Posts Tagged Linux

How to convert a video file for the MEMUP Wizzle portable video player

Posted by on Sunday, 11 July, 2010

I own a really cheap MEMUP Wizzle video player. It plays regular mp3 files, but it’s not simple to get videos to run on it.
This device uses a AVI video compression codec (sherpya mencoder-mingw) with some strange options (version 1.0, based Xvid 1.1 video with 20 fps and audio codec 0×0050 mpeg1 layer 2, 44100khz and sample rate 128kbs)
After some research, I found that you can convert your videos easily with, surprise surprise, mencoder :) !

This works perfectly under Linux and even on other OSs (so said, I did not test it).

Here is the command line to convert a video:

mencoder -noodml INPUT_FILE -of avi -o OUTPUT_FILE.avi -ofps 20 -vf-add scale=320:240 -vf-add expand=320:240:-1:-1:1 -srate 44100 -ovc xvid -xvidencopts bitrate=600:max_bframes=0:quant_type=h263:me_quality=4 -oac lavc -lavcopts acodec=mp2:abitrate=128

Replace INPUT_FILE and OUTPUT_FILE with the filenames you wish to convert from and to.

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Will I replace the system in @Linuxcar with an iPad?

Posted by on Wednesday, 7 April, 2010

Some friends have been asking me if the iPad could eventually replace my custom made Linux multimedia car system.
I reckon that the screen is nice an all, but can the iPad …

- Take Skype phone calls
- Automatically pause live radio (not just mute) when a call comes in
- Update the twitter account @linuxcar with what ever it is doing
- Bring up my current location on Google maps
- Update my current location on the web
- Allow free WiFi in the car
- Allow any other web devices in the neighborhood to control the multimedia
- Allow for a remote system to use the web interface

… all at the same time? No? Well, there is your answer.
Now, an Android based system like this might do it…

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Cancel all print jobs

Posted by on Monday, 29 March, 2010

Hey folks,

Is this still the best way to cancel *all* print job requests from a queue in Solaris?

cancel `lpstat <printer queue name>|awk ‘{print $1}’`

Sugestions welcome. :)

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Proud member of the Linux Foundation

Posted by on Tuesday, 16 March, 2010

Just a quick note to let you know that I’m a proud Individual Member of the Linux Foundation since the 14th of March 2010. Somehow I just can’t stop bragging about this! :)

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Convert AVI (or something else) to FLV

Posted by on Thursday, 11 March, 2010

To convert a video to the Flash Video format, use the mencoder command like this:

mencoder <SOURCE_VIDEO> -o <OUTPUT_VIDEO>.flv -of lavf -oac mp3lame -lameopts abr:br=56 -srate 22050 -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=flv:vbitrate=500:mbd=2:mv0:trell:v4mv:cbp:last_pred=3

Some (older?) versions of mencoder will require you to add the option -lavfopts i_certify_that_my_video_stream_does_not_use_b_frames

This assumes you have the lamemp3 libs installed and that the output video rate shoud be 500k (good for web content). For better video quality increase the value at vbitrate=500 to something like 1000 or so.

This works fine on Ubuntu 7.04 (and probably any other system with mencoder installed).

On Fedora I use this command line to convert a HD video to 800×450 with good quality:

mencoder <SOURCE_VIDEO> -o <OUTPUT_VIDEO>.flv -of lavf -oac mp3lame -lameopts abr:br=56 -srate 22050 -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=flv:vbitrate=5000:mbd=2:mv0:trell:v4mv:cbp:last_pred=3 -vf scale=800:450

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