MPD getting stuck

XploD

It happened a few times before but now it's happening everytime I reboot the device and the only way to avoid this is to disconnect my external HDD and boot without it and then connect it. But like this, I have to wait every time for it to scan the whole HDD which takes a lot time. If I start the Pi with HDD connected, RuneUI shows volume at 100, and I can't change it, it keeps returning back to 100 and MPD doesn't react on buttons. I can create playlists and navigate through RuneUI but pressing Play won't do anything. I tried to run "mpc status" and it gives me Updating DB #2 status and it says Volume: n/a.

Before it always worked, after each start, there was a small updating but it worked while updating. Is it possible that I broke it somehow because I was installing a lot packages to enable LIRC and WiringPi? How to fix it?

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

Is it possible that I broke it somehow because I was installing a lot packages to enable LIRC and WiringPi? How to fix it?

Yes, there are many places/things you can break the system.

Maybe you are running out of space on your sd-card

df -h

If so, you can try to resize your image as described here.

Frank

XploD

Thank you for your answer! There's enough space:


[root@runeaudio ~]# df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/root       1.7G  950M  591M  62% /
devtmpfs        111M     0  111M   0% /dev
tmpfs           115M     0  115M   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs           115M  372K  114M   1% /run
tmpfs           115M     0  115M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
tmpfs           115M   20K  115M   1% /tmp
/dev/mmcblk0p1   90M   43M   48M  47% /boot
/dev/sdb1       968M  712M  256M  74% /mnt/MPD/USB/sdb1-usb-takeMS_MEM-Drive
/dev/sda1       466G  371G   96G  80% /mnt/MPD/USB/WD

Now it happened even without the HDD plugged in. I disconnected all the USB storages and make it work and then I played an online radio. But when I plugged in HDD and USB flash drive, it started stuttering pretty bad and once I stopped the playback, I wasn't able to run it again.

Is there a way to somehow "reset" MPD or something? Or I'd have to reinstall RuneAudio (and all thos things I installed to make LIRC and WiringPi work)?

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

plugging in your external discs will force mpd to rescan your library.
Rebooting your PI with storage devices plugged in has the same effect.

/dev/sdb1 968M 712M 256M 74% /mnt/MPD/USB/sdb1-usb-takeMS_MEM-Drive
/dev/sda1 466G 371G 96G 80% /mnt/MPD/USB/WD

With ~370G your library is huge and mpd will need some time to rescan all the files.
To avoid this you can disable rescanning by tweaking /srv/http/command/usbmount

// connect to MPD daemon
$mpd = openMpdSocket('/run/mpd.sock');
// update MPD database
#sendMpdCommand($mpd, 'update USB');
// update library panel
ui_libraryHome($redis);
// close MPD connection
closeMpdSocket($mpd);
// close Redis connection
$redis->close();

From now you have to rescan your library manually each time you change files.
We have to find a better solution for this in the future.

Frank

XploD

Yes, but the weird thing is that this wasn't happening before. When I plug in the HDD for the first time, rescan took some time but after that, when I rebooted the device, it would rescan but only for a short and all files were available instantly on boot. Also, before, MPD wasn't stuck while it was rescaning. So I was able to play music immediatelly after the device booted, even though there was a Scanning... label in RuneUI. I don't get it why this started happening now.

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

I don't get it why this started happening now.

What do you expect?
As nobody here can guess what you changed by installing LIRC and WiringPi, it is hard to help.
Did you update the system (pacman -Syu)?

Frank

XploD

I'm sorry if this sounded wrong, I wasn't expecting nothing and I wasn't complaining

I just wanted to ask if maybe somebody had same problem or if there's some way to reset/reinstall MPD or something. Problems are meant to be solved, not to be avoided

I can't just rollback everything because I will probably mess it again when I do all this again, and I just want to have that LCD display, buttons and IR remote. But I'll definitely try everything again on a clean install of RuneAudio. Otherwise, I'll try to disable rescaning, this would be a decent solution since I don't update music very often. Also, to update it, I must unplug the disk and plug it into my laptop. When I plug it back to RPi it will update anyway.

From one side, Arch Linux is great because it's lightweight and fast, in contrary to Raspbian who takes ages to boot. But from other side, Arch doesn't have almost anything preinstalled and it's very unfriendly for us Linux newbies to do anything. But hey, we can't have booth, can we?

Yes I updated it with pacman -Syu (I had to) and I installed "sudo", "make", "wiringPi", "gcc" and all other packages needed for this to work. And I also installed LIRC and needed packages for it to work. I will also have to install Java since coding in C, especially working with strings, is a pain in the a**

I spent around 20 hours just to make buttons work and display song and artist info on LCD display and another 2-3 hours for little script which contacts my website with "curl" requests when playing a few choosen radio stations, so I can scrobble to last.fm from that radio stations. This would take maybe 2-3 hours in total with Java. Or maybe I should consider using PHP since I have some knowledge and it's already there and supported.

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

I'm sorry if this sounded wrong, I wasn't expecting nothing and I wasn't complaining

No problem.

What do you think about a detailed step by step tutorial?
Let us implement the following features each at a time:
- LIRC (with TSOP4838 or similar)
- LCD with HD44780 controller (16X2 -> 20X4)
- Buttons (play/pause, stop, next, prev, vol+ and vol-
- Button for shutdown
- ?

I would use python, because it is easy to learn and the best language for playing with raspberry pi.
No need to install "sudo", "make", "wiringPi", "gcc".

Frank

XploD

That would be great! I'm not familiar with python but I guess is not that hard to learn it, I done once some programs in it but it was long time ago.
In fact, I'm looking now at it and I should take it from the beggining, it looks so clean and simple and the LCD library is great, it also supports custom characters.

There's one possible problem with getting song info from MPD. "mpc status" is a mess somehow. It gives song info in one line in ARTIST - TITLE format. To separate artist and title, I can split it by " - " but if there are artists or songs with " - " in its name, it will split it wrong. Is it possible to get all that informations (including current source etc) from RuneUI for example in JSON or XML format?

If not, I'm planning to get familiar with all RuneAudio code written in PHP and then modify t a little bit to be able to get all possible information and also to interact with it from Python so I can implement changing sources and folders with buttons/remote via LCD display, maybe even use some graphic (gLCD) display. But this needs a lot of work and I wouldn't probably have time for this till summer.

ACX

XploD wroteAlso, there's one possible problem with getting song info from MPD. "mpc status" is a mess somehow. It gives song info in one line in ARTIST - TITLE format. To separate artist and title, I can split it by " - " but if there are artists or songs with " - " in its name, it will split it wrong. Is it possible to get all that informations (including current source etc) from RuneUI for example in JSON or XML format?

Hi XploD, take a look at this topic:
#763

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

If I got it right, you meant about me doing the tutorial and then share it to you to implement it?

No, i will do it for you!

Frank

XploD

hondagx35 wroteHi XploD,

No, i will do it for you!

Frank

Oh, my bad

That would be great, if you have time and you're willing to do it, thanks you!

Thank you @[deleted], I missed that one. I'll try it.

XploD

I managed to break RuneAudio that much it didn't want to boot anymore so I started from scratch and MPD is not getting stuck (so far

). I started using Python and got LCD screen to work and currently I'm working on scrolling both lines independently (because often Artist/Title name doesn't fit the screen since it's only 16 characters long).

ACX, the solution from link you gave me looks good but it probably won't fit my needs. Your idea was to call a Python script everytime there's a status change and pass this JSON to it to update the display. But I have a problem with it. I want to use LCD also for other things. For example, when I change volume, I want the LCD to display for example: "Volume: 55 %" for a few seconds and then return back to artist/song, the same as any other hi-fi system or car radio works. But if I have one script which will be called on each status update, this won't work. I guess he script will be called on volume update also, but how will my script know what has changed? I have to know if the volume has changed or song, or playing status.

So, is there any way to pull this JSON manually? For example, from URL (for example: "http://runeaudio.local?command=get_status") or something so I can catch it in Python when I want? Or maybe is there a better solution how can I pass this JSON as you recommened but to a running process/thread?

EDIT: now I see that you're parsing MPD status as well (I though you're pulling data from somewhere else, for example song data from ID3 tags) so I can continue to use "mpc status" and parse it by myself in Python. But how do you actually parse song artist and title (for example, for sending to last.fm)? Mpc returns it as ARTIST - TITLE, but parsing it by " - " is not very scalable. For example, if we have ABC - DEF - TITLE where "ABC - DEF" is artist name, it will parse it wrong. I thought that there's possibility to get separated artist and title data (from ID3 tags).

ACX

At /command/?cmd=status you can get the plain MPD response to the "status" command. It will look like this:

volume: 96 repeat: 1 random: 1 single: 0 consume: 0 playlist: 216 playlistlength: 74 mixrampdb: 0.000000 state: play song: 1 songid: 2 time: 50:287 elapsed: 50.155 bitrate: 645 audio: 44100:16:2 nextsong: 24 nextsongid: 25 OK

hondagx35

Hi XploD,

sorry for the late response.

hondagx35 wroteHi XploD,

If I got it right, you meant about me doing the tutorial and then share it to you to implement it?
No, i will do it for you!

Frank

I'm working on the tutorial, but also had problems with lirc.
From your posts here i have seen,
that you have exactly the same issue as i discovered.
In our case "irrecord" doesn't work proper and gives us the wrong settings for our remotes.
I installed lirc and copied the lircd.conf from my raspian image and all works fine.
So the solution for your problem may be to run irrecord on a other machine or try to find a configuration for your remote on the internet.

Frank

Your config:

begin remote

name new_lircd.conf
driver devinput
bits 64
eps 30
aeps 100

one 0 0
zero 0 0
gap 569
toggle_bit_mask 0x0

begin codes
KEY_VOLUMEUP 0x115200000100023D 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_VOLUMEDOWN 0x1159000001000232 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_PLAY 0x116300000100022C 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_PREVIOUS 0x114F000001000240 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_NEXT 0x115400000100023C 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_MUTE 0x115800000100027E 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
end codes

end remote

Mine was nearly the same, but it should look like this:

begin remote

name lircd.conf
bits 16
flags SPACE_ENC|CONST_LENGTH
eps 30
aeps 100

header 8942 4524
one 522 1720
zero 522 601
ptrail 523
repeat 8943 2280
pre_data_bits 16
pre_data 0xF9
gap 107731
toggle_bit_mask 0x0

begin codes
KEY_POWER 0xEA15
KEY_PLAY 0x0AF5
KEY_STOP 0xC837
KEY_VOLUMEUP 0xE817
KEY_VOLUMEDOWN 0x2AD5
KEY_UP 0xC23D
KEY_DOWN 0x50AF
KEY_NEXT 0xD02F
KEY_PREVIOUS 0xF00F
KEY_LEFT 0x609F
KEY_RIGHT 0x708F
KEY_OK 0x40BF
KEY_HOME 0xE21D
KEY_FORWARD 0xC03F
KEY_BACK 0xE01F
KEY_ENTER 0xF20D
KEY_MUTE 0xDA25
KEY_OPTION 0x6897
KEY_SEARCH 0xB847
KEY_OPEN 0x7887
KEY_ESC 0x807F
end codes

end remote

XploD

hondagx35 wroteHi XploD,

sorry for the late response.

hondagx35 wroteHi XploD,

If I got it right, you meant about me doing the tutorial and then share it to you to implement it?
No, i will do it for you!

Frank
I'm working on the tutorial, but also had problems with lirc.
From your posts here i have seen,
that you have exactly the same issue as i discovered.
In our case "irrecord" doesn't work proper and gives us the wrong settings for our remotes.
I installed lirc and copied the lircd.conf from my raspian image and all works fine.
So the solution for your problem may be to run irrecord on a other machine or try to find a configuration for your remote on the internet.

Frank

Your config:
begin remote

name new_lircd.conf
driver devinput
bits 64
eps 30
aeps 100

one 0 0
zero 0 0
gap 569
toggle_bit_mask 0x0

begin codes
KEY_VOLUMEUP 0x115200000100023D 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_VOLUMEDOWN 0x1159000001000232 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_PLAY 0x116300000100022C 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_PREVIOUS 0x114F000001000240 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_NEXT 0x115400000100023C 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
KEY_MUTE 0x115800000100027E 0x00000000BEE1E9A5
end codes

end remote
Mine was nearly the same, but it should look like this:
begin remote

name lircd.conf
bits 16
flags SPACE_ENC|CONST_LENGTH
eps 30
aeps 100

header 8942 4524
one 522 1720
zero 522 601
ptrail 523
repeat 8943 2280
pre_data_bits 16
pre_data 0xF9
gap 107731
toggle_bit_mask 0x0

begin codes
KEY_POWER 0xEA15
KEY_PLAY 0x0AF5
KEY_STOP 0xC837
KEY_VOLUMEUP 0xE817
KEY_VOLUMEDOWN 0x2AD5
KEY_UP 0xC23D
KEY_DOWN 0x50AF
KEY_NEXT 0xD02F
KEY_PREVIOUS 0xF00F
KEY_LEFT 0x609F
KEY_RIGHT 0x708F
KEY_OK 0x40BF
KEY_HOME 0xE21D
KEY_FORWARD 0xC03F
KEY_BACK 0xE01F
KEY_ENTER 0xF20D
KEY_MUTE 0xDA25
KEY_OPTION 0x6897
KEY_SEARCH 0xB847
KEY_OPEN 0x7887
KEY_ESC 0x807F
end codes

end remote

Hello,

Well, thank you! This could be the answer to my problems since everything other (prior to creating lircd.conf) worked fine, it does recognize my remote. I have a running Raspbian where I successfully used that same remote so I'll copy it from there.

Thank you for working and trying with this. In the meantime, I created a Python program for LCD display and buttons with following features:
- Displaying artist in first line and title in second line; when playing radio: first line is radio name, second line is in ARTIST - TITLE format
- It scrolls long texts (artist or title name) and it scrolls both lines independently; when it reaches the end, it scrolls backwards and then again forward and so on
- On volume change, it shows Volume: XY % in first line and volume level with squares in second line for few seconds and then returns on song/radio name
- play, pause, previous, next, stop, volume up and volume down keys
- it shows PAUSED or STOPPED on display in these states
- two LEDs: green one being on when playing or blinking when paused, red one being on when stopped

But I also have a few problems which I'm currently working on:
- Python is a little bit slow, so I have to make a pause 200 - 300 ms between calling "mpc status" commands so display update is not really "at the same moment"
- RPLCD library is also very slow and obviously it uses /sys/gpio which is like reading/writing to "file" when using GPIO so on song change, you can see how it writes character by character on LCD
- because of writting to LCD (scrolling), the script is constantly taking 20% of CPU

TODO:
- I'll try to use another library for LCD (WiringPI) or to use C language for everything or C (which would be called from Python) to update display and execute "mpc status"
- fast forward/backward on long press
- 4x20 LCD with additional info like current time, remaining time/total time, bitrate etc.
- Nokia 3310 LCD!?

I'm currently in process of writting a tutorial and I will also upload video showing it in action and give my code.

I also have another crazy idea but this will wait till summer

Since I have a Hi-Fi with iPod/iPhone dock and I don't have not even one Apple device (don't like them), I was thinking about learning something about it's protocol and then create a iPod interface. My Hi-Fi can receive info from iPod about current track and show it on display and also change tracks from the Hi-Fi (remote). Also, it has a 5V 2A output on the dock itself so it would be enough to power up my Pi. So the idea is to connect the Pi on the Hi-Fi as an "iPod" and then use Hi-Fi's LCD and remote

It would be as an "add-on" to turn my hi-fi to network player.

XploD

It's making problems again... I restarted it for the fifth time and still can't get it to play. Now it's saying "ERROR: Can't open audio output" on "mpc status". I tried to switch between analog audio and USB audio DAC and even HDMI but nothing.

EDIT: managed to get it to work after a few tries with connecting/disconnecting storage and audio dac and rebooting.

Don't know why it's acting like that and what kills him. It was working fine till today and the only difference is that I installed LIRC yesterday.

XploD

To avoid opening new topic... RuneAudio died again and this time for no reason! It was running for two days without ANY problems and 15 minutes ago it was playing when I noticed that it lost network connection. I couldn't reach it but it was playing normally and I was able to change tracks with IR remote. I tried to reboot it, I can get through the login screen (but I can't enter since I don't have a keyboard) but network is not working, Wi-Fi nor Ethernet, nothing is working.

I know that it's probably my fault due to messing with Python, LIRC and all that, but never had any problems with anything on Raspbian. You can't even give the wrong look to Arch Linux, it will crash. Now I have to use my laptop as a music source again, since I don't have time to repair it.... Well, thank you Arch Linux :

Whatever I do, it dies. Or I am being stupid, or Arch is very unstable. But it's weird that it died by itself.

hondagx35

You can't even give the wrong look to Arch Linux, it will crash.

All my devices (RP, RP2, Cubietruck, ITEAD A20 und ODROID) run with Arch Linux i never had one crashing.
For me Arch is the best OS around there for embedded devices.

Don't give up.
Sleep a night over it and then try it again.

Frank

XploD

Seems that I concluded to fast that it's RuneAudio who got broken. Now I wanted to watch a movie and figured out that my other Pi (Pi2) running OSMC can't connect to the internet as well. Seems that there's a problem with my router. But, on laptop and phone the internet worked so I would never think that it's the router's fault.

Well, that happens when you're a laptop user and you don't have any keyboard so the only way to access the Pi is via SSH and when it can't connect to the network, there's no way to check where's the problem

EDIT: yep, it's working now. Oh, providers and their cra**y routers ... Sorry for bothering you for no reason.