UbuntuHandbook

Alternative Toolbar Plugin Updated for Rhythmbox 3.4.3 (PPA)

Last updated: January 11, 2019

Rhythmbox music player

Alternative toolbar plugin released a new bug-fix version today with the latest Rhythmbox music player 3.4.3 compatibility.

Alternative toolbar is a third-party plugin for Rhythmbox. It replaces the default header bar with Gnome-style client-side decoration. And the standard toolbar replaced by a compact toolbar.

The plugin is installed in Ubuntu 18.04 and higher out-of-the-box. However, it does not work well in the most recent Rhythmbox 3.4.3 release.

For Ubuntu 18.04 and Ubuntu 18.10 users upgraded to Rhythmbox 3.4.3, you may do following steps to update the Alternative Toolbar plugin:

1. Open terminal either from app launcher or via Ctrl+Alt+T keyboard shortcut. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

Type user password (no asterisks feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. Then launch Software Updater, and update Rhythmbox as well as the plugin:

Uninstall:

You can remove the PPA by launching Software & Updates and navigate to Other Software tab. Or simply run command in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

In Howtos, News rhythmbox

Rhythmbox 3.4.3 Released with Numerous Bug Fixes

Last updated: January 8, 2019

Rhythmbox music player

The default Rhythmbox music player released version 3.4.3 a few days ago. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 18.04.

Rhythmbox 3.4.3 release highlights:

Improved Android plugin to work better with Samsung and Android 9 devices
Replaced status bar with floating bar as used by Nautilus
Fixed crash when store request processing fails
Fixed crashes when editing auto playlist sorted by Location / Bitrate
Fixed crashes when insert a cd
Fixed issue that can not transfer songs to phone over MTP
And many other changes.

How to Install Rhythmbox 3.4.3 in Ubuntu:

For Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 18.10 and derivatives, you can install Rhythmbox 3.4.3 from the unofficial PPA.

1. Open terminal either from app launcher or via Ctrl+Alt+T keyboard shortcut. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

Type user password (no asterisks feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. Then launch Software Updater, upgrade the music player packages:

How to Restore:

You can purge the PPA which also downgrade Rhythmbox to the stock version via command:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

In Howtos, News rhythmbox

Rhythmbox 3.4.2 Released, How to Install it via PPA

Last updated: October 9, 2017

Rhythmbox music player

Rhythmbox, Ubuntu’s default music playing application, got a new release update after a year of development.

Besides removing visualization plugin, Rhythmbox 3.4.2 features responsiveness improvements during media player sync, better network buffering when crossfading is enabled, and various bug-fixes (or feature request) including:

Critical Assertion Errors
Add --version command option.
Rhythmbox crashed with SIGSEGV during import
Expand playing icon column in entry view
Import hangs for special file
Playqueue UI improvements
Memory leak in error handling of utimes on podcast-timestamp
Open settings crashes the app
build failure with gcc 7.1.1
Keyboard navigation with tab is broken by search entry widget

How to Install Rhythmbox 3.4.2 in Ubuntu:

The project leader for Ubuntu Budgie, fossfreedom, was maintaining PPA with Rhythmbox package and its plugins, though they are not updated for a period of time.

So I uploaded Rhythmbox 3.4.2 into the PPA, available for Ubuntu 16.04, Ubuntu 17.04, and Ubuntu 17.10.

1. Open terminal via Ctrl+Alt+T and run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

Input your password (no visual feedback while typing) when it prompts and hit Enter.

2. Then upgrade the music playing application via Software Updater:

or upgrade your system via command:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

How to remove:

To revert back to stock version of Rhythmbox in your Ubuntu, purge the PPA as well as downgrade the player via command:

sudo apt-get install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/apps

If it’s working good, you may still remove the PPA repository via Software & Updates utility under Other Software tab.

In Howtos, News music player, rhythmbox

How to Install Rhythmbox 3.4 in Ubuntu Gnome 16.04 via PPA

Last updated: September 4, 2016

Gnome’s default music player, Rhythmbox, has reached the 3.4 release. It has been made into the universe repository (to be default) for Ubuntu 16.10 Yakkety.

Rhythmbox 3.4 comes with a new remote web control plugin, allows users to control the basic music playback remotely via a web browser.

Other changes in Rhythmbox 3.4:

Grilo plugin now uses Grilo 0.3
Soundcloud plugin fetches more search results and allows pausing
No longer uses webkit (partly due to OpenBSD W^X enforcement)
Slightly better handling of keyboard shortcuts for playback
Core and some plugin data files compiled into binaries using GResources
Memory leak and plugin fixes, translation updates, etc.
See more in NEWS page.

Install Rhythmbox 3.4 in Ubuntu 16.04

Besides building the new release from source, you can install Rhythmbox 3.4 in Ubuntu Gnome 16.04 via a third-party PPA repository.

Tried both official Rhythmbox 3.4 build in Ubuntu 16.10 daily and the PPA backports in Ubuntu 16.04, there are a few issues found in my case:

No menu (global or title bar menu) in Unity Desktop
new web control plugin does not work in my browser

If you intend to install Rhythmbox 3.4 via PPA, follow below steps:

1. Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

2. Update package index and install the 3.4 packages:

sudo apt update; sudo apt install rhythmbox rhythmbox-plugins

~~DO NOT use apt upgrade, because the PPA also contains GTK 3.20 backports you may not want.~~

~~3. Remove the PPA after installation, via either Software & Updates -> Other Software or the command below:~~

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:vascofalves/gnome-backports && sudo apt update

4. (Optional) To revert back to Rhythmbox 3.3, purge the PPA via ppa-purge

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

In Howtos rhythmbox, rhythmbox remote control

Rhythmbox 3.3.1 Released, Ported to WebKit2, Better Handle Locked Android Devices

Last updated: April 4, 2016

Rhythmbox, Gnome’s default music player, has reached the 3.3.1 release with a few improvements, bug fixes, and translation updates.

According to the changelog, Rhythmbox 3.3.1 features:

Better handling of locked Android devices
Simplified ReplayGain processing that might crash less
Switched to webkit2 API, except for the context plugin which is disabled
Notifications behave better when actions aren’t available

And a few reported bugs has been solved in this release:

Rhythmbox segfaults when trying to access Android 4.0 MTP device already mounted by Nautilus
Rhythmbox crashes when trying to access Android device.
Port to WebKit2
CD playing with cross fading on crashes rhythmbox
Display notifications about playing song when pausing
RhythmDB-CRITICAL **: rhythmdb_entry_get_entry_type: assertion ‘entry != NULL’ failed
Gtk-WARNING **: Drawing a gadget with negative dimensions. Did you forget to allocate a size? (node grid owner RBHeader)
Rework logic of Python support option

How to Install/upgrade Rhythmbox 3.3.1 in Ubuntu:

Besides building from the source, fossfreedom is maintaining a PPA to make it easy to install the latest Rhythmbox music player for all current Ubuntu releases.

Check out the PPA page before doing following steps since there may be a small delay for the latest packages to be made into PPA.

1. Launch terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run below command to add PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

Type in your password (no visual feedback just type in mind) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. After that, launch Software Updater and install updates for Rhythmbox, or just run below commands one by one in terminal:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install rhythmbox

3. (Optional) To downgrade to the stock version of Rhythmbox in your Ubuntu release, use ppa-purge:

sudo apt-get install ppa-purge

sudo ppa-purge ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

In Howtos, News rhythmbox

How to Install Rhythmbox 3.3 in Ubuntu 15.10, 14.04

Last updated: January 31, 2016

Rhythmbox, Ubuntu’s default music player, has reached the 3.3 release recently. It brings new plugin supporting Android devices via gvfs-mtp. Encoding settings are now configurable per device type, and it can force lossless files to be transcoded.

Rhythmbox also brings translation updates and following bug-fixes:

While extracting music from CDs, information in the “Year” field is lost
Typos in documentation
audioscrobbler: Fix displaying icon for libre.fm
JSON import errors
Sync Preferences Missing
iradio: remove Radio GFM
[PATCH] data: Add various mod files as supported MIME types
Don’t handle RTL icons manually for GTK+ >= 3.12
error: conflicting types for ‘rhythmdb_metadata_cache_purge’
crash when adding files found during startup scan
hangs after handling mod/xm/it (modplug) file when crossfade is enabled
Freezing with crossfade backend and Pulseaudio with GStreamer 1.6.x
commit 85c185d breaks compilation with -Wl,-as-needed
Album-Art caching issue

(rhythmbox 3.3 with alternative toolbar plugin)

How to Install / Upgrade Rhythmbox 3.3 in Ubuntu:

David mohammed, a Rhythmbox plugin developer, has made the new release into PPA, available for Ubuntu 15.10, Ubuntu 15.04, Ubuntu 14.04 and their derivatives.

1. Open terminal from Unity Dash, App Launcher, or via Ctrl+Alt+T shortcut key. When it opens, paste below command and hit run:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

Type in your password (no visual feedback just type in mind) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. After that, do upgrade via Software Updater, or run below commands one by one:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install rhythmbox

3. (Optional) To downgrade to the stock version of Rhythmbox in Ubuntu, use ppa-purge:

sudo apt-get install ppa-purge

sudo ppa-purge ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

via: xpress-ubuntu

In Howtos rhythmbox

Use Gnome Shell’s Header Bar in Rhythmbox Music Player

Last updated: April 9, 2015

For Gnome Shell users, Rhythmbox music player now looks better by using new GTK3 header bar (client-side decorations) provided by alternative-toolbar plugin.

Thanks to David Mohammed, Ozon and Georgi Karavasilev. With the new alternative-toolbar plugin, Rhythmbox player looks better in Gnome:

And below is the plugin configuration window with a few options:

How to install alternative-toolbar plugin:

For ubuntu 14.04, Ubuntu 14.10, and Ubuntu 15.04, install the plugin from developer’s PPA by running below commands one by one in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox-plugins

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install rhythmbox-plugin-alternative-toolbar

If you don’t want to add the PPA, grab the .deb package from launchpad.net

In Howtos client side decorations, rhythmbox

Rhythmbox Music Player 3.2 Released [How-to-upgrade]

Last updated: March 29, 2015

The 3.2 release of Rhythmbox, Ubuntu’s default music player, was announced just a few hours ago with some new features, bug fixes and translation updates.

According the the changelog, Rhythmbox 3.2 brings a Soundcloud plugin, support for disc and track total tags, ability to clear, re-fetch and manually set cover art using the song info window.

There are also some bugs has been fixed in the new release:

same songs played after reading a playlist
no easy way to unselect the browse by album,artist,genre option
Unclear string “in” for translation
rhythmbox skips one or two songs after playing certain songs
configure warning: ‘INCLUDES’ is the old name for ‘AM_CPPFLAGS’ (or ‘*_CPPFLAGS’)
Add track count and disc count to the database
data: Add Vorbis aliases as supported mime-types
Failure to build with tdb 1.3
Crash when right clicking the track list in the library
Rhythmbox fails to import MP3 files with ID3 v2.4 tags created by PicardQT
Tracks with no embedded covert art show a random cover art from the music collection
Right click on any file in ‘Tracks list’ clashes the application
Duplicate symbol _rb_metadata_iface_xml
gdkx.h explicitly included; prevents building on Mac
symbolic icon is broken

How to upgrade to Rhythmbox 3.2 in Ubuntu:

The new release is available in fossfreedom’s PPA, available for Ubuntu 14.04, Ubuntu 14.10, Ubuntu 15.04, and Linux Mint 17.

1. First open terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run below command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox

2. After adding the PPA, launch Software Updater (or Update Manager) and install available updates for Rhythmbox after checking for updates.

In Howtos, News rhythmbox

Enable Client-side Decorations for Rhythmbox in Ubuntu 14.04/14.10

Last updated: February 7, 2015

For Rhythmbox users who are using Gnome Shell, now there’s a plugin to make it look like a real Gnome application by enabling the GTK3 Client-side Decorations (Header bar).

Thanks to david mohammed, with this alternative-toolbar plugin Rhythmbox in Gnome looks like:

For non-gnome desktops, this plugin doesn’t use the CSD header bar by default. But there’s also a little changes:

If you really want the CSD header bar, non-gnome user cat get it in the plugin preferences.

How to install the plugin for Rhythmbox:

For Ubuntu 14.10 and Ubuntu 14.04, the plugin is available in the developer’s PPA.

Open terminal from the Dash or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run below commands one by one to add the PPA, update system cache, and install the plugin:

sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox-plugins

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install rhythmbox-plugin-alternative-toolbar

If you don’t want to add PPA, grab and install the .deb package directly from this page. Once installed, enable it by going to Tools -> Plugins.

For other systems and issues, go to the plugin’s project page.

In Howtos client side decorations, rhythmbox

Show or hide the Control Bar in Ubuntu 14.04 Rhythmbox Player

Last updated: December 25, 2014

Quick tutorial shows how to show or hide the play bar (control buttons and volume control) in Ubuntu’s default Rhythmbox Music Player.

As a small Christmas present to Rhythmbox v3.x users, a rhythmbox plugin developer has created a plugin allows the control toolbar to be hidden when the application starts.

The bar can be redisplayed via the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+T or the menu “View -> Show Toolbar”.

How to install this Rhythmbox Plugin:

The plugin is available in the developer’s PPA for Ubuntu 14.04 and Ubuntu 14.10.

Press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run the commands below one by one to add the PPA and install the plugin:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:fossfreedom/rhythmbox-plugins

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install rhythmbox-plugin-alternative-toolbar

For those who don’t want to add PPA, download & install the .deb package (“rhythmbox-plugin-alternative-toolbar_xxx_all.deb”) from the launchpad page.

Once installed, restart Rhythmbox Music Player and enable the plugin from menu “Tools -> Plugins”.