positron - Neuros Synchronization Manager for Linux Version 1.1 Copyright 2003-2004 - Xiph.org Foundation Written and maintained by Stan Seibert MP3Info.py: Copyright 2002 - Vivake Gupta (vivakeATomniscia.org). All rights reserved. See COPYING for software license. --------------------------------------------------------------------- OVERVIEW Positron is a synchronization tool for the Neuros portable music player (https://web.archive.org/web/20060615211239/http://www.neurosaudio.com:80/). Positron allows you to individually add and delete tracks from a Neuros, as well as synchronize it with a directory tree of music. As far as your computer is concerned, a Neuros is just an external USB hard disk, following the USB Mass Storage standard. You can copy any sort of file, music or otherwise, onto the Neuros. However, only files that are listed in a special database stored on the Neuros will be playable. This is where positron is needed. It will both physically copy files and update the Neuros database so those files are playable. INSTALLATION First, you need to install positron on your computer. To install from the source tarball, unpack the positron source and cd into the resulting directory. Then run the following commands: python setup.py install You will probably need to become root in order to do this. If you want to install somewhere other than the default location of /usr you can type: python setup.py install --prefix=/some/prefix For Gentoo system you may be able to use: emerge positron CONFIGURING Next, you will need to configure your system to work with USB Mass Storage devices. The work required to do this varies depending upon your particular distribution, but here are some general hints: * You need kernel support for USB, USB Mass Storage, and SCSI drives either in the kernel or loaded as modules (usbcore, usb-storage, scsi_mod, sd_mod). Some of these may automatically be loaded for you. * Plug your Neuros into your USB port and wait a moment. The "dmesg" command should show the Neuros being recognized by the USB subsystem and the assignment of a SCSI device (like "sda", for example). * Create a directory to mount your Neuros under, like "/mnt/neuros" * Now you can edit your /etc/fstab file and add a line like: /dev/sda1 /mnt/neuros vfat user,noauto,umask=0 0 0 This is assuming that the Neuros was registered as "sda" when it was discovered by the kernel. You may have to adjust it. The Neuros filesystem, however, is always on partition 1. * Test your setup by running "mount /mnt/neuros" as a normal user. You should be able to go browse around the contents of /mnt/neuros. (There will be something there, even if your Neuros is brand new and "empty".) * Finally, run "positron config" while the Neuros is mounted and configure your personal settings. BACKING UP THE DATABASE Given various bug reports about lockups when doing USB transfers to the Neuros in Linux, it would be best to back up the Neuros database before use. You can do this by copying the entire "WOID_DB" directory on the Neuros to some safe location. If you need to restore the database, just remove the "WOID_DB" directory on the Neuros and copy your backup copy of the directory in its place. USAGE Before using positron, make sure to mount your Neuros. And when you are done, remember to unmount it before unplugging it. Linux buffers disk writes, and you want to make sure everything gets written to disk. Most people will use "positron sync" to copy over all of their music directories (specified when you ran "positron config"). You can run this command periodically, and only new tracks will be copied. If you want to add a specific track, you can use "positron add track.mp3". More detail on these commands can be found using "positron help". IN CASE OF EMERGENCY If for some reason your Neuros seems to be mysteriously locking up, or your song listing seem incorrect or unusable, you can use "positron rebuild" to recreate your database based upon the music files already on the Neuros. Positron will try to figure out where everything should be filed, but with the following limitations: * The pcaudio database will be cleared. * All HiSi clips will be marked as unidentified, even if they had been previously identified. "My Neuros has locked up, and I am very angry. What now?" You can reset the unit by pressing and holding the Up and Play buttons simultaneously. CONTACT INFO This project is no longer maintained. Any further discussion should be directed to https://gitlab.xiph.org/xiph/positron. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Special thanks go out to: * Emmett Plant * Manuel Lora * Jack Moffitt and most especially: * the awesome folks at Digital Innovations, who answered many questions, and were willing to open source positron. Without valuable support from all these people, this software would not have been possible.