[Cialug] How to debug media player/window manager interaction

[David Champion]

Last I knew, xmms was a fairly dead project. I started having problems
with it too - mostly that it would quit playing audio unless I restarted
the sound server.

I've been using Audacious - http://audacious-media-player.org - which
seems to be working quite well. It's very similar to xmms / WinAmp.

There's a project called "beep" or BMP that's apparantly a fork of xmms.
I tried it, but liked Audacious better. There's also a new fork of xmms
called xmms2, haven't tried it.

-dc


Daniel A. Ramaley wrote:
> Recently i migrated my office machine from Debian Sarge to Debian Etch. 
> Rather than upgrading, i wiped the drive and did a clean install. I 
> know that isn't necessary with Debian (and on servers i don't bother), 
> but i'd learned enough about how i like things set up between 
> installations that it would be faster and easier just to start fresh 
> rather than massaging the old installation to my current standard. 
> Anyway, since the upgrade i've discovered a weird problem and have no 
> idea how to track down the cause:
> 
> I am usually listening to music using xmms. But, after xmms plays for 
> around 10 or 15 minutes, anything involving the window manager 
> (AfterStep) starts to bog down; switching between applications becomes 
> noticeably slow. By the time xmms has been playing for 20-30 minutes 
> the window manager is unusable: applications won't focus correctly, 
> applications won't move properly to the foreground or background, and 
> switching virtual desktops takes many seconds when it should be 
> instantaneous. If i run a terminal and view the output of "top" 
> AfterStep will be listed as taking 98 to 100% of the CPU. (Normally 
> AfterStep's CPU usage is negligible.) If i pause xmms, then AfterStep's 
> CPU use drops to 0. If i unpause xmms, then AfterStep pegs the CPU 
> again. If i quit xmms and restart it, then i can play music for another 
> 20 minutes before AfterStep is unusable again. I've tried not running 
> my other major applications (kmail and Firefox (er, "Iceweasel", since 
> this is Debian)) and they don't seem to be involved.
> 
> Any ideas on how to go about tracking down what the actual problem is? 
> Failing that, any recommendations for a different music player that has 
> the classic WinAmp interface and can play FLAC, Ogg, MP3, and the 
> occasional MOD, MIDI, and NSF?
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Dan Ramaley                            Dial Center 118, Drake University
> Network Programmer/Analyst             2407 Carpenter Ave
> +1 515 271-4540                        Des Moines IA 50311 USA
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