Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[mcewanw]

# Changes:

# Version 2.0.3:
# No longer loses file entry content moving from MIN to Config GUI.
# Added sound card hardware selection (plughw:card,device)


no, I wanted

arecord -vvv (I prefer a small dynamic graph to a one line display), but I had already cut down the rxvt console as is in this 2.0.3 version. Note that the current VU meter is for setting up only. You can't use it whilst actually recording.

[EDIT] NOTE: When the VU meter is running you can freeze it with ctrl-s and scroll up to see lots of sound card statistics. Then restart it with ctrl-q

Been trying rxvt -e arecord -vvv etc... with wav files (since easier to arrange) but the pause controls won't work when starting arecord with rxvt -e (problems with parent/child processes not being able to find each other and so on). No way out of all the issues that I've found with that as yet (easier in C...!).

[mikeb]

Personel taste eh....mini version with mini player perhaps

I tried with my bash version and just killed the parent rxvt when going into record mode...

[mcewanw]

[mcewanw]

What I'd really like is to have the VU working when recording mp3 and/ogg, but I've not managed to split the audio from the VU noise when piping arecord into lame (for example). If you find out how, let me know.

[esmourguit]

Bonjour à tous,
Can i share with you my feelings on Precord.
I know nothing about audio, but i'm testing this Great little program.
But there are two things a little disturbing:
- I am obliged to adjust the microphone up and audio output too. It seems that the record level is fairly low. Or did it come from my microphone?
- I am forced to click the stop button at the end of listening to the recording. Could it be automatic?
Cordialement

[mcewanw]

[esmourguit]

Bonjour à tous,
Thank you for your reply.
Here is an overview of Alsamixer. I don't know how to enable Mic Boost in Alsamixer.
Cordialement.

[mcewanw]

Regarding play and stop.

When the audio file ends playing the Linux process involved dies. Unfortunately, there is no way, that I know of, for that event to be signalled back to gtkdialog to re-enable the play button. Otherwise that would allow an automatic stop without human intervention.

Only one play process is, by core design, allowed to run in Precord at a time since it would be extremely difficult to control/keep track of more than one.

I could provide a version of Precord which does not disable the play buttons but instead simply allows the user to press Play at any time to restart the file playing. I'll upload a version that operates in that manner for testing to see what the general opinion is on these two ways of arranging things.

[mcewanw]

Have you tried moving the cursor further to the right hand side in Alsamixer. The Mic Boost control lies further to the right than is shown in your overview. If you can reach it, you then press key 'M' to activate it.

Also, I suggest you turn down the Mic volume when recording, since the mike you show in your overview may be for playback, which can interfere with your recording. Instead, I suggest using the TAB key to until the alsamixer heading moves to the Capture screen (rather than 'All') and see what you have available in there. You should see 'Capture' maybe, and Mic. You need the volume of 'Capture' turned right up, and the Mic control should be activated (using space bar). But different sound cards maybe show different screens. The Mic Boost control would be on alsamixer 'All' (to the right hand side, off the screen, as I said, of the alsamixer overview you uploaded).

In a few minutes you'll find an alternative version of Precord on the first thread post which doesn't disable the Play button (instead, pressing Play a second time simply restarts the playback from the beginning...)

[mcewanw]

I have to go and sleep; it is very late (night turning to morning) here...

[esmourguit]

Bonjour à tous,
Thank you for your kindness. I finally found the Mic Boost and it's absolutely perfect.
Thank you again.
Have a good night (maybe short?).
Cordialement

[mikeb]

This was a crude way I detected the end of an mp3 track playing......basically madplay outputted blurb at the end and that was used to trigger notify to kill the player gui....perhaps ffmpeg might be obliging.

[mikeb]

ooops should be
kill `ps | grep arecord | grep rxvt | awk '{ print $1}'`
that occasional leading space messes up cut

More blah....

on my machine at least
arecord -vvv /dev/null 2>/dev/null
has the undesirable habit of turning /dev/null into a file

arecord -vvv mono does not but gives thesame output.

mike

[mcewanw]

[mcewanw]

Well I've tried:

arecord -vvv mono 2>/dev/null

and

arecord -vvv mono /dev/null 2>/dev/null

But both of these constructs create a file called "mono"! :-)

If you check arecord --help, you should see that there is no parameter after -v (or -vv or -vvv) but mono or stereo can be used after -V (capital V), which gives a one line display.

arecord -vvv /dev/null 2>/dev/null

does not, I believe, actually create the file called "null" in /dev; rather the system may create it in response - but it is a tiny 8 byte file.

To prove that, I suggest you run the
arecord -vvv /dev/null 2>/dev/null command, then, for example, change dir to /dev and run the command rm -f null
That will temporarily rm the small 8 byte null file, as running LIST directory command