Playin mp3s in console

Ah. FreeBSD is great! FreeBSD console is great too! I never knew there's so much that I can do in console (blame it on DOS). Although I can't play any movie yet, I can play mp3s contained in my ad0s1 slice (the XP partition, C:) with no problem! Wanna know how? Read on.

First, grab a console or ncurse based mp3 player (multi media player is better) from a FreeBSD ftp site. Currently the main FreeBSD site is down so I grabbed the .tgz file from another mirror. The files is:

ksmp3play-0.5.1.tbz # my choice of mp3 player
smpeg-0.4.4_1.tbz # dependency file needed fer ksmplay
aumix-2.8_1.tbz # ncurse based audio mixer, not needed fer ksmp3play but I love to have this included.

I put all those files in /usr/ports/distfiles. su and issue pkg_add filename.tbz (man pkg_add fer more info) and wallah, it's installed. man ksmp3play, man aumix fer the infos. Now to use it. Make sure your sound is tested, work and all the nessescary module are loaded.

Workin with ksmp3play:

As I have screen installed, it's even better workin with screen than wastin virtual terminal. If you know the directory and the mp3 file name you're about to play, you can just issue:

% ksmp3layer mp3-filename.mp3 # if the file is in the current directory you're in.

or

% ksmp3play /directory/mp3-filename.mp3 # if the mp3 file is somewhere else.

or

% ksmp3play playlist-name.ks3 # to play a saved playlist (more on it below)

and the ksmp3play ncurse screen appears. As the man is not that complete, I just found a few shortcut fer workin in ksmp3play ncurse screen. Press [a] to open a window listin the current directory ksmp3play is playin. If you have lotsa mp3 files, you can move around the list usin arrow keys. To get into a directory, just highlight the directory name and press [Enter]. To go to the previous directory, highlight .. and press [Enter]. You can select the file(s) you want to include in the playlis usin [Spacebar]. To save the playlist just press [s] and the playlist file will have the extension .ks3. To quit just press [q]. To increase and decrease the volume, hit [-] and [+] keys (in my case, I have to press [Ctrl] + [=] because it's a laptop keyboard). Now the console session won't be as quiet as the graves. Hurrah!

Current shortcut that I learned:

a # add file(s) to playlist.
s # save a playlist, will as fer directory/playlist filename input if it's a new list. All playlist is saved as .ks3 files.
d # delete highlighted file from playlist.
e # edit the file (probably id3 tag, I haven't test this yet because ntfs is read only)
q # quit ksmp3play / close file browser (fer addin file to playlist)
= # increase volume
- # decrease volume

I'm still experimentin with the shortcut as there is more that I still don't know of and the man is not that complete.

Update!: Hey! I just found out that pressin [h] will pop up a shortcut button list! Cheers!

Workin with aumix:

This is pretty easy. Just issue aumix and the ncurse screen appear. Just use the up and down arrow keys to scroll the list and use the left and right arrow keys to slide the sliders. The shortcut button are listed on the left side of the program screen so you won't get lost. I wish there's a mixer on bass, treble and stuff. Anyway, enjoy!