Rockbox: An open source firmware alternative for your MP3 Players (iPod, Sansa Clip+, etc)

This isn't going to be a lengthy post, I promise you that.

I learned about Rockbox back when I was still using Ubuntu, and therefore browsing through Ubuntu forums years ago. It wasn't that well known, and to be honest I don't know if it got the spotlight it deserves but well, give it a try. Rockbox truly rocks.


What is Rockbox though? And why do I bring it up?

Rockbox is an alternative firmware for your MP3 Player, simply put if you don't want to depend on your MP3 Player manufacturer to provide updates for your Sansa or iPod in terms of firmware, you can choose Rockbox.

Why did I choose it? Today I had one hell of a struggle. I'm using youtube-dl to download a few audio files, you know, to play then when I exercise, etc. And for some reason my Sansa default firmware was freezing up when I played an mp3 file that was freshly converted by avconv. I spent like 2 or 3 hours figuring out what was the issue. Sadly, I couldn't find what was the issue. But you know what? I recalled that years ago I installed Rockbox on one of my mp3 players, which was also a Sansa.

Problem eliminated, and now I have even more features that Sansa Clip+ couldn't provide me. I have a very stable firmware that can play any audio file and the most important part? It didn't choke up, hurrah!

Sometimes the Open Source Community is too draining

Alright, it's been a while and welcome to yet another blog post. I've been on and off, to be honest I have some subjects to write about but I've been misusing my time on other matters.

 Today's subject is how the community reacts when there's a security issue in different distributions. I came across a security issue where Portal 2 crashes in SELinux, the initial response in reddit was "valve doesn't give a shit about security", such a title full of assumption and ripe with opportunities to magnify an issue. I do care about security, but sometimes people get.... a little emotional maybe?

The debates gets to the point where you don't know if they are discussing the subject or totally went off topic to keep their "knowledge pride" intact. I found it really draining and sometimes I just have to give kudos to the developers that have to endure hours of endless babbling reading the same responses in different grammar structures. I'll probably get some heat too on my part, but then again I'm just yet another GNU/Linux user out of the thousands out there so whatever people leave in the comment section will be either spite or some type of excuse for their behavior.

That aside, I'm hoping to get into my normal routine once I make a full recovery. I have a project that I want to work on and share with the world but due to my back problems my time is limited =/