[xiph-cvs] cvs commit: positron/doc install.html user-guide.html index.html

Stan Seibert volsung at xiph.org
Tue May 27 19:53:35 PDT 2003



volsung     03/05/27 22:53:35

  Modified:    doc      index.html
  Added:       doc      install.html user-guide.html
  Log:
  Step 1 in the user docs.

Revision  Changes    Path
1.2       +1 -2      positron/doc/index.html

Index: index.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /usr/local/cvsroot/positron/doc/index.html,v
retrieving revision 1.1
retrieving revision 1.2
diff -u -r1.1 -r1.2
--- index.html	25 Apr 2003 04:14:56 -0000	1.1
+++ index.html	28 May 2003 02:53:35 -0000	1.2
@@ -9,8 +9,7 @@
 Positron is a command-line synchronization tool for the <a
 href="http://www.neurosaudio.com">Neuros</a> portable music device.
 It allows you to add and remove music files, synchronize your music
-collection between your computer and your Neuros, and create
-playlists.
+collection between your computer and your Neuros.
 </p>
 
 <ul>

<p><p>1.1                  positron/doc/install.html

Index: install.html
===================================================================
<html>
<head>
  <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="style.css" />
  <title>Positron User's Guide: Installation</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Installation</h1>

<p>
The only prerequisites for running positron are a UNIX-like operating
system that supports USB Mass Storage devices and Python 2.2.  These
directions focus specifically on Linux, though positron is certainly
not Linux-specific.  (Warning to the adventurous: positron should work
on MacOS X, however a USB bug on the Neuros makes it appear as a
read-only device on OS X.  Hopefully a fix will be available soon.)

<p>
If you do not have Python 2.2 installed on your system, you should
install it before continuing.  You can get Python from the <a
href="http://www.python.org/">Python website</a>, but all modern Linux
distributions package it, so you should look for one of those packages
first.
</p>

<p>
There are three parts to installing positron: setting up the kernel
for USB, making the Neuros mountable, and installing the positron
software itself.
</p>

<h2>Setting up the Kernel</h2>

<p>
The Neuros requires no custom drivers because it interfaces with the
computer using the USB Mass Storage standard used by USB hard disks
and other storage devices.  If you already have Linux setup to do
this, you can skip to the next section.
</p>

<p>
First make sure you are using a Linux 2.4 kernel.  It appears that the
reliability of USB Mass Storage in the 2.4 series has varied quite a
bit, so using the newest kernel you can is suggested.  Kernel 2.4.20
has been reported to work well on several platforms.
</p>

<p>
The next thing to check is that you have the required kernel modules.
</p>

<ul> 
  
  <li>usbcore - This is required for any USB device.</li>
  <li>usb-uhci/usb-ohci - One of these is used depending upon
  your USB host controller</li>
  <li>usb-storage - For using USB Mass Storage devices</li>
  <li>scsi_mod and sd_mod - USB Mass Storage devices show up as SCSI
  disks, so you'll need SCSI support.</li>

</ul>

<p>
Nearly all current Linux distributions come with these modules
precompiled and many automatically load some or all of them for you.
If you need to load them manually, you can use

<pre class="console">
modprobe [name of module]
</pre>

to load a module once, or edit /etc/modules or /etc/modules.conf to
have the module automatically loaded for you.  If you find that you
are missing one or more of these modules, you will have to recompile
kernel to get them.  Kernel compilation is beyond the scope of this
document, but you can read the 
<a href="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Kernel-HOWTO/index.html">Kernel HOWTO</a>
for more information.
</p>

<h2>Making the Neuros Mountable</h2>

<p>
Now that you have all the kernel modules loaded, you can plug your
Neuros into your computer using the USB cable that came with it.
Within a couple seconds, the kernel will recognize the device and (if
all goes well) assign it a SCSI device.  Run
<pre>
dmesg
</pre>
as the root user, and you should see messages that look like this:
<pre>
hub.c: new USB device 10:18.0-1, assigned address 2
scsi1 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
  Vendor: NEUROS    Model: dig. audio comp.  Rev: 1.00
  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Attached scsi removable disk sda at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
SCSI device sda: 39070048 512-byte hdwr sectors (20004 MB)
sda: test WP failed, assume Write Enabled
 /dev/scsi/host1/bus0/target0/lun0: p1
WARNING: USB Mass Storage data integrity not assured
USB Mass Storage device found at 2
</pre>

The line that says "SCSI device sda" tells you that device name Linux
assigned to your Neuros is /dev/sda.  The Neuros has only one
partition, so you will be mounting /dev/sda1.
</p>

<p>
Next, make the directory /mnt/neuros.  (Of course, you can name this
whatever you like, just be consistent through the remainder of the
directons.)  Edit /etc/fstab and add the following line:
<pre>
/dev/sda1 /mnt/neuros vfat user,noauto,umask=0    0 0
</pre>

This will permit normal users to mount and access the Neuros, so you
won't have to use positron as the root user.
</p>

<p>
Finally, login as a normal user and mount the Neuros:
<pre>
mount /mnt/neuros
</pre>

You should be able to change to the /mnt/neuros directory and list the
contents.  There should already be files and directories on your
Neuros, even if you just bought it.
</p>

<p>
Before you unplug your Neuros, make sure to unmount it:
<pre>
umount /mnt/neuros
</pre>
</p>

<h2>Installing the Positron Software</h2>

<p>
The hard part is over!  Now you just have to install positron itself,
if you have not done so already.  The method you use will depend on your
setup.
</p>

<h3>RPM Based Distributions (RedHat, Mandrake)</h2>

<p>
Download the latest positron RPM from the 
<a href="http://www.xiph.org/positron/">positron homepage</a>.  (Note:
you do not need the Source RPM.)  As the root user run:
<pre>
rpm -Uvh positron*.rpm
</pre>

This will also upgrade your current version of positron if you already
have an older version installed.
</p>

<h3>DEB Based Distributions (Debian, Knoppix, etc.)</h2>

<p>
Add the following lines to your /etc/apt/source.list
<pre>
deb http://i.cantcode.com/~jack/debian unstable main contrib
deb-src http://i.cantcode.com/~jack/debian unstable main contrib
</pre>

Then type:
<pre>
apt-get update
apt-get install positron
</pre>
You can rerun this later to upgrade to a newer version of positron.
</p>

<h3>Gentoo</h3>

<p>
There is a masked ebuild for positron.  Just type
<pre>
emerge positron
</pre>
and it should download the source and install it for you.
</p>

<h3>Installing from Source</h3>

<p>
If for some reason one of the above methods do not apply to you, or
you just want to install positron from source, download the source
tarball from the <a href="http://www.xiph.org/positron/">positron
homepage</a>.  Untar the tarball and cd to the positron source
directory.  If you want to install positron to the default location of
the /usr directory, run the following as the root user:
<pre>
python setup.py install
</pre>
If you want to install to a different prefix (like /usr/local), run
<pre>
python setup.py install --prefix=/some/prefix
</pre>
or:
<pre>
python setup.py install --home=/some/prefix
</pre>
Please see "Installing Python Modules" at
http://www.python.org/doc/current/inst/inst.html
for more information on how to use python distutils.
</p>

</body> 
</html>

<p><p>1.1                  positron/doc/user-guide.html

Index: user-guide.html
===================================================================
<html>
<head>
  <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="style.css" />
  <title>Positron User's Guide</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Positron User's Guide</h1>

<p>
Positron is a synchronization tool for the Neuros portable music
player (http://www.neurosaudio.com).  Positron allows you to
individually add and delete tracks from a Neuros, as well as
synchronize it with a directory tree of music.  This document will
teach you how to install and use positron.
</p>

<h2>Why Do I Need Positron?</h2>

<p>
This is a common question.  As far as your computer is concerned, a
Neuros is just an external USB 1 hard disk, following the USB Mass
Storage standard.  No custom drivers are needed.  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 what positron does.  It will both physically
copy files and update the Neuros database so those files are
playable.  If you copy music to the Neuros using cp or a filemanager,
it will not be shown in the song listings.
</p>

<p>
This manual is divided into the following sections:
</p>

<ul>
  <li>Installation</li>
  <li>Configuration</li>
  <li>Common Tasks</li>
  <li>Command List</li>
  <li>Troubleshooting</li>
</ul>

</body>
</html>

<p><p>--- >8 ----
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