[ubuntu-uk] Ubuntu mp3 players, again

[Rowan]

  Michael G Fletcher <michael at ilovemylinux.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 1, 2009 at 11:45 AM, Rowan<rowan.berkeley at googlemail.com> wrote:
>   
>> -- So, in fact, all these players will open and play MP3 files, or whole MP3 folders (i.e. albums), straight from the Nautilus file >browser, if you right-click and select that -- even if you prevent them from 'populating' their own 'libraries' altogether? You can >certainly do this with Winamp in Windows -- I never let it 'populate' its own 'library', but it worked fine straight from the Windows >Explorer file browser.
>>     
>
> Ok, maybe it's just me being stupid, but why would you not want a
> library with all your music in? all neatly categorised and searchable?
One reason is that the 'music libraries' that these players create are 
not auto-updating, nor can you simply add new items to them as you add 
them to your files: you have to 're-populate' them from scratch every 
time you add anything, if you want it listed. This is a 'known issue' in 
Banshee. But more generally, even though I have 13,000 MP3 files, or 
about 1000 albums, I prefer to use the general file browser (Nautilus or 
Internet Explorer) to navigate among them, and see no need to duplicate 
it. I cannot in fact experiment right now to see whether it is really 
the case that you can use the Banshee player without 'populating its 
library', since I am in between Ubuntu machines, and do not expect to 
get my next one (a Thinkpad from LInux Emporium) for a couple of weeks, 
but I shall attempt it then. At any rate, it's a good thing I keep all 
my music, ebooks, and personal material in general on an external hard 
drive, which I can access equally from any computer ( I am now on my 
fourth home computer, and the Thinkpad will be my fifth).