iTunes on Ubuntu and all its official variants

[Eric Bradshaw]

Ali, I feel for you. I managed to switch my whole family to *buntu from Apple Macs, but my wife was by far the hardest to convince. I ended up setting up Ubuntu for her like a Mac - with launcher(s), menu placement, etc. that mimicked the Mac OS "look and feel" - which is what it's all about. She's hooked on the Mac experience and that experience comes through with many of Apple's core Apps (I don't know if the names have changed now, but) like iPhoto, iWork, iLife, etc.

My wife doesn't give a hoot about the underlying technology and doesn't really understand what an MP3 is (much less an AAC file). I've tried Banshee, VLC and several other media players on her own computer, but she won't use them. She still takes photos, but has me make copies, or changes, or prints because no matter what I put on her computer, it doesn't work (look and feel) like iPhoto did. I can make CDs of MP3s for her to play in any computer or DVD player in the house, the car, etc. But, she'll still use her iPhone to listen to music because it runs in iTunes.

I used nothing but Mac in my home for many years, so I understand the appeal. I also understand the frustration of trying to use *buntu software with an iPod, iPad, iPhone, iTunes in general to appease my wife. I've convinced myself (though have no proof) Apple purposely releases another update to their iOS that breaks any significant "breakthrough" Linux programmers make at "cracking" some of their code. After all, they have share holders, artists and record companies to answer to.

I gave up the iTunes battle of *buntu long ago. I keep an old G4 PowerPC Mac around to back up my wife's iPhone. You can probably get a G4, or G5 really cheap online or maybe at a garage sale. It's saved me a lot of frustration.

Eric

PS - Search for the Mac application called Audion sometime - what most Mac users back then (2000?) knew iTunes was based on when it came out. It had hundreds of skins too, only they called them "Faces." Lots of other neat features too. I miss it.