Crossing Over

Okay, so fixing the Pidgin problem was a lot easier than expected.  A quick Google search yielded the following forum result…

Go to Synaptic and search for SSL then selected: libnss3-dev, libnss3-tools and libnss3-0d (it might be installed already thie one). Then after installing those, search for pidgin and reinstall it, that should do it.

Thanks big time madelman.

So I’ve been told that running a large number of windows applications can be easy using WINE on your linux PC.

Apparently iTunes is not necessarily one of these easy running applications.

As a matter of fact, I can’t seem to get past the halfway point in the installation process.

As you can see in the screen, everything seems to be able to get in the half-way point really well, but that’s aboot where it stops.  Three or four failed attempts leads me to believe that I should just stick with Amarok for now.

Posting to the AmaroK forum yielded little in the way of results, although I didn’t get anything in the way of sarcastic replies.  The only response I managed to get was “You should call Apple support.”

The downside is that if I call apple support they will say “use iTunes on Windows or OSX - we don’t support Linux in any way, shape or form.  Even Ubuntu” and I KNOW I don’t have problems when I use iTunes on Windows XP to load the music.

I’m going to try uninstalling and reinstalling AmaroK tonight.  With all of the problems I’ve had in trying to get it to work properly, that may have screwed something up.  The good news is that I know the fast and easy way to install MP3 support in AmaroK so this won’t be another adventure in futility.

Also, the good news is that Songbird DOES work for me, it’s just incredibly slow.  And as much as it sucks to have a music application that’s slow, it sucks even more to have one that doesn’t work.

So it turns out that Rhthmbox will recognize and read files from my 2nd gen iPod Nano, but it won’t do the automatic sync of playlists like iTunes or Songbird.

Also disappointing is the lack of crossfading support.  It’s kind of lame to listen to a cd that you know shouldn’t have any gaps between the songs and get that harsh break in the middle - it’s especially bad for live stuff.

So as it stands, it seems like Songbird still provides the best overall music experience, though I still haven’t been able to get Amarok to work properly on GNOME.