symphonic-developers

[JS <sir...@ya...>]

Hello everyone.

I'm one of the satisfied users of JSymphonic, and I originally found out about it on the SonicStage wikipedia page. The "external links" on that page have been removed, and I was hoping it could be re-posted so others could find out about JSymphonic and once again enjoy using their Sony music players.

I'm a total door-knob when it comes to making web pages or even wikipedia, as I found out with my first-ever posting on it regarding reinstating the "external links". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:SonicStage#External_links

I was directed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:EL to review the policies, but it was a bit over-whelming for me, and I am still left scratching my head as to why those links couldn't be posted. I think it IS relavent to the original article regarding Sony's SonicStage software, especially since Sony no longer even supports that software.

I'm hoping somebody with the knowledge, skills, ability and time can comment on this and maybe even get that list of links re-instated, or perhaps get a new wikipedia page started for JSymphonic. I would LOVE to help in any way I can, but I'm SO clueless that I think it would be like asking my cat to assist in brain surgery.  :-)

I also don't have my own internet connection, so my ability to get online and do much is extremely limited as well. Thanks for listening (reading) and I'm hoping for much success for JSymphonic, and may it once again bring smiles to the faces of owners of Sony digital music players.

Respectfully,
JS  :-)

--- On Sat, 3/7/09, Nicolas Cardoso <car...@gm...> wrote:
From: Nicolas Cardoso <car...@gm...>
Subject: Re: Fw: Re: Help needed for OMA support in JSymphonic
To: sir...@ya...
Date: Saturday, March 7, 2009, 3:30 AM

Hi !

It is a very good idea ! I was thinking about doing a Wikipedia page for JSymphonic, but I didn't think about linking it to the SonicStage's one ! I didn't write the page myself because filling the website has a higher priority. 


But, in a few weeks, JSymphonic is coming to be stable (with the 0.3.0 release) and it could be a good thing to have the website ready for this date and to communicate as much as we can to make it more famous. Wikipedia is a great way to do so.


You are welcome to write to the developpers and testers mailing list to propose the idea !
Here are the adresses:
Sym...@li...

Sym...@li...

And, if you have time and will, you can contribute to JSymphonic's website:
http://symphonic.sourceforge.net/

(As you can see, so far, it is just the default CMS page... everything has to be changed !)
If you want so, let me know ! If you don't have any skill but you want to improve them, it's time to learn !! ;-)


See you !
Nicolas


2009/2/25 JS <sir...@ya...>


Hello Nicolas.

I'm glad to help and I'm also glad that this project is still alive and kicking. I so VERY much dislike Sony's SonicStage, your JSymphonic program will be SUCH a welcome alternative to use.


On a side note, I believe the original resource I found that lead me towards JSymphonic was on Wikipedia. I had done a search on Sony SonicStage and towards the bottom of the page there was a list of alternative software programs with links that a person could use. I checked and none of those alternatives are any longer listed. I think it might be helpful to continue to have a notation on that page (if it is allowed) pointing people towards the JSymphonic page. I would be more than happy to promote JSymphonic as much as I can, but I'm one of those dinasaurs that doesn't know how to make a web page or even make an addition to a Wikipedia
 page.

If you want, I'd be more than happy to start a thread suggesting these things on the JSymphonic message board to see if anyone that has the knowlege and skills to do so, but I don't want to do that if you don't think it's the right time for that. I do think there are MANY Sony Walkman users that would be VERY happy to find out about and use JSymphonic as an alternative to the disaster known as SonicStage.  ;-)


Have a GREAT week!

Kurt  :-)

--- On Tue, 2/24/09, Nicolas Cardoso <car...@gm...> wrote:

From: Nicolas Cardoso <car...@gm...>
Subject: Re: Fw: Re: Help needed for OMA support in JSymphonic
To: "JS" <sir...@ya...>

Date: Tuesday, February 24, 2009, 11:01 AM

Hi !!

Don't apologize, I didn't code
 during 4 months, I totally understand !!!

Thanks for this tests ! No, you didn't make any mistake, a second alpha-tester reported same results as yours ! I've updated the part of the code doing the copy of files, and I was sure I did correctly for the OMA part...


Anyway, I didn't need your files from your walkman for the moment, don't worry for that.
Also, the title I gave you were protected, so it explains why you had trouble even with SonicStage !

I'm gonna try to fix it in one or two weeks. I'll come later with a new version to test !




Thanks for your help !

Cheers,
Nicolas


2009/2/24 JS <sir...@ya...>




Sorry, it seems Gmail doesn't want to accept any of my attempts to send you an archive of my folders from my player. I did send this email and the attachments to your sourceforge email, but I'm not sure if they got through to you either. Hopefully the log files attachments will make it through, but I'm not sure how to get my player's folders to you if you need them.







Kurt  :-)



--- On Mon, 2/23/09, JS <sir...@ya...> wrote:

From: JS <sir...@ya...>
Subject: Re: Help needed for OMA support in JSymphonic


To: nic...@us...
Cc: "Nicolas Cardoso" <car...@gm...>


Date: Monday, February 23, 2009, 7:54 PM



Hello Nicolas.
 
I'm sorry I've been absent for so long in this testing. I've been
without a computer to be able to do testing and now I finally have one
and have been trying to do my part.
 
I was reading on the JSymphonic message board and downloaded the
version 0.3.0a2 after running into problems with 0.3.0a1. I'm not sure
what the ffmpeg.exe is for, but I read that you mentioned we are
required to have it installed in the same folder that we have the
JSymphonic .jar, so I put it in there. Being the novice that I am and
not knowing what I'm doing, I did give in to the temtation to
double-click the ffmpeg.exe and saw a dos screen pop up and then
disappear.
 
As a refresher, I have an NW-E107 walkman and I primarily use it
with .oma music files. It's been quite a while since I've used my
walkman, so I had to try and refresh myself on how the setup and
transfer worked. Needless to say, I'm having troubles.
 
I started by formatting the walkman via the "format" command
within the walkman. I then used SonicStage to "authorize" the player
and therefore again had the OMGAUDIO folder present. I then ran the
MP3FileManger program (actually the CopyTool.exe program) to get the
MP3FM folder back on the player, and it does have the DvID.dat file in
the MP3FM folder.
 
I first tried using SonicStage to transfer one of my .oma files
over to the player and it worked and played fine on the player. I then
tried using the JSymphonic 0.3.0.a2 to transfer that same .oma song (I
had used SonicStage to remove it first) and when I tried to play it on
my player, it briefly showed the name of the file but then flashed
"CANNOT PLAY FILE".
 
I also tried using SonicStage to transfer all of your five test
.oma files you sent me, and neither of the 128 bit rate files would
import into SonicStage to try and transfer, and the other three would
import into SonicStage but would not transfer over to the player.
 
I used JSymphonic to try and transfer each of your test files over
individually to my player and they transfered over with no problems,
but none of them would play and once again my player flashed "CANNOT
PLAY FILE".
 
So, to recap, none of your five test files would play on my player
with two of them (the 128's) not being able to import into SonicStage,
and when I used JSymphonic to transfer my .oma files, they would not
play on my player. I did make sure to have "Generation" in JSymphonic
set to "Generation level 3 (NW-E10x)".
 
I do have two log files I'm attaching for you to view if they are
helpful. I looked at them and none of it makes any sense to me, but
like I mentioned, I'm just one of those pesky "end users".  :-)
 
I recall having difficulty sending attachments to your sourceforge
email address so that's why I'm Cc'ing this to your gmail account. I
also recall having difficulty making a zip file to send you of my
folders on my player, so I made three different kinds hoping you can
open at least one of them. I use 7-zip as the compression program. Just
let me know which one of my files works best and I'll use that format
from now on.

Once again, I apologize for being absent for so
long, and also for not having the best of results to report, and if I'm
doing something wrong on my end, please let me know since I am not a
wizard at any of this.  :-)

Thanks again for taking on this
project, and if I could BE a wizard, I'd wave my magic wand and have
Sony give you open source rights to their .oma encoder/decoder.  :-)

Sincerely,
Kurt (a.k.a. JS)  :-)

P.S.
- I forgot to mention that I mainly use Vista Ultimate 32-bit, but I
have to dual-boot with XP in order to use SonicStage. I just don't want
to deal with the Vista version of SonicStage as I read there were
HORRIBLE problems with it, and I'd rather not use SonicStage ever at
all. I've also used the 0.3.0a2 JSymphonic in both Vista and XP to do
the trials with the same results as mentioned above.

--- On Sun, 4/13/08, Nicolas Cardoso <nic...@us...> wrote:



From: Nicolas Cardoso <nic...@us...>


Subject: Help needed for OMA support in JSymphonic
To: sym...@li...
Date: Sunday, April 13, 2008, 3:59 AM



(you received this e-mail because you are either on JSymphonic alpha
testers list or the Symphonic developers list)

Hi guys !

As you may know, JSymphonic last version is always in alpha version...


and I have some problems understading what's going on in the different
generations for the OMA support... So I would like you to run some
tests for me (using SonicStage, so pure Linux or Mac users, you can

stop reading here and delete this message...)


I have encoded a "test file" (Offspring-Americana-Welcome) using
different ATRAC options in SonicStage. I need to know how SonicStage
transfers these


 files on your walkman. BE SURE THAT SONICSTAGE IS
CONFIGURED SO THAT IT ONLY CONVERT NON COMPATIBLE FILES (I don't want
these files to be converted another time). Tests are as follow:

For EACH file in the archive enclosed, you have to :


1) empty your player (rename your original
 OMGAUDIO folder in
something else OMGAUDIO_backup for instance and create an empty
OMGAUDIO)

2) start SonicStage, transfer the file

3) go to ".../walkman/OMGAUDIO/10F00" and copy the OMA file, changing


his name into something like "SS-originalName" where original name is
the name of the file in the archive enclosed.

Re-do these step for each file (don't do this in a row, as it is the
same track with different encoding, I won't be able to distinguish


them...)

Then send me back all the files you have generated. (Sourceforge
servers limit the size of the e-mail, you may need to use my gmail
adress
 "cardoso.nicolas
 <at> gmail.com")


Thank you
Nicolas

PS: BTW, lot's of development is currently in progress, lots of things
will have to be tested in a near future
 !!