Xmcd Local Discography

by Ti kan

Local Discography

Main Index

## Introduction

Welcome to xmcd Local Discography. This is a storage area on your system that can be used to collect and organize files related to each CD you own. The files can be text, HTML or other documents, image or animation files, sound clips, etc. Examples are music reviews, artist interviews, photographs, fan information, MP3 sound files etc. You can download these from fan sites on the Internet, or create your own. You can make local web pages that contain links to Internet sites, or links to files associated with other CDs in Local Discography.

These files can be viewed, played and/or printed using the wwwWarp feature of xmcd. Xmcd will drive an external web browser to access the files.

## Directory Organization

The top-level Local Discography directory is /usr/pkg/lib/X11/xmcd/discog on your system. This was created when xmcd was installed. Under this directory there are hierarchy of directories of music genres (i.e., Rock, Classical, Jazz, etc.). These genres match those of the CDDB2 service. Xmcd automatically creates the genre and sub-genre directories, as well as the per-CD directories. When you select the "Xmcd Local Discography" entry in xmcd's wwwWarp menu, your web browser will go to a xmcd-generated web page about the CD that is currently loaded.

The Local Discography directory path pertaining to the CD is displayed on the web browser when you select "Xmcd Local Discography". Scroll the browser to the bottom of the page.

## Setup Instructions

No setup in xmcd is necessary to use wwwWarp and Local Discography. However, you must have a supported and functioning web browser installed on your system.

#### Web browser configuration

Your system must have the Netscape Navigator or Netscape Communicator web browser software installed in order to use xmcd's wwwWarp and Local Discography features. Other web browsers will not work correctly with wwwWarp.

In order to reach Internet sites via wwwWarp, your system must be connected to the Internet. However, the Local Discography feature does not require an Internet connection.

If your system is within a firewall, and requires the use of a proxy server to access the Internet, then your web browser must be appropriately configured. See your local system administrator about configuring your web browser. To test internet accessibility, start your web browser and enter http://www.amb.org/xmcd/ in the location bar. This should take you to the Xmcd official web site.

To test xmcd's wwwWarp capability, start xmcd and click on the wwwWarp button (the one with the world symbol). Choose the "Xmcd official web site" entry in the menu. This should cause your web browser to go to the Xmcd official web site.

Normally xmcd will automatically invoke the Netscape browser on your system when you use wwwWarp and Local Discography. However, if one of the following conditions occur:

- Xmcd cannot locate the Netscape browser on your system.
- You have more than one version of the Netscape browser installed, and xmcd is invoking an undesired version.

The remedy is to define the full path to the Netscape browser executable in the BROWSER_PATH environment variable. If you use Bourne Shell, Korn Shell or similar, add the following to your $HOME/.profile file:

    	BROWSER_PATH=/usr/local/bin/netscape
    	export BROWSER_PATH

If you use C-Shell or similar, add the following to your $HOME/.cshrc file:

    	setenv BROWSER_PATH /usr/local/bin/netscape

Substitute /usr/local/bin/netscape above with the actual path to your desired browser executable. Log out and log in again to have this take effect.

#### Local Discography directories

When xmcd is installed for the first time, the top level Local Discography directory as well as some basic music genre subdirectories are created for you. When xmcd or cda gets a successful CDDB2 query of CD information, it automatically creates the Local Discography directory for the loaded CD.

An HTML index file is also automatically installed by xmcd and cda in each CD's Local Discography directory. This is the file that xmcd will point your web browser to, when you view a CD's Local Discography.

You can put other related files in each CD's Local Discography directory, such as images and sound clips. These files will automatically appear in the CD's Local Discography when you use xmcd's wwwWarp system to view it.

Xmcd and cda will also automatically create the index files for browsing your Local Discography directories. Once you start loading and playing your CDs in the drive, you will find that your Local Discography will grow, and you can go to the Main Index to browse your CD collection by the genres and subgenres.

You are now ready to use Local Discography!

## How to Use

To use Local Discography, start xmcd and load a CD in the drive. Click on the wwwWarp button on xmcd's main window (this is the button with the world symbol). A wwwWarp menu will pop up. Choose the "Xmcd Local Discography" entry, and your web browser will go to the appropriate entry.

The web browser will display the artist, disc title and track title information about the currently loaded CD, as well as other information from the CDDB2 service.

Disc and track titles on the Local Discography page are usually clickable hyperlinks, that causes a search to be done on the CDDB search engine.

If there are other files in the directory, the browser will also display a listing of those files. You can click on a file to view or play it. Note that your web brower may need certain plug-ins in order to open or play some file formats.

The page will also display hyperlinks (URLs), if any are found in the Disc Notes or Track Notes portions of the CD information.

## Copyrights

Please be aware of possible legal implications when sharing music-related files with others. Some of the information, including album cover art, graphics and photos, lyrics and other data are likely to be protected by copyright. Xmcd and its author are not liable for the users' actions.

## Related Links

- Xmcd - Motif CD player by Ti Kan
- Xmmix - Motif audio mixer by Ti Kan
- CDDB - The #1 music info source
- Plugger - Streaming multimedia plug-in for UNIX Netscape by Fredrik Hübinette
- Sox - Sound eXchange: sound file format conversion utility by Lance Norskog
- Open Sound System - Sound driver for many UNIX platforms

CDDB and CDDB2 are trademarks of Gracenote.
@(#)discog.htm 6.28 01/07/01