Ubuntu Wiki

Taylor "Ripps" LeMasurier-Wren

• Launchpad: https://launchpad.net/~ripps818

• Blog: http://ripps818.livejournal.com

Projects that I'm working on in the mean time is maintaining the GMPC-Trunk team, where I provide updated packages of mpd and gmpc, my preferred linux music player combo. I have setup seperate ppa's in the team:

• Gmpc-Trunk for latest gmpc/gmpc-plugins from git. ppa:gmpc-trunk/ppa

• Mpd-Trunk for the latest mpd/mpc/mpdscribble from git. ppa:gmpc-trunk/mpd-trunk

• Gmpc-Stable for stable gmpc packages synced from Debian Sid. ppa:gmpc-trunk/gmpc-stable

Also, I've setup a PPA devoted to making it easier to install CoreAVC into Ubuntu. I've prebuilt the coreavc-for-linux project's dshowserver and added a dshowserver patched mplayer into the PPA (courtesy of rvm). ppa:ripps818/coreavc

My main PPA is mostly devoted to several programs that I like that aren't provided by Ubuntu. ppa:ripps818/ppa

Accomplishments

Gmpc-Trunk

Besides supplying an easy means for Ubuntu users to install bleeding edge versions of gmpc/mpd packages, I've created a gmpc-plugins package in the Gmpc-Trunk PPA. The original one included Debian was pretty simple and only installed a small bundle of plugins. The change I've made is to allow the creation of individual packages for each individual plugin as well as a corresponding debug version. This allows users to pick and choose which plugins to use, without being forced to download and install a bunch of unwanted plugins. Also, to make it easier for users who wish to install all the plugins, I made some gmpc-plugins and gmpc-plugins-dbg metapackages that will install all the plugins in one go.

I've upgraded my ppa management system to now use fta's daily ppa bot. Now I can upload and supply Ubuntu users with updated and working packages for gmpc, mpd, mpdscribble, mpc, libmpd, libmpdclient2, and every gmpc plugin for every distro from Hardy to Karmic (and Lucid in the future); all with just a single command in a terminal.

Also, I've setup a special mpd-userspace package to the Mpd-Trunk PPA. The it runs mpd as the logged in user by running with a modified mpd.conf and setup and using XDG autostart. The purpose was to fix the issue I was experiencing with devkit-disk and how it would only mount the ntfs usb harddrive with all my music, with user-only permissions. This made it impossible for the traditional mpd, which runs as it's own user, to access the harddisk. It isn't fully tested for all use-cases, and causes issues with programs that require it to be started at boot, like mpdscribble.

Debian

I've succesfully packaged the gtrayicon package and got it into debian sid. Gtrayicon is a small program that allows the easy creation of an enable/disable system tray icon. It also allows users to create a simple menu config to turn it into a customized application launching menu. GetDeb made a version of this a while ago, but it wasn't up to standards and couldn't be included in any distribution. My version does this and has been accepted into Debian. It has since been synced into Ubuntu.

Another package I've made is the libcue package. As far as I can tell, I'm first and only person to have attempted to package this program. It's a libray to easily read and parse cuesheets. It's used by the latest mpd 0.15 to read embedded cuesheets in flac files.

I've recently made a libxspf (successor to libspiff) and an updated liburiparser package. I've uploaded them to Debian Mentors, but I haven't been able to find a sponsor to check and upload them for me yet.

I've also updated the liburipaser package, it was needed by some of the packages I do daily updates to.

All the packages I maintain in Debian can be found from my Debian QA page: Taylor LeMasurier-Wren Debian QA

Themes

Aside from packaging, I also customize popular Ubuntu themes and give them a colder blue twist. First ,Dust Cold, a version of the Dust theme except with a nice cold blue color scheme instead of the original warm brown. It looks nice with light blue and/or monochrome iconset. Along with Dust Cold, I also have Nodoka Dust Cold. Instead of using Murrine, like the original Dust uses, it uses the git version of the Nodoka theme engine, primarily used by Fedora. It has really nice gradients and buttons, so I actually prefer this to the my traditional Dust Cold theme. I've had to include a few hacks and tweaks into it to make some things look correct.

• Packages for the git version of Nodoka are in my Extra Themes PPA: ppa:ripps818/themes

• Both themes can be found at Gnome-Look.org: Dust Cold

The theme I've been putting the most effort towards lately is my Ambiance variants: Ambiance Cold, Ambiance Colder, and Ambiance Mint. This color variations of the Ubuntu Light-themes's Ambiance theme. The Ambiance Cold(er) themes are more blue colored to give a colder feel, while Ambiance Mint uses a green color scheme. I've made a Google Chrome theme and Namebar themes to help make the theme more complete. I've also packaged them in one of ppa's as the light-themes-ripps. This allows Ubuntu users to easily install and update the theme without having to mess with theme tarballs and checking gnome-looks for updates.

• The light-themes-ripps package can be found int my Extra Themes PPA: ppa:ripps818/themes

• All the Ambiance theme variants can be found on the Ambiance Cold page on Gnome-Look.org: Ambiance Cold

I've also modified the Night Impression theme into my Cold Impression. This one is nice, but isn't as complete as my Dust Cold themes and still requires some more tweaks before it looks as slick as the original theme it was born from.

• Gnome-Look.org: Cold Impression

I also upgraded the Noia and Noia Warm Iconsets in late 2008. I updated them to be compatible with Intrepid Ibex, but I haven't updated them in a long while. Since I'm not the artist that made the original theme, I've slowly run of icons I can use to further expand the theme, and haven't worked on it in a long while. The original artist never responded to all my attempts to contact them about updating the theme, so I'll just leave it here until another artist approaches me with completing the theme.

• Gnome-Look.org: Noia (Update) Noia Warm (Update)

Comments

Hi, Ripps

I just wanted to say thanks alot for the mpd and GMPC packages from your PPA. Both me, alot of my Uni friends and the local ubuntu community here use gmpc/mpd alot and it wouldn't be possible without your packages (due to how complex it is to setup mpd.) Your unstable PPA packages also help alot in testing git mpd and gmpc and report those pesky bugs!!

thx again

Zeltak

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