Concert Preview: Amarok 2.2.1 Going on Stage

Oct 15, 2009

Genuine Amarok fans are still reminiscing about the good old version 1.4, code-named Fast Forward. The new Amarok 2.2.1 should bring back memories.

Just weeks after release of Amarok 2.2 (code-named Sunjammer), developers are already blogging about the new features in version 2.2.1. New features only? Hardly just that. With Amarok 2.2 the team behind the KDE audioplayer wants to match the quality and stability of the renowned KDE 3 version 1.4. Therefore, Sunjammer will get numerous minor versions intent on enhancing Amarok and not necessarily rushing head-on to the next release.

The first in the series is 2.2.1. As Mark Kretschmann announced in his blog, next to countless bug fixes, the release includes support for the KNotify KDE notification system (previously Amarok showed titles and such in its own dialog box), over a positionable toolbar (with a slim version option) and a markedly improved collection scanner.

Jeff Mitchell is responsible for the new collection scanner. In his blog he describes how he optimized its speed by scanning directories only if their mtime changed, thereby reducing multiple scans of unchanged directories. The result is noticeable speed improvements when scanning collections with few directories but many items in the directory.

To try out the early Amarok 2.2.1 version, the source code is available on Gitorious.

Related content

  • Amarok 2.1 Test Phase Begins

    By their own accord, the Amarok music player people are working on the "coolness factor" for Amarok 2.1 and hope to make a good first impression with their Beta 1.

    more »
  • Amarok supports storage on external data storage units

    As of yesterday, the Nightly Builds from Amarok now support storage maintenance on USB data storage units. This feature is to be found in Amarok 2.2.

    more »
  • Amarok 2.1.1 Ready, 2.2 On The Way

    Development at Amarok is moving fast. Version 2.1.1 has only just been released and already programmers are working on the features of version 2.2.

    more »
  • Amarok to Better Guard Against Potential Malware

    To program an effective virus for Linux is fairly difficult. It's much easier to provide malware disguised as an add-on, however. The Amarok project now wants to protect against that.

    more »
  • Free Software Projects

    Projects on the Move Free software covers such a diverse range of utilities,applications,and other assorted projects that it can be hard to find the perfect tool.We pick the best of the bunch.This month we cover the Amarok player,Flightgear, Debian’s third revision of Woody,and Skolelinux.

    more »

Comments

comments powered by Disqus
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters

Support Our Work

Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.

Learn More

News

Tag Cloud

Administration Community Desktop Events Hardware Linux Mobile Programming Security Software Ubuntu Web Development Windows free software open source