigation pane and I can access them and their contents. See screen dump here (hopefully this works) http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmaroknotshowingMyBook_zps10ab897e.png and here is the screen dump showing the 8 weird partitions http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmarokshowingweirdiconsinFilesListing_zps25f12199.png
If it helps,here is the contents of my fstab

Code: Select all

# Entry for /dev/sdb2 :
LABEL=Mageia / ext4 acl,relatime 1 1
# Entry for /dev/sda1 :
UUID=785C66935C664BC6 /media/win_c ntfs-3g defaults,umask=000 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sdb1 :
UUID=BC14C4DC14C49B32 /media/win_c2 ntfs-3g defaults,umask=000 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda3 :
UUID=01C6CA6653521100 /media/win_d ntfs-3g defaults,umask=000 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda4 :
UUID=01C55086D50A7800 /media/win_e ntfs-3g defaults,umask=000 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
# Entry for /dev/sda5 :
UUID=b68852c8-ac47-40de-9fe0-c95df52fe564 swap swap defaults 0 0

Does this now mean I have to mount my external drive via fstab or something?
Excuse my ignorance, but where is this

"root" path under places

location?
In Mga #2, there is a "Places" icon - that for me - doesn't exist in Amarok in Mga #3, or that I can see to access it. Here it is in my Mga #2 Amarok http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/AmarokfromMga2showingquotPlacesquoticon_zps8748dade.png

So still in the dark about how to fix these things, or even if I can.

[benmc]

Hi Myles

"root" path under places

Amarok.png (62.21 KiB) Viewed 2024 times

for me, this directory "music " requires root permission to access as it is in seperate internal disk called "extra " and I forgot to mount it as I should have during the installation.
to access it I open dolphin, attempt to access the drive contents, which then asks for root permission. Otherwise it will be just an empty window in the Amarok "add media " pane.
then, when I make a playlist from here it will list and play every song until i reboot. then the playlist is displayed but greyed out, same as you.- permission has been revoked.

also, have a read of this regarding MCC seeing your "My Book " incorrectly : viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3855#p27730, it may be related.

[doktor5000]

Well, the problem with the playlists is probably that they use absolute paths at some point.
And the path where removable media are mounted was changed by upstream from /media to /run/media/username.
That's probably why your playlists created under Mageia 2 won't play.

I'm not using Amarok anymore, so can't really help you further with that - for me it also doesn't show places.
But maybe it's just confused by your old settings?

EDIT: Well, i can navigate to files/places via the "Files" pane. Does that work for you?

[Myles]

No, I can't navigate to Places from Files. If I go from the original pane in Amarok, Select Files, it takes me to Root and lists all of the root folders.

But SUCCESS, I remembered (I think benmc mentioned) that the path had changed now for drives. So I can now access my music on my MyBook once again via this path: Files > Root > run > media > myles > My Book > Music and then access the folders under there just like I used to and R-Click and "Add to Playlist" just like I used to.

So there is the workaround for me.

Thanks for the help benmc and doktor5000.

[artificeprime]

....one showing as 394Gb on my 3Tb external hardrive - for some reason unknown to me I have no idea why it only shows as 394Gb in MCC!

Hi Myles, I'm not 100% sure (I'm no expert), but I think I can field this question for you as I too have a 3TiB external. It's because as its backend MCC uses plain old fdisk which can only handle disks up to a certain size (2TiB iirc). Your 3TiB external is surely a GPT disk, and the only way I know of to manage them properly under Linux is with GPT fdisk from the CLI (here's a thorough tutorial should you need it). You'll find you have it installed already as [/usr]/sbin/gdisk. (I was rather hoping MCC would have been updated to handle GPT disks in Mageia 3, but sadly, no.)

As for Amarok, I'm searching for a fix too. I keep my music locally in my /home so I don't have your issue, but I listen to streaming audio and since the upgrade, if a stream is stopped, I can't simply restart it by hitting "Play" off the tray icon anymore. I have to restore Amarok's window and double click the stream itself in the Play List before it responds, which is odd because the tray method still works fine for local music. I'm guessing this new (and annoying behaviour) is intentional, but I can't help wondering "why?".

Cheers.

[doktor5000]

Maybe try clementine, or exaile or something like that? Doesn't preserve your collection, but also does the job.
Another idea would be to just create a symlink /home/myles/Music to /run/media/myles/My Book/Music or mounting it via autofs under your /home/myles?

[Myles]

Thanks for that artificeprime, I'll read up on it.

But so much for my workaround, today that path doesn't exist in Amarok for some reason (I am having all sorts of problems with this upgrade to #3 - see some of my other posts). Now when I go from Files > Root, there is no media folder listed anymore! So I am back to square one!

[doktor5000]

So I can now access my music on my MyBook once again via this path: Files > Root > run > media > myles > My Book > Music and then access the folders under there just like I used to and R-Click and "Add to Playlist" just like I used to.

[Myles]

doktor I double-checked the path before writing that - but I now know why it wasn't showing up. Each time I have to re-boot and my 2 dolphin sessions are restored (1 for the root of my Home drive and 1 for the root of My Book), there is always an error msg for my My Book under the path Root > run > media > myles > My Book - see it here: http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g391/Myles5712/Mageia%203%20Problems/DolphinshowingMyBookerror_zps6a97c9e3.png. BUT, after I click on the My Book definition under the list of devices on the L-hand pane, it restores that path in Amarok as well of course so I can access my music! So I mustn't have done that before posting update! I presume it mounts it somehow.

[doktor5000]

Well, devices are not automatically mounted, so if you directly access the path, it's not mounted.
Clicking on it in the places pane mounts it, that's normal behaviour.