Review: Amarok 2.x in Kubuntu 9.04 a problem

[Alan Dayley]

I have been very happy with my 6 days of Kubuntu 9.04 use.  Easy to
install, nice icons and desktop, easy to add applications and running
smoothly.

I cranked up Amarok for managing my music and podcasts.  Version 2.x
looks very nice and it plays music great.  Then I grabbed my iPod to
sync and found Amarok did not have a Devices tab.  Thinking I must be
missing some library or something else, I went on a hunt.  As the hunt
grew longer and I could only find complaints about missing devices
connections, I got irritated.

Jumping onto the irc.ubuntu.com:8001 connection and channel #kubuntu,
I asked about the Devices tab in Amarok.  The answer shocked me:
Amarok 2.x does not support devices yet.  Wha?

User ActionParsnip provided the steps to get Amarok 1.4 installed on
my Kubuntu 9.04 system.  People use a Personal Package Archive (PPA)
to create packages for their Ubuntu flavor that don't exist in the
main archives.  ActionParsnip gave me the link to his PPA that
provides Amarok 1.4.  Here are the steps to take:

1. Open a Konsole or other command line window.

2. Remove the Amarok 2.x application to avoid confusion later. Enter
the command (without the quotes): "sudo apt-get remove amarok"

2. Enter the command (without the quotes): "kdesudo kate /etc/apt/sources.list"

3. Add the following two lines to the bottom of the sources.list file:

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bogdanb/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/bogdanb/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main

4. Save the file and close kate

5. Enter the command (without the quotes): "sudo apt-get update"

6. Enter the command (without the quotes): "sudo apt-get install amarok14"

The Amarok icon in your application menus is now Amarok 1.4.  You'll
have to change it's settings to point at your music collection, etc.
In my case, it pulled all my podcasts from my previous configuration
just fine, which would have been a pain to set up again!

And now my iTunes free iPod is syncing my music just fine!

Alan