First: Does your soundcard work for playing non-MIDI music? Assuming the answer is yes. Do you use OSS or ALSA as your sound library? From what I understand the ALSA one has much nicer interfaces for MIDI. I believe that /dev/midi and /dev/sequencer are older, outdated interfaces, so their omission might not be a big deal. CentOS probably made this decision for you, but I dont know much about that distro. I would *guess* that it isnt a hardware driver issue, but a software configuration one. XMMS uses a series of plugins to decode media files, I dont believe that it know how to play anything intrinsically. This means that if you want to use XMMS to play the file, you will need is a plugin that can decode MIDI files. It has been my experiance with XMMS that if you attempt to add a file it doesnt recognise to the playlist, and if it is the only file in the playlist then XMMS thinks it has an empty playlist and opens a file dialog to allow you to select a file to play. Counterintuitive, probably. If XMMS did understand the file it was trying to play but was having trouble accessing the device, it would probably pop up a dialog with an error, which leads me to believe that you dont have a MIDI decoding plugin installed. In the configuration/preferences menu, there should be a list of the input plugins that are installed, check them to see if there is one that can interpret MIDI files. There is a list of available input plugins at: http://www.xmms.org/plugins.php?category=input There is an interersting series of articles about Linux and MIDI you might want to check out: http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/7773 http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/7912 http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/7918 http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/8050 -Matt On 11/21/05, Dan Lund wrote: > Do an "lspci -v" as root, send the results. > The problem is not with XMMS, it's with the audio not being > initialized, driver-wise. > > This is not even to the point of discussing audio formats, yet. > > --Dan > > On 11/21/05, Victor Odhner wrote: > > I have a few hundred midi files to edit over the next several months, and > > this problem may drive me back to Windows for a long time. I really > > don't want to regress, but to prevent that, I need not only (1) for MIDI > > files to play on my machine, but (2) to find a viable MIDI sequencer > > package (which I expect I'll have to pay for). > > > > So, is there anybody out there who can discuss MIDI under Linux? > > > > Dan Lund wrote in another thread: > > > > >Well, I do know that XMMS will play MIDI format. > > > > It's comforting to hear that. So, how do I make it happen? > > > > I'm on CentOS 4. > > > > I select a MIDI file, say "Open With" and enter XMMS, and up it comes. > > Or I bring up "xmms &" from the command line. > > Or "xmms /wherever/it/is/filename.mid &", which doesn't help any. > > Either way there is a (highly non-standard, of course!) file-browse menu. > > I can see my file after pressing the "Add Files in Directory" button. > > > > So I browse to the file and select it, and the browse dialog disappears. > > > > xmms stares at me blankly. > > I press "Play". The browse dialog comes up again. > > I select the file. Highlight it. Press "Play". Dialog disappears. > > > > What weird little cultural incantation am I missing? > > > > FOSS programmers need to be *so* doggone inventive with > > their interfaces, but can't produce a decent diagnostic message. > > Grrr. > > > > KDE offers kmid to play the file, so I try that. > > Could not open /dev/sequencer; > > probably there is another program using it > > > > ls -ld /dev/sequencer > > ls: /dev/sequencer: No such file or directory > > > > ls -ld /dev/midi > > ls: /dev/midi: No such file or directory > > > > /sbin/modprobe -l | grep via > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/sound/pci/snd-via82xx.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/scsi/sata_via.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/i2c/busses/i2c-via.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/i2c/busses/i2c-viapro.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/i2c/chips/via686a.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/net/via-rhine.ko > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/drivers/net/via-velocity.ko > > > > # /sbin/modprobe -l snd-intel8x0 > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/sound/pci/snd-intel8x0.ko > > > > # /sbin/modprobe -l snd-pcm-oss > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/sound/core/oss/snd-pcm-oss.ko > > > > # /sbin/modprobe -l snd-mixer-oss > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/sound/core/oss/snd-mixer-oss.ko > > > > # /sbin/modprobe -l snd-seq-oss > > /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.0.3.EL/kernel/sound/core/seq/oss/snd-seq-oss.ko > > > > /dev/sequencer and /dev/midi are still AWOL. > > > > # cat /etc/modprobe.conf > > alias eth0 via-rhine > > alias snd-card-0 snd-via82xx > > options snd-card-0 index=0 > > install snd-via82xx /sbin/modprobe --ignore-install snd-via82xx && > > /usr/sbin/alsactl restore >/dev/null 2>&1 || : > > remove snd-via82xx { /usr/sbin/alsactl store >/dev/null 2>&1 || : ; }; > > /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove snd-via82xx > > alias usb-controller ehci-hcd > > alias usb-controller1 uhci-hcd > > > > ... so I enter: > > # install snd-via82xx /sbin/modprobe --ignore-install snd-via82xx > > Modprobe returns a process result of 1 and replies: > > install: unrecognized option `--ignore-install' > > Try `install --help' for more information. > > > > /usr/sbin/alsactl restore > > no response; result code is zero; those two devices still absent. > > > > shutdown; switch to Windows; double-click the file. Hear music. > > > > Help! > > > > Vic > > > > > > --------------------------------------------------- > > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change you mail settings: > > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > > > > > -- > To exercise power costs effort and demands courage. That is why so > many fail to assert rights to which they are perfectly entitled - > because a right is a kind of power but they are too lazy or too > cowardly to exercise it. The virtues which cloak these faults are > called patience and forbearance. > Friedrich Nietzsche > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change you mail settings: > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > --------------------------------------------------- PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change you mail settings: http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss