Headunit (Linux/Windows CarPC frontend) + initial screenshots

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 02:41 AM

Well, I finally had some time last week to do some real work on that Linux port I was doing of MediaCar. Actually, it's not really a port since I don't have the MediaCar source code

. I just used feb's mediacar skin and coded everything else from scratch in Qt.

EDIT: Latest Files (9/21/2004)
HeadUnit 0.3 (Windows Installer)
HeadUnit 0.3 (Source Code - Linux/Windows)

Before I jump into details, here are some screenshots. They really aren't that exciting since it's the same skin as MediaCar:

You will notice some minor differences that are mostly due to different fonts in X11 and lack of numbering in the playlist. For audio, video, and DVD playback I used xine-lib. The result is media playback that is integrated into the program and does not rely on external applications.

I just started on this thing so there aren't many featuers yet, but here is a short list:
* Support for most popular audio formats (COMPLETED)
* Support for most popular video formats (including DivX) (COMPLETED)
* Support for DVD playback (including menus) (INCOMPLETE)
* Skin support (currently only MediaCar, but plan to support FrodoPlayer) (COMPLETED)
* Fullscreen audio visualization (using GOOM) (COMPLETED)
* simple playlist (COMPLETED)
* Creates a database of all media files during initial setup (uses SQLite as DB) (COMPLETED)
* Windows port (COMPLETED)

Now, you are asking why did I do this?

Well, mostly for personal reasons:
1) I want to run my CarPC in Linux for reasons I don't want to get into now
2) I wanted to get MediaCar running again since Coyote left (altough now it looks like FrodoPlayer is the way to go)
3) I was too impatient to wait for dashpc and xcar to mature (although I am still eagerly waiting for a release...I like the notion of a CarPC distribution of Linux)
4) I wanted to play around with Qt
5) I wanted to **** people off by starting yet another CarPC frontend that really doesn't offer any new features

So, what now?

1) I submitted this project (HeadUnit) for review to SourceForge. If they accept it, it will be available there for download and for developers to work on.
2) Since the source is open, anyone can add stuff to it. It is coded in C++, but not well documented. However, it should be pretty easy to figure out if you know Qt.
3) I will be porting it to Windows so it should basically run exactly like MediaCar does now (I don't anticipate this will take more than a week or so...anyone want to help??? PLEASE???)
4) I will probably change the skin to FrodoPlayer style so that it can provide FrodoPlayer's better browsing features.
5) I already played aroung with trying to integrate Destinator (in Wine) so I will work on doing that next (after the above stuff is done).

Having said all this, I really don't have that much time to work on it, so I was really hoping to get volunteers to help develop this thing. Also, a note about XCar: this project has a different goal than xcar and I don't believe it is a competing project. Xcar has much bigger goals and will be a much more professional-quality product when completed. HeadUnit is meant to be a quick solution to hold us over until XCar is ready for use.

Also, to be realistic, this project will probably go the way of the dodo, but I thought I'd give it a shot while I had the motivation.

I will post the sourceforge link as soon as I hear from them, but if you want the source in the meantime, send me a PM. You will need to have qt-3.3.2, xine-lib, and sqlite installed before building this project.

frodobaggins · 07-02-2004, 02:48 AM

Kick ***.

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 02:59 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by nopistonpc

5) I wanted to **** people off by starting yet another CarPC frontend that really doesn't offer any new features

Quote: Originally Posted by frodobaggins

Kick ***

at least i didn't **** frodo off.

frodobaggins · 07-02-2004, 04:29 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by NoPistonPC

at least i didn't **** frodo off.

Different platform

No competition for me.
But it wouldn't **** me off anyway

Plus, I like you (platonic!)

Frodo

Edit: I see you are porting to windows.
Still cool.

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 04:54 AM

Actually, I was just referring to you being ****ed off about yet another carpc frontend, not because of competition but because there are already so many out there. I know I have a hard time keeping it up with all of them...except for yours of course!

And anyway, I have a LOOOOOONG way to go before it gets anywhere close to the *** kicker that FrodoPlayer is.

frodobaggins · 07-02-2004, 05:07 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by NoPistonPC

Actually, I was just referring to you being ****ed off about yet another carpc frontend, not because of competition but because there are already so many out there. I know I have a hard time keeping it up with all of them...except for yours of course!

And anyway, I have a LOOOOOONG way to go before it gets anywhere close to the *** kicker that FrodoPlayer is.

See this post:
http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/show...25&postcount=8

dominic · 07-02-2004, 05:32 AM

does anyone know how long sourceforge usually takes to accept/decline projects??

Nic · 07-02-2004, 07:37 AM

sweet i want the source

pity i wont be able to do anything with it... you ready for some feature requests? bass and treble controls on the player page, syncing of files over wifi before shutdown (like put a relay on the serial port to see if ignition goes low, when it does check if my home computer is in range, sync then shutdown or just shutdown) and make it based on some sort of database, media car really loads folders slowly when you have a few hundred mp3s in them

the other big feature i want is blutooth/phone support but i guess these will do for now

Jawbreak · 07-02-2004, 11:10 AM

linux frontend - love it, great job

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 02:08 PM

Quote: Originally Posted by frodobaggins

See this post:
http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/show...25&postcount=8

LMAO! Where's my mouthwash?

Quote: Originally Posted by Nic

sweet i want the source

pity i wont be able to do anything with it... you ready for some feature requests? bass and treble controls on the player page, syncing of files over wifi before shutdown (like put a relay on the serial port to see if ignition goes low, when it does check if my home computer is in range, sync then shutdown or just shutdown) and make it based on some sort of database, media car really loads folders slowly when you have a few hundred mp3s in them

the other big feature i want is blutooth/phone support but i guess these will do for now

I'm not really taking feature requests at this point since there still a lot of basic work that needs to be done, but I can't stop you from making them.

In any case,
it already uses a database (SQLite) and is really fast once the database is initially setup. The syncing of files over wifi is best accomplished with a small external app (preferebly a daemon process) whose only purpose is to do that. It's the UNIX way! Bass/Treble is easliy done...the only problem is redoing the skin (feb?)

Quote: Originally Posted by jawbreak

linux frontend - love it, great job

Thanks!

mobileh1 · 07-02-2004, 02:23 PM

Can I get a copy? hafman at yahoo.com

Does this build fine on Fedora Core 2 or did you use anything distro-specific?

Thanks

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 04:08 PM

It's up on sourceforge (http://sourceforge.net/projects/headunit).

If you have problems accessing source through CVS, try (with empty password):

Code:

cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs-pserver.sourceforge.net:80/cvsroot/headunit login
cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs-pserver.sourceforge.net:80/cvsroot/headunit co headunit

Quote: Originally Posted by mobileh1

Does this build fine on Fedora Core 2 or did you use anything distro-specific?

I use gentoo, but it should work fine with fedora. Read the INSTALL file for compile instructions. You need to have the SQLite driver for Qt (instructions here: http://doc.trolltech.com/3.3/sql-driver.html#QSQLITE) and make sure your xine-lib was compiled with sdl support. The fedora RPMs may already have these compiled for you, so try it out before you re-compile anything.

jbors · 07-02-2004, 04:28 PM

Amazing.
Whole bunch of rework. Don't know why you took MediaCar as a parent if you haven't used any of MediaCar's code...

Definitelly the way to go, if your graphics level is abstracted then it would be a piece of cake to have it run under DirectFB or something which is making more sense than running X.
Good luck,
Bors/

NoPistonPC · 07-02-2004, 05:16 PM

Quote: Originally Posted by jbors

Amazing.
Whole bunch of rework. Don't know why you took MediaCar as a parent if you haven't used any of MediaCar's code...

Definitelly the way to go, if your graphics level is abstracted then it would be a piece of cake to have it run under DirectFB or something which is making more sense than running X.
Good luck,
Bors/

I really didn't model it after MediaCar. I actually modeled it after feb's brushed metal skin. I figured it would be better to make use of existing skins rather than defining yet another skin format. It means less work for febsperanza.

I'm actually going to change over to FrodoPlayer skins since they allow for more functionality than the MediaCar skins. Actually, I will probably use the MediaCar main menu skin and frodo's player and playlist editor skins.

Also, in reality, it wasn't that much work. Qt is a well designed framework that allows for rapid cross-platform code development. Regarding the graphics abstraction layer, basically I am relying on whatever Qt provides. From what I know, I believe that Qt does provide framebuffer support through Qt/Embedded. I'll look into it.

stevieg · 07-02-2004, 05:16 PM

Hiya, glad to see you're getting along well with it

Got a question!!!!

Will it support an External App/GPS App so (as you tested before) I can make/use a windows app such as destinator/ app in MapPoint control?