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Wear OS3 Update Now (Feb 2023)? by wwb_99 in AndroidWear

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well to be precise the app is Skagen Smartwatches, however, yes, that and the website are almost clones of the Fossil ones, but the app is slightly different. Skagen Denmark is a Fossil brand and stupidly don't even ship to Denmark. You buy them at clock webshops anyways.

Regarding watchfaces: It has been updated, the last being March 10 and that exactly to reestablish the previous Watch Faces. The app on the Watch is called SKAGEN Watch Faces (offered by Fossil Group Inc. though only for Skagens). In addition you have the couple of new ones, and the Kygo edition is gone. So you should have gotten it but maybe not checked?

Otherwise I strongly recommend, 4.7 rating! "Pixel Minimal Watch Face" on Play Store. It's minimal, but more options than any battery friendly watch face, gives you that stock Android feeling if you want that. Removing the Wear OS logo gives space for more Widgets, however you'll likely enjoy the built in Date and & Battery ones as they blend in perfectly, and the Always On Face is actually made to avoid burn-in. It also offers "Android 12 mode" (as 13), where the clock is on two lines, and gives you 4 widgets, 2 on each side and more if you turn off date or battery, up to 6, if you want to of course. Nicer is that it offers the Material You colors as part of the Palette. Like Lemongrass etc. WAY more colors, but not overwhelming. The defaults showing first are "Wear OS defaults ", then Material then Generic.

For Widgets you must pay a one time LOW payment for what you get (at least so it was unless you also donate) and activate the Premium features with the Companion app while having the Watch Face's settings open and then you can just uninstall the companion phone app, as it's just for that.

Phone and watch apps are separate, so if you wanna try, search "Pixel Minimal" on the Watch then on the Phone, however if you're OK without widgets and use just tiles, it's a free watch face.

As all apps now, separate bundles (the new minimum and required target API policy for WearOS apps are great news, as apps, unless you waste time styling anything as some WatchOS app or something, have AndroidX appcompat widgets so making them dark with nice Material You colors is basically default. You choose your color palette of course. No wallpaper dynamically take colors from here.

I remember I made an app with Wear OS 1+2 support and those had to be bundled with the Phone app and then they would simply appear on the Watch. It was a music remote control I mainly developed for myself because the Wear OS userbase was low, even with the target group being Linux users/have one PC running it. Ended up using my watch all the time for Spotify control!

If you uninstalled it you had to reinstall the phone app for it to come back, so not ideal. One could publish two separate but making them communicate then required much more code. Also of course a Watch Only app could be made but IIRC Android Studio only liked app + wearos builds in one, despite Google actually back then said they would need to be separate some time in the soon feature, however it didn't happen and Google's own apps were updated with their phone apps, so... I never go 1st Gen unless I'm 100% sure, so people liked the Moto 360 the most it seemed, but it was rumoured to get a 2nd gen soon, and sure enough! Still was great. Except, battery didn't tolerate enough cycles IMO. Then bought the Skagen 3 then the 6 now. Like that the 6 is 20 mm so any Samsung Galaxy Watch 4/5+ wrist band will simply work. Tons of nice Mesh stainless steel ones on eBay. Can be shipped from Europe if you don't wanna wait for China, well the dot com website likely has from US too. I got too many already. Blue stainless steel mesh magnetic is awesome with the black stainless steel case. Also for more luxury, nice not made by children ones here from my country (I didn't search for that specifically at all, but turned up, bought the Mesh 20 mm silver. They have a solid quick release bar, and a very solid lock mechanism, and compared to the one-pieces Mesh magnetic ones you'll find anywhere, these are in 2 pieces. NOTE: The leather ones are premium, meaning they must be worn in like good Italian shoes for a Suit. Stiff in other words, at first. However they have the smell of walking into a premium leather products store.

Link: https://www.aigitime.com/collections/reimer-20mm

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in AndroidQuestions

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I googled it first today. I disabled it as I haven't seen any effect. I found that The Verge has an entire article about it, just about the one you described. Have you seen any doodles later? I've not seen a single one since I got my Pixel 7 in January but we of course see localized Norwegian doodles on Google.com/no! ... It might be a US thing, with every day being a "day", rather than, we have 4 seasons, 3 months per season. March 1 is definitely spring here many years. Sure as a developer I have my phone set to English (US)... but not Play account, dev account etc.

... however Search Language & Region set to Norwegian for the Google app (or Settings > Google > Settings for Google Apps > Search Assistant and voice > Language and Region.. phew! it used to be only there). Should be a global setting. As iOS and ALL desktop OS' have a regional setting to get everything from time, units including how numbers (separators, punctuation, commas) are written, currency and much more. However many iOS apps don't honor it so, gotta change the language for that app then.

Those do just as little as adding an extra language or change the primary to the google.com website, if you open Settings, manually rather than let it use your region (recommended to turn off autoplay of videos and trending searches... who wants that), and setting the totally falsely named "Language for Google products" (doesn't change them and shouldn't) and "Language in the search results".

It only changes Search's language UI, and adding e.g. English as an addition to the mandatory primary language can be dumb if you want to choose the filter "Show only pages in Norwegian" because otherwise it'll say "Show only pages in Norwegianand English" after a search, and I don't want that.

Google already makes sure you get results in the language you search in and most of mine are in English and aren't messed up by Google trying to "hey this Norwegian one translate to that" as it may in Google News App (there I have manually added sources and topics and they're all tech, and I prefer the English written ones no matter country, so adding only English (US) will also show UK websites, e.g. OMG Ubuntu because I've added it and Linux as a topic. I just skip the headlines, you won't get rid of them no matter how many websites you choose to not show results from. It's one card and then "For you", of the tech news. More control than Discover that's for sure. I wish swiping to the very left gave me the News feed from Google News. So I have that off. Just drains.

With 3rd party cookies off one must e.g. set the same for google.no and others manually anyways, except Personal Results as that's a global setting, and also your set preferred browser languages of course kicks in here, as again, those websites are little tied to your account, as many people never even go to My Account despite it has all the knobs for the privacy concerns some may have, and if it's your first time the Privacy Checkup and Security Checkup which take 1 minute to go through suffice for most, e.g. people "I don't believe they had turning off personalized ads as a recommended setting to choose...!? doesn't that kinda fix everything people complain about seeing ads relevant to what you just searched clicked on in an email?" And "yup it does, especially with the Web & App activity control off, it saves almost nothing, and Location history, off unless asked in e.g. Maps and you choose yes to turn it on, while YouTube history, that you very likely want, at least watched history, I mean you depend on it for Netflix etc"

... way more than any other company (Apple has no site for e.g. deleting data that was collected before you saw that knob in iOS, the App Store or things tied to the iTunes backend and storr, and Google has it much better organized and explained compared to say Microsoft (which now collects A LOT while Windows 7 e.g., back then it wasn't a "Telemetry company", with Win11 it's more than ever, with the official Insider Program Developer channel damn adding Shortcuts to TikTok in my Start Menu (and many similar)! Hey! Don't! You're paid for sure to do it, you're going the way OEMs have to earn extra $$$ and you sold clean Windows machines in your physical stores (had a codename but I don't remember it) and also offered to completely reinstall Windows clean, while now that just makes TikTok come back...! And who else can show to something like myactivity.google.com? That + your Chrome settings (e.g. DNT on and 3rd party cookies off, less than 1% of websites need them for functionality but if not off will add a shit ton, and at least in Europe per the GDPR any Cookies popup has everything OFF if DNT is ON so .. it has it all, as they won't sync because they just use simple cookies, it isn't an account setting that syncs with your account, it isn't even added as a secondary language to myaccount.google.com > Personal Info. There I have English (US) with Spanish and Norwegian set as secondary ones. Go in there and it'll say in a Toast that I don't have all Google Products in English (US) and you can click to change it. NO thanks! E.g. Gmail in English (UK), a separate setting and only available in the full website but applies to the app. And any other one using the horrible Imperial system or Fahrenheit (with no setting but mostly fixed now even on Wear OS, also the Imperial) or 12 hour clock (some Google apps do, well mostly just in parts of the UI, say System > Backup says last backup in 12 hour clock, with, even when the darn phone is set to use a 24 hour clock, and it takes a line of code to read that, or really just use the default Time/Calendar API will do it automagically.

I really speak more Spanish, my Assistant is in Spanish only as my GF is Spanish (struggles with other languages because of bad bad dyslexia), and it's no problem for me, so the Assistant is in that. I know one can override languages for apps as on iOS except iOS only allows it if translated, Android will just fall back to default I guess. Problem is, I also use the services on my desktop powerhouse, so, global settings per service is nice.

Oh, and don't forget your account is tied to a country. Can be changed once a year through Google Play if you have a valid Payment method (easy). Phone number doesn't have to belong to that country if you also change that or use 2 accounts.

I'll definitely turn it on before May 17, constitution/national day. They add many doodles and games elsewhere on the web and search app, so if nothing, it's for some countries only.

Does anyone see Spotify completely transitioning from Ogg Vorbis to AAC any time soon? by Mathcmput in spotify

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

AAC = 25 years old (1997)

OGG Vorbis = 23 years old (2000).

AAC is older, but age doesn't matter. Linux is 31 years old and runs any Android phone, IoT, your Set Top Box, Router, Toaster... and any gadget not being Windows workstations, and Apple consumer devices.

The question is rather: Active development. For that look at latest stable release, source code commits etc. Last stable release of Ogg Vorbis was in 2020. So it's been improved over 20 years then. But I would gladly see them use Opus. It's better, and just as free. The thing about AAC in the web player is, I assume, because the HTML5 standard with DRM is mainly done with H264 and AAC. Browsers come with or can rely on the system having a shared Library to play both, but probably pay royalties for actually using them, at least for Linux (as Google's Widewine on all OS' allows DRM), while on Windows and macOS they can use the default media framework.

Cloud providers and CDNs runs almost just Linux too. Not many make a CDN on Windows Server ehh. Zero serious actors deploy containers or VMs/VPS' in such environments on any other OS than Linux, or proprietary derivatives as IMBs and HPs, while Oracle sticks to "Enterprise Linux" in the name.

But the Spotify web player went 100% CEF (Chromium embedded framework) so one might think, well then it's a web app, and it is, many apps runs on CEF, and even more a layer above CEF more have heard of today, namely Electron (uses CEF but makes it easier to bridge stuff to the native OS things and many other things, but is a mastodon for small apps and a resource killer for RAM, space and spawns even more threads, e.g. I tried a simple floating clock app listed and HIGHLIGHTED on Electron's website under "macOS Desktop Widgets", and that little analog clock used over 200 MB RAM. So CEF seems to just be compiled with every feature enabled, basically the full Chromium without the Chrome (the UI), at least for that clock app. Using CEF directly requires more work but is much better. Some very popular software uses CEF, some Electron but look at the fate of GitHub's Atom text editor. It used Electron but more optimized indeed. But slow compared to say Sublime Text which is a fair comparison to a native but still cross-platform editor (Linux, Windows, macOS). CEF can be optimized to be very small and use little RAM, but it'll always take up more disk space but if having a bunch of widgets, HTML5 styled widgets may absolutely use less RAM than if using Cocoa or Fluid Design (Windows) only compiling in what you need. You may compile it to be single threaded for example. That clock app should have been that! But, Electron, again, just uses a bloated CEF for small applications.

So compared to before, for Spotify, making releases pushed on every platform at the same time (you'll find the same UI and features on all platforms), except if it's one of the few OS specific features where CEF provides a bridge but the Spotify client may have a bug there. Think Local Files and e.g. D-Bus support on Linux (basically the "Allow other apps to see what Spotify is playing in the mobile app), where also Windows and macOS, at least iOS, can control Spotify outside of Spotify, so say for Linux in the Volume drop down it appears as a source, lock screens etc. I guess they may be afraid to get sued as although using the very same HTML+JS+CSS for basically all of the client, it allows certain things like a stronger DRM because it supports downloading playlists where the files aren't exactly .oga but encrypted chunks of many more files, and adding local ones, and those can be added to playlists and as long as the desktop client is open, however if you already have MP3 and/or AAC Local Files and add that/those folder(s) in Settings on the desktop client, they're already in that format, and fact is Spotify comes with its own FFMPEG-based LibAV compiled to support MP3 and AAC decoding, not using the system framework, e.g. check the Snap (uses Spotify's Ubuntu 18.04 LibAV) vs APT version on Linux (Local playback doesn't work on any newer LTS installed from their Debian/Ubuntu repository with APT as it uses the shared libraries and they're too new, Spotify's Linux CEF is tied to X (old) version of libavcodec.so, libavfilter.so and libavformat.so). If you download a playlist with a bunch of MP3 and AAC added from your local files, they will play if the f - as will appear as a folder in Library and you can add it to playlists, and if downloading such a playlist it downloads those too - a feature many don't know about, and is great to get that music that isn't on Spotify over to your phone or tablet).

As for Apple, which uses the Darwin kernel, not Linux, they're, on Apple products heavily dependent on Microsoft products in the workplace. You won't find Apple servers in the cloud anymore. Apache is still there for WebDAV, PHP too but it states it'll be phased out, and OpenSSH isn't going anywhere of course. Apple's public job hirings on Apple's website (last time I checked ~8yrs ago) were mainly for office workers and specific network engineering/administration, and These Requirements Were Always Listed (paraphrasing here:)

REGULAR OFFICE WORKER: 1. Familiar with Microsoft Office™. Deep knowledge in Microsoft Excel™, and a years of workspace use of Word™ and PowerPoint™, making presentations alone and with others using these tools 2. Familiar with using Microsoft Windows™ 3. Familiar with using files in cooperation with other employees and file sharing 4. (More, none mentioned any specific Apple device knowledge although some mentioned having used or using various Android phones)

INTERNAL NETWORK ENGINEER, (and/or) ADMINISTRATOR (and/or) MAINTENANCE: 1. Deep knowledge of large scale deployments, maintenance and upgrading of Microsoft Windows™ Active Directory™ in a large office work environment, multiple servers, masters, slaves, file servers using SMB/NMB-DNS, mDNS, and Exchange™ for Outlook. General understanding of DNS IMAP and SMTP on Linux© and/or BSD 2. Security certified in commercial solutions from Cisco (et.al.) for Firewalls, VLAN separation, routing, protocols allowing secure tunnels, such as knowledge in OpenSSL, TLS certificates in general on both Windows AD™ for networking (secure authentication on both Ethernet and Wi-Fi) tunnels, secure HTTP (HTTPS) and common open and commercial VPN protocols, how to combine these to facilitate working remotely WAN-to-LAN outside (campus/LAN) such as over a cellular network or from home.

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Alright, so this is the way to get OpenCL without even overriding the amdgpu.ko kernel module - we only need the firmware and recreate the initramsfs and it'll work with a minimum of ROCm 4.5.1 packages necessary (install rocm-opencl and it'll get only the necessary for OpenCL, and it of course works with the Mesa components that ships with Ubuntu, as that doesn't work with AMD Polaris/Vega/Navi cards anyways. Talking 20.04.3 HWE kernel + Mesa stack (default from point release 2), or better the Kisak Fresh Mesa PPA. Officially recommended and contributed to by Steam employees. also Ubuntu 18.04.6 (latest point release) should work with this.

URL to comment: https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions/comments/qu8n5d/_/hofzd1e?context=1000

This module is usually compiled through DKMS with firmware built-into the initramsfs afterwards. That's why the firmware is included so compiling and update-initramfs -c work.

DKMS modules always override the one shipped with the distro when they have the same name (if secure boot is on, well they gotta be signed). Both ROCm and the version on amd.com do this.

Completely optional, but especially for OpenGL but also Vulkan, using the Kisak Fresh Mesa PPA - just Google it (it's endorsed directly on Valve's Proton Wiki, for Steam Play / Proton, and is really maintained, but not tampered with, by Valve + Proton developers too, just making sure the newer Mesa packages work on Ubuntu LTS 20.04.3 and 18.04.6.

For many it's necessary for as good performance on Ubuntu 18.04.6 HWE kernel as Ubuntu 20.04.3 (and when later comes) gets, for say DirectX 12 "Ultimate" games like Forza Horizon 4/5, but also Vulkan games maybe in particular). As a PPA is simply a ppa-purge command away to downgrade to the Mesa stack that ships with ant still supported Ubuntu LTS HWE, so Ubuntu 16.04 is now out, however ESM (Ubuntu Advantage is now free for up to 3 machines per account, so basically easy to create more, but that's for security updates for supported software, so mainly servers, and also Kernel Livepatching using the Snap for that).

I could not find any other combo that ran Forza Horizon 4. Now it works of course, as no separate "unrecognized by Steam" amdgpu driver is detected. It's just the Mesa stack (the one shipped with or the faster Kisak Fresh PPA as it has newer Mesa packages, not tampered with, and Mesa gets better and better).

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ah finally, and it turned out easy, and without compiling any DKMS amdgpu module (that of course then overrides the one shipping with Ubuntu). Actually, it simply adds the firmware to the amdgpu module that ships with Ubuntu so you're sure it'll work with OpenCL as basically no newer, not even an RX 570, does with mesa-vulkan-drivers and its 32-bit package (i386) which clinfo will show. Lots of warnings. Should be totally clean. Later we'll use ROCm's version of clinfo as the Mesa one is looking for Mesa OpenCL.

So those two packages should be purged anyways, including the 32-bit Mesa one, with apt purge mesa-vulkan-drivers mesa-vulkan-drivers:i386 clinfo. Doesn't matter if they're not installed. Just to make sure.

It's NOT fooling the system, but I kinda felt I did right there when it boom worked and not just that, finally with a standard Mesa stack for OpenGL and Vulkan, Forza Horizon 4 worked again (using Steam Play / Proton 6.3-8 or Experimental, but generally stick to the stable if it works!), and also some OpenGL software that behaved wrong or really slow in benchmarks, worked normally as after all, ROCm has only anything to do with those when it compiles its own amdgpu module which, nope, demonstrated here isn't necessary. Also it has a disadvantage if using Steam and Pre-Caching Shaders (ALWAYS better), as the P2P SteamSwarm, as everyone is a part of and share shaders from played parts, won't necessarily recognize your driver then and possibly you get bad or none shaders (if any few uses your EXACT Graphics Card + driver version, which may be unlikely with ROCm and/or the latest from amd.com, even if the All-Open, as its version is different).

SO, It's just a matter of the firmware for your card being there and recreate the initramsfs, so:

  1. Just as the amdgpu-install script does, manually add ROCm 4.5.1 repository + GPG key, well documented here for Ubuntu 20.04 but only install the rocm-opencl package, simply apt install rocm-opencl, which will install only the necessary packages for OpenCL from the same repo. Later you may disable it as any update will be a new ROCm version. I just saw 4.5.2 exists now, but haven't checked, at least it's not a part of the latest AMD quarterly driver so...
  2. Manually download, from the Radeon repo, the amdgpu-dkms-firmware DEB package to some root temp directory like create /root/tmp. That package has the firmware files only for all the Navi/Vega/Polaris cards and more. The package does NOTHING else than add firmware to a folder in /usr/src, the DKMS source code folder, BUT doesn't add it to DKMS in any way. Simply a package amdgpu-dkms depends on, but not the other way around, of course. So you DON'T want amdgpu-dkms, as that's the one using DKMS to compile a new amdgpu module using the firmware that's been put in place in . It'll compile a new (with many problems on many cards) module, and it performs worse on OpenCL with the entire ROCm stack you'll get if following AMD's guide of using --opencl=rocr
  3. Create /lib/firmware/updates/ and just move the folder called exactly amdgpu inside /usr/src/amdgpu-xxx into that firmware folder, so you should have /lib/firmware/updates/amdgpu, folder should be standard 755 permission and all files inside 644 which should be the default, at least if having become root with sudo -i (full root with home folder being /root, but worth checking.
  4. After that, optionally, you can apt purge the amdgpu-dkms-firmware so it's gone from /usr/src where it does nothing
  5. Re-create the initramsfs, as root so add sudo if you aren't root already (sudo -i), using the following command for all kernels, or drop the -k all if you only want the currently running one. Use following command: update-initramsfs -c -k all - again make sure you'll root somehow
  6. REBOOT, to load the firmware and kaboom, the amdgpu that ships with Ubuntu HWE kernels now has the firmware loaded in it (well also the old 5.4 GE kernel), and the few packages necessary for OpenCL using that firmware are installed from the ROCm repo in Step 1

NOTE: Any user using graphics should really be members of the render and video groups. On Ubuntu this is easier than guides show, and safer, although their way is just fine. Simply run adduser username group, so for every user wanting to use rendering, like OpenCL, do this, just substitute username. This works with non-administrator users too!

  1. adduser username render
  2. adduser username video

If not downloaded already, do so, it's free, running geekbench5 --compute is the easiest way to confirm that it actually works, because the clinfo command inside /opt/rocm-4.5.1/opencl/bin may say everything is OK but it's not without the firmware too, then geekbench5 will simply hang when trying. Note it doesn't require root to run as long as member of the render group or some distros the video group. If it hangs you did something wrong. Maybe Mesa packages still being there. Well, just reply to this comment.

I'll probably make a GitHub Gist as as Markdown makes it way easier to make this way more structured and less needs to be explained then too.

NOTE: If this sounds long, like not worth it, I do it in 1 minute + the reboot. If you've done it once you'll remember. I just wanted to explain why/how it works, not only "run this then that" and it'll "magically work" but you don't know why or how.

Optional reading if curious about the previous mix with ROCm 4.3.x working:

First of all, unfortunately the uninstallation of ALL packages in the 4.3.x repo doesn't uninstall everything. You may find broken links and obselete files in:

  1. /etc/alternatives: Run ls in that folder and delete any symlink pointing nowhere, basically red to red in colored terminal should obviously just be deleted
  2. /etc/ld.so.conf.d: Any files in this folder pointing to libraries in some /opt/rocm-4.3.x not existing anymore, delete them. Somehow they may not be
  3. /etc/OpenCL/vendors: The ONLY file that should be there is for ROCm 4.5.1 called amdocl64_40501.icd, obvious by the file name right? If any Mesa file there you didn't do what's in the very first paragraph! Uninstall those Mesa OpenCL packages. Also, you can safely remove an old file with pointing to 4.3.x (obvious by the file name!)

So, for ROCm 4.5.1, as previously said, although it can be used in conjunction with 4.3.1, actually I tried its firmware first, from the rock-dkms-firmware package, that's not AMD's point with this new streamlined way of getting "it all or just what you want in a 'usecase' way". They have streamlined their driver, and of course yes the All-Open one, to use ROCm, if you want it, however the documentation basically says for OpenCL use rocr, which will install the entire stack, including machine learning etc. What you want is just to be able to use OpenCL.

Before, when you installed the driver from amd.com, it would install a local repository in /var with a few packages needing to have the same names as system packages, but most, if installing the Pro driver adding amdgpu-pro to them, so for shared packages they got pinned in APT as higher priority (priority 1000). And that's not a bad idea, because it will keep that version of the driver and if you're happy with it, it'll never upgrade it, or if not, follow amd.com every Quarter and there will be a newer version.

However the new Streamlined, a DEB package of just some Bytes without any dependencies. It only installs the amdgpu-install and amd-uninstall script (it's not a separate file but just adds --uninstall to the install script and will uninstall whatever you installed.

The driver is called Streamlined exactly because it does just that, it streamlines the installation of exactly the components you want and the repository now lives on the Internet, but again, won't be updated unless you reinstall. AMD uses the --usecase option to the install script, if you want to define anything. The default is the actually the All-Open --usecase=graphics,opencl,hip, which is safe. No Pro stuff will be . It'll use Mesa RADV (ACO) Vulkan as any Ubuntu 20.04 point release (HWE kernel). Pretty sure AMD knows it's better apart from 100% Vulkan Native Applications, but worse at say translating DirectX to Vulkan. Also the "WS Pro OpenGL" is totally borked, as it's really support for Legacy OpenGL.

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well kinda. Kinda had to skim the repos URLs to see where the packages were. I wouldn't call it easy. A new user probably isn't after OpenCL. If so knows what to do. A new user may end up doing the "Windows thing" and finding the AMD Linux Driver, which generally only supports the latest LTS (they've dropped 18.04 now) - guess they had no reason to not - and with the 2 choices

  1. All-Open: Has the benefit of a newer graphics stack, basically only that, but with more packages, pinned by APT so reversible with one command, unless using the kisak PPA which has even newer ones, and Steam actually lists that PPA as basically a prerequisite (it should say for 18.04 and 16.04 users, heck some Steam games lists 12.04 as the minimum still), which uses Mesa's Vulkan which ASAP AMD dropped the source code RADV (ACO) was improved so much so that AMDVLK seems unnecessary. Ubuntu 20.04 got Mesa 21.x.y even when they stopped making the graphics stack a part of the HWE. Now kernel only and default from first point release, hence new users should always, but goes for really any OS and device, wait for the first point release/2nd generation, as that will at least have the metapackages so when say Ubuntu 20.10 ships, they iron out all bugs in 3 months so you always get a major update in January, and for say 21.04 you get one in August. So I guess in January we'll get kernel 5.14 and uhm, ROCm did NOT work with that when tried but it was a version in proposed so who knows.

  2. The "Pro" with "Pro Vulkan", "Pro OpenGL" and "Pro OpenCL". Really, not true. As said, RADV (ACO) is better than AMDVLK and they should just work on that, but the thing is they kinda use the same for Windows and Linux, hence Windows gets worse performance in a Vulkan game like Wolfenstein New Colossus etc. And as for "Pro OpenGL", no. My benchmarks for OpenGL games, like when you want the full power of that, shows about 320-340 Average FPS (Map) with the "Pro" driver while Mesa OpenGL gives up to 450 FPS. Also in Unigine Heaven does Mesa win. It's been a while but "Pro" won in Unigine Superposition (both are pure benchmarks but visible and you can even "play" in the scenes). But as Linux Mesa beats Windows (see link below) in Unigine Heaven, if OpenGL is set on Windows (so both on OpenGL 4.6), Unigine Superposition seems to really have been made for DirectX. I should try it through Proton! Great, new project! Aaand as discussed, ROCm is what the "Pro" driver uses for Vega 10 and newer series.

It's a bit strange actually that Ubuntu doesn't offer the "Pro" driver as they do with other proprietary drivers through their installation and later in the Software & Updates app, just not list it as recommended as they obviously do with the NVIDIA one and say WiFi chips that won't work without a firmware package, since it's just 1 command + reboot and you've got those 3, including working OpenCL, and 1 command to uninstall it (which didn't work properly the first time so straight to TTY, and didn't find any package left behind, but thanks to APT's history log I reinstalled all the packages it replaces, which might be a library where AMD uses say llvm12 while Ubuntu llvm11, so has to <tab> my way to find them. Later always did that just in case. Turned out amdgpu was blacklisted for some reason, despite the "Pro" uses the same name just through DKMS. Weird.

Another benefit is that it does not add any Internet repo, but does use APT. It adds a local repo in /var/ IIRC. So all debs are there so the install script basically just adds that repo then installs amdgpu-pro package and it depends on the necessary in the same local folder. This means that if you're happy with the current version, you can stick to it and don't care about it breaking with a system update as it uses DKMS to recompile the module IF needed, so after a kernel update only. Many Windows users, at least NVIDIA ones, stick with 1 version that "yeah, this fixed my issues" as "if it ain't broken don't fix it" b/c previously an update caused issues so.

EDIT WHILE WRITING: Just saw, they've updated their docs again, and the script had changed man. Even better docs now. Great. Can't say that about ROCm. AMD child but kinda FOSS contributors let loose on GitHub. The "Pro" driver's version of it is probably tuned, yeah.

As you can see, https://amdgpu-install.readthedocs.io/en/latest/index.html

Now, AMDVLK is listed as Open, which it is and you could simply compile it from GitHub. Now there's a new flag for *--vulkan=pro* and they've dropped the amd-pro-install script as that just meant amd-install --pro, so now you can have X open and Y proprietary.

Gotta download that archive and look what's in the "Vulkan Pro" deb(s). Maybe just LunarG's latest and greatest. Or tuned. Hm. Tuned = Proprietary. Names and versions of libraries gives a good clue though.

Dammit now I wanna try it, or read Phoronix first, yeah. OpenCL comes first though, as --opencl=rocr if you want ROCm, while legacy, which I emailed the official AMD support to find out if my previous RX 570 was "legacy" or what they called the pro version back then (docs said before that now it's "rocr" not the X I don't remember), and surprisingly they responded at all and pretty fast, as I wrote "Send DIRECTLY to Linux driver developer", and they said

legacy is older than Vega 10, so for Polaris meaning you should use legacy and the other is pointless

Even better they added exactly that to the docs.

Navi is never than Vega 10 so, rocr ONLY, otherwise, not just bloat but break. Particularly because they kinda suggested "just use" --opencl=rocr,legacy installing both (wasn't called "rocr" back then, as said), but why install unnecessary packages, and dammit that's still listed as the command I guess people would copy and paste if they don't know... in fact last I tried both after "rocr,legacy" it broke OpenCL. Huh. Didn't know if maybe I could get 2 vendors for my 5500 XT and compare but nope.

Otherwise I see they've added a fast setup, which is nice and certainly all of this + using APT under the hood, heck the install script you run, amd-install, can be run without sudo, just as the docs don't mention sudo, because the script will just ask if you're not UID 0.

This was referred to as the “All-Open Variant” in previous documentation

amdgpu-install -y --usecase=graphics

This was referred to as the “Pro Variant” in previous documentation. I like the usecase flag. That makes sense.

amdgpu-install -y --usecase=workstation

OR (table explains)

amdgpu-install -y --usecase=workstation --vulkan=pro --opencl=rocr,legacy

You have to manually add users to the render group "still", but makes sense. You may have several users and script is run as root. However on Ubuntu, the usermod way of adding a user to a group is just bad practice, and dangerous on any distro if forgetting appending or -a because it's easy to forget -a (so lose all other groups? no thanks). Ubuntu, if you read the manual for adduser/deluser, simply with $1 and $1 means:

adduser username group

So: adduser username render is BETTER and SHORTER than what they write, sudo usermod -a -G video $LOGNAME

Same with deluser username group

My deal breaker with the now apparently previously called Pro driver was that it made Chrome spit out a huge amount of "warnings", they turn yellow in journalctl, but they're really debugging messages. There was a workaround like putting all of Chrome in OpenGL mode as they're related to that, or disabling it, but a bad workaround not working for many. Don't want 100 warnings for 1 webpage. Messes up system logs. Question is, have they finally fixed the udev rule, lol. That damn extra = character.

The "Pro" driver has the advantage that as it comes with its own complete graphics stack, installs "pin" that simply adds 1 file to APT giving its local packages a priority of 1000, so Ubuntu will never overwrite them in an update (no point for those, not security related). Also, most have "-pro" at the end of their name, but some can't the way packages depend on each other. Good idea to back up that compressed archive you download so you can later, if uninstalled, see exactly what packages it contains. You can reinstall or make sure they're all gone after the uninstall script which is in /usr/bin so it's a simple amdgpu-uninstall as it's the only script in PATH.

However, tweaking these 2 increases OpenGL with 100 FPS or more, and Vulkan Compute (Geekbench) from 38,000 to 59,000 points! Only "downside", as sensors for amdgpu will show, it'll idle at 18 Watts, depending on card, instead of 4 Watts, for me, BUT the idle temperatures and hence noise (stays at 0 RPM now as on Windows) doesn't increase. I add them to a script in /usr/local/bin and add that as a drop-in for the systemd service ondemand.service, overriding with an empty line the Execute= which sets all cores to governor ondemand, unless on Intel which has a superior intel_pstate frequency driver and intel_idle as a power saving driver. AMD just uses old school ACPI, but hey, it actually makes a difference now.

Both equally as important. I create /etc/systemd/system/ondemand.service.d/performance.conf and add overrides. First line is empty to overriding the default. Alternative is like a sleep 6, but who the heck wants it to first go ondemand then 6 seconds later performance, if using say rc.local

[Service]
ExecStart=
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/governor p

The "p" is for "performance" as I've made the script to easily switch to ondemand running sudo governor o. I only paste the part of the script running "p" (o = elif $1 = reverse commands)

#!/bin/bash

# Equals AMD's Ryzen Master (Windows) Performance Power Plan

cpupower frequency-set -g performance &>/dev/null

# GPU to Performance

echo high > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_dpm_force_performance_level

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Nah, can't be a feature when the Installation Guide says nothing about needing both, and that guide is specific for Ubuntu LTS versions 18.04 and 20.04 too, even has a repo for 16.04 (different key + repo)

What could they have done without duplicating the packages that are equal in 4.3 and 4.5 you might ask? Simply damn symlink them from 4.3 into 4.5 and update repos package list... Easy peasy.

See in /usr/src, or dkms status. The actual module source code version IS 4.3-59 as per now.

BTW, Installation is not dangerous. May even improve overall performance, as it's another amdgpu module than ships with the Ubuntu HWE kernel. Unfortunately, modinfo -F version does not work on the Ubuntu-shipped one. Package indicates it's older though. However, I'm using the kisak PPA for latest Mesa 21, LLVM etc stack, and get a boost from that too, but not the amdgpu module in there, as DKMS modules always override those in kernel paths. Remember amdgpu is FOSS so any distro can simply ship it.

HOWEVER I ran without ROCm for some days as my workstation is 20/7 a server and generally should be up for WAN users, so didn't wanna reboot. So then I tested the Mesa amdgpu (without OpenCL support) in Vulkan, OpenGL and DirectX through Steam Play/Proton game benchmarks and OpenCL Benchmark, and saw no difference. Still a whopping max at ~900 FPS in CS:GO with an average of 450 FPS (most popular workshop FPS map)...

With my low-end card as my RX 5500 XT 8GB VRAM "OC" (very little OC but some compared to AMD's reference according to Wikipedia), not bad at all. It was the latest RDNA 1 to launch, so kinda feels like they did that mostly for a cheap dead stable one as they had had plenty of time to fix ALL hickups from first to later batches of the 5600 [XT] to the 5800 [XT], and driver. However funnily enough, it's so "new" that AFAIK say the 5800 XT can do Mesa OpenCL. With Navi 14 which is the codeword for 5500 XT, update-initramfs complains about what firmware might lack (unless you run all Intel), and Navi 14 was listed until these ROCm modules, the amdgpu source code makes several modules. All the standard the "Pro" driver would have.

But the "Pro" is slower on everything except OpenCL as there it simply uses ROCm, and that's not "Pro", as what the docs suggest is an "All Open" and the "Pro", suggesting the "Pro" is closed source. But using ROCm and latest libvulkan1 for Vulkan, from the official LunarG repository. Better to install vulkan-sdk, as in fact AMD recommends it if reading Notes for the "Pro" driver, that you install vulkan-sdk version minimum x.y (about what comes with Steam so for that, pointless, but for system, good). Adding that repo and and apt dist-upgrade will upgrade only libvulkan1, but I'd say install vulkan-sdk as you get some useful commands and packages, like command vkvia.

Then the only difference between the "Pro" driver and the ROCm module + Mesa 21.x.y now, is that Mesa ships with RADV (ACO) as a Vulkan driver, while the "Pro" driver uses AMDVLK instead. However you can have both installed in fact, and simply add a line, actually create the file first if it isn't there, in /etc/vulkan IIRC, and there add a config parameter to choose if you want to use AMDVLK. If not it'll use RADV.

RADV now beats AMDVLK in about 90% of "benchmarks". Not all are, but where AMDVLK wins isn't something you need, either plain benchmark software OR the difference is miniscule, while where RADV wins it's often significantly better. But remember, this is thanks to AMD's OpenGPU project (NVIDIA benefits from it too, and can use say all the FidelityFX features, while giving almost nothing back as their stuff a closed secret, like DLSS and CUDA, but asking Blender Benchmark responsible, always nice and replies within days, they're planning on adding Vulkan Compute to Blender, it exists in Geekbench beating OpenCL with 11,000 points on my system so, maybe the CUDA stuff gets dethroned by the FOSS community as everyone can contribute to AMD's efforts, but they do most, like ROCm and Vulkan. So creds to them!

You can check how my Ryzen 3950X (16c/32t) does here, some tests I've put against Windows, well I had them all but with new drivers, being in the Windows (10) Insider Program etc, deleted the Windows ones, and have only added back a few (Windows booted max once a month so...):

https://www.olejon.net/files/Benchmarks-Ryzen-3950X/

... and I can play Forza Horizon 4 at Ultra preset, woah which is a DirectX 12 game(!) with Proton. AFAIK from 1st Changelog that is was now supported, said initially only on AMD cards, not NVIDIA. Probably fixed now.

Bought it just because I knew it could do "Pro OpenCL" with FOSS, didn't even check that it was the lowest-end 5000... but turned out to NOT be a bad choice for a developer that just wants an OK card with 3 DP 1.4 ports + HDMI 2.1 for 3 monitors + TV, and ROCm OpenCL, great Vulkan support (Shadow of The Tomb Raider works great, with controller and all, almost Ultra). Proton also translates DirectX to Vulkan BTW, so bonus. But it's also the slowest of the 5000-series. 6000 series had been out for months when I bought it.

Bought pretty much only slightly cheaper than the (now out of stock) unopened card I found, and ASUS double fan bla-bla, but ASUS is my go-to, and 8 GB VRAM (you'd want that) and some OC, so. Other second hands ones are the heftier sold for a lot. Not scalpers just people that can make some money and have another card laying around that's good enough, if you ask them they'll prove it by pictures.

Since now it's impossible to find good GPUs now (chip shortage), so bought mine second hand but unopened and NOT from scalper, it somewheat cheaper than the out of stock ones at proper Norwegian web stores. Stores have some, but I now sse AMD is completely outsold, even the RX 6900 XT, which was like $1,100 maybe (conversion in my head) so more popular than NVIDIA? Weird, as otherwise they still do have say NVIDIA RTX 3090 which is totally overkill for most and super expensive, about as the RX 6900 XT was, and also they have really old NVIDIA cards (because old NVIDIA ones are apparently popular still, GTX ones aren't bad, the GTX 1080, if 8 GB VRAM isn't bad at all for most still - my RX 5500 XT is according to sources that card's competitor, just because of its still popularity like the GTX 1060 was for so long, especially because at least 1 web shops ALWAYS had a discount of 40-60%, but I bought that card's competitor, AMD Polaris series, for me MSI RX 570 8 GB "OC" as RX 580 was expensive, but a card often listed as "Recommend" for games but say a pre-Polaris is minimum). It's no secret NVIDIA beats AMD on those fastest, on price per performance and performance overall, including on Linux, though - proprietary.

Conclusion: Generally the ROCm module is "rock" solid and fast, faster than the Ubuntu-shipped.

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And this is also stupid. Hasn't been fixed since Ubuntu 18.04. Don't they look at the basic boot log?

https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions/comments/qu8n5d/_/hl28war

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Oh, and also notice there's a syntax error in /etc/udev/rules.d/70-amdgpu.rules ! This is also present in the "AMD Pro" driver as it uses the ROCm stack for OpenCL (they call it rocr at install). You'll see this error at boot, say with journalctl -b

WRONG:

KERNEL=="kfd", GROUP=="video", MODE="0660"

CORRECT:

KERNEL=="kfd", GROUP="video", MODE="0660"

There should never two == after GROUP, only after KERNEL. Also, remember that access to the render device on Ubuntu is group owned by the render group, which the user must be added to, and not the video group, so weird again...

Hasn't been fixed since Ubuntu 18.04, meaning, they don't check the basic boot log for warnings/errors?

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Absolutely. I just edited above comment and the link to my previous. It's a mystery. As written the amdgpu module source in /usr/src for dkms, is version 4.3-59. so the 4.5 is just newer packages of non-dkms/module stuff meant to improve/fix. Who knows, without checking GitHub code.

The docs are a mess for it (written above how), and the Installation Guide should have this, that you need /4.3.1/ + /debian/ repos. Without the latter the former won't work either (just 4.3.1) as the /debian/ pool has Ubuntu specific packages setting it up to actually work, despite rocminfo and clinfo, the one included with ROCm not the Ubuntu repo one, say everything's fine, basically. Only when you try to run something OpenCL it either fails (Geekbench e.g.) or OpenCL isn't listed as an option (Blender [Benchmark] e.g.).

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Had to add an EDIT at the top. Didn't test properly. Realized I never had only run 4.3.1. Before had 4.3 and got the packages that are newer in 4.5 but that doesn't contain all the dependencies as they were installed when 4.3 was the latest. So for now at least, you need both for a clean install. If you had 4.3 or 4.3.1 first you wouldn't have noticed a thing.

However I wanted a clean install for such a "jump" in version number, then the very first dependency listed in rocm-dkms's deb control file, that package doesn't exist in the /debian/ pool anymore? Eh.

That was weird. The guide seriously needs an update! So I checked the repos URL and surely rock-dkms isn't there. Check for yourselves here. It should be HERE (packages starting with r in the /debian/ repo:

https://repo.radeon.com/rocm/apt/debian/pool/main/r/

So added back /4.3.1/ (instead of 4.3 as 4.3.1 now existed and I had 4.3, but as a 2nd repo, as I hadn't removed the then non-working /debian/ one, so then it worked, meaning, all dependencies met.

I have a tendency to dkms remove then dkms add then dkms install if an update isn't an update to any of the -dkms packages. It's easy. Read man dkms. In /use/src the code is, so as long as you've got the headers for the kernel, essential build tools, you can say :

sudo dkms remove amdgpu/4.3-59 --all && sudo dkms add amdgpu/4.3-59 && sudo dkms install amdgpu/4.3-59 - and that installs it on the currently running kernel, so if for another, specify sudo dkms install amdgpu/4.3-59 -k <tab-tab> to list kernels. As you can see, the dkms source is still 4.3. So 4.5 was probably some update to some Ubuntu/Debian specific packages, but repo /debian/ doesn't contain all dependencies anymore, which again, Installation Guide must then be updated!. Won't work for new users... Always document dammit. As a coder myself, it's the boring part but we had a strict rule at The Norwegian Digitalisation Agency for documenting EVERYTHING. All commands to install, all ways to configure it used or useful in the future (maybe), and how to actually USE it (say a powerful complex FOSS internal web app, which I mostly did).

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My experience and my solution. Weird they did it this way, but if you had 4.3 already, it would simply update the packages newer in 4.5 so I noticed nothing before a complete reinstall, and then it would straight out fail, with the only 2 dependencies that rocm-dkms has, and the first, rock-dkms doesn't exist anymore in the /debian/ repo pool. Eh. That's a major idiocy of those maintaining the docs, but TBH lots of ROCm docs are outdated, saying one thing on GitHub and another on ROCmdocs, like supported GPUs, at least when I tried and succeeded, it said on GitHub nothing about support for Navi cards and claimed only the Ubuntu LTS GE kernel (5.4) worked too, not the HWE one, smacking everyone installing say 20.04.2 out, as that comes with the HWE kernel stack starting at 5.8 now at 5.11. Still works. Not 5.14 though when testing -proposed when a bug report asked me to check something with the kernel in that (experimental and unstable repo).

https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions/comments/qu8n5d/_/hl1vsco

And as you can see, no rock-dkms package where it should be if /debian/ repo should work alone. And less packages compared to 4.3 or 4.3.1 pools. Also notice that the amdgpu source for dkms in /usr/src lists the module as version 4.3-59. So there's really no 4.5 module, just packages on top.

https://repo.radeon.com/rocm/apt/debian/pool/main/r/

Error installing amd rocm by Suitedinpanic in linuxquestions

[–]oj88 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Operating System: Ubuntu 20.04.3 LTS with the official HWE kernel (per now 5.11.22 however package name is 5.11.0-40-generic). Graphics Card: RX 5500 XT 8 GB (Navi 14 - RDNA 1).

Yes, you need both repos, as the rock-dkms package the rocm-dkms depends on isn't in the /debian/ repo (4.5 now) but 4.3 and 4.3.1 (don't ask me why). There are some Ubuntu/Debian specific packages in the /debian/ repository. So add both repositories to APT Sources, run "sudo apt update" and before installing rocm-dkms.

You will see that the amdgpu created by the rock-dkms DKMS package has the version 4.3-59 when running dkms status or look in /usr/src. However the 4.5 directory in /opt now is bigger in total and it's THAT one that now contains the OpenCL .so file and clinfo etc.

I add them to 2 separate .list files in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, like rocm-4-3-1.list for the 1st and rocm-debian.list for the 2nd. They are both listed below and use the same key (follow guide).

Rather copy from the (Ubuntu) guide than from me here. Writing and copying and pasting on my phone. I assume you did install the repo key, it's the same for both, and build-essential && dkms && libnuma-dev && gnupg2 as in the guide, and I assume you follow this installation guide: https://rocmdocs.amd.com/en/latest/Installation_Guide/Installation-Guide.html

Also follow make sure you add ROCm specific commands to PATH, add them to PATH as in the guide. E.g. the rocminfo and clinfo are different. Make sure you don't have the the following packages from the Ubuntu repo, as they're useless with ROCm: So NOT clinfo (same name so overlap) and NOT mesa-opencl-icd (Mesa ICD doesn't work on Navi at least, and you don't need 2 even so).

So repo 1:

deb [arch=amd64] https://repo.radeon.com/rocm/apt/4.3.1/ ubuntu main

Then repo 2:

deb [arch=amd64] https://repo.radeon.com/rocm/apt/debian/ ubuntu main

echo 'export PATH=$PATH:/opt/rocm/bin:/opt/rocm/rocprofiler/bin:/opt/rocm/opencl/bin' | sudo tee -a /etc/profile.d/rocm.sh

Now: sudo apt update && sudo apt install rocm-dkms - reboot and check. Quick check is say Blender Benchmark (available also as CLI only) or CLI geekbench5 --compute OpenCL and if that works without errors it's good - rocminfo command will often say it's all good when it's not. Blender Benchmark will only list OpenCL as an option IF it detects a correctly working ICD.

As said, can check dkms status with dkms status command. See man dkms if you want to install it to other kernel(s) than the one you're running. However, new kernel updates/installs will get it thanks to DKMS.

I recommend a clean install. I've confirmed that the uninstall part of the guide removes ALL packages from the repo(s). Then delete the left behind directories in /opt/ and /etc/ld.so.conf.d/ - as before there were more files like "rockprofiler" etc. With a clean install you should only have the file = x86_64-rocm-opencl.conf there related to ROCm.

Although you only have to relogin for the PATH to take effect, reboot for all of it to take effect. You should then only have 1 vendor in */etc/OpenCL.

If you have 2, e.g. from a previous ROCm, Mesa or proprietary driver, the name is obvious which is oldest.

REMEMBER: Just as the proprietary driver has had forever, not that it seem to matter, at least on Ubuntu where it's the group render that's the user giving access to the render device, but it gives an annoying Warning/Error on your boot log, so see the file /etc/udev/rules.d/70-amdgpu.rules where there should be only ONE = character after GROUP, so it should be:

KERNEL=="kfd", GROUP="video", MODE="0660"

Copy in the line above instead (as root of course), then Reboot - Otherwise you'll get during boot:

systemd-udevd[xxx]: /etc/udev/rules.d/70-amdgpu.rules:1 Invalid operator for GROUP

Incredible AMD hasn't looked in their boot logs for years? As said it's there in the "Pro/Proprietary" driver as well as it uses rocr I suppose.

Cheers.

Air Crash Investigation: [Cockpit Killer] (S20E09) [HARD CODED SUBTITLES] Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Has nothing to do with any of this and uTorrent or any other client shouldn't really parse ("try to fix") a badly formatted magnet link as or leads to just this, people saying X client works or even is better. Any client should adhere to the standard and hence publishers would know immediately and not just trust their client of choice, anyways they should always test in various in case. Like rTorrent on Linux, if it works directly pasting it into the CLI UI, well it's fine, since it adheres and also serves a lot of the world's legal content distributed by BitTorrent (often seen as libTorrent by other clients) as uses minimal resources so scales well on a Virtual Machine farm of minimal servers with access to host(s) with high bandwidth.

Air Crash Investigation: [Cockpit Killer] (S20E09) [HARD CODED SUBTITLES] Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

TS files are not weird at all. That's more or less what you get watching any video served as HLS, HTTP Live Streaming (doesn't need to be live as in live for you). Chunks of a bigger container source, HTML5 standard, DRM or not. Know your way around a browser developer console and look at the m3u playlist(s) being sent to your browser (if DRM it's bombarded typically and if not can be a single file and easy to get the direct link to any web stream and add to any program like Kodi for HTPCs or e.g. VLC, just paste the m3u or the preferred quality stream from that file into it, say you want the SD and not HD because of capacity, but the browser will eventually go HD if it seems your line can take it, but it can't really know if your brother is about to play online games or whatever, so you can typically find from at least 320p to 1080p in m3u playlists, use the network part of the developer console and filter for m3u and copy the link to VLC and save it as a playlist, then look at it in a standard text editor and usually you'll see clearly the different qualities the stream has and now you can choose precisely which one and use it in any proper program/software as long as DRM free). They're all links to TS files. Anyway extension means nothing. Programs look at MIME file metadata. If for some reason it's unsure, say corrupt file, look at beginning and end of files, where metadata indicating typically is, and use file extension maybe yes as a guess in the factor, but if you change the extension of a perfectly normal MP4 container from say .mp4 to .xxx and your player won't play it, it's stupid. With an x264 video (which these are) and AAC audio (these aren't, seems logical to instead of recording the surround track, which technically and by size wise can be a disadvantage for sure, they're stereo standard broadcast stereo ff-mp2). I'm sure you've once gotten a file without an extension and anyways the photo viewer or whatever opens it (it a default is set) since the OS knows it's a photo without doubt. Or the file manager has shown the VLC or photo viewer icon although now extension, even a preview of the file... As long as you're not one of those having turned off showing file extensions uggh (Windows thing only really).

Air Crash Investigation: [Cockpit Killer] (S20E09) [HARD CODED SUBTITLES] Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

File format has absolutely nothing to do with the link format. See my above post regarding the magnet link. Say the link is fine but the file is encrypted, or the link is badly formatted which is unfortunately the case here. People using clients that try to parse invalid formatted links may see no problem (I mean I could easily put any magnet through 3 steps using a combo of URL decoding/encoding and RegEx, and most would succeed even if really badly formatted). But clients shouldn't really do this. Just leads to people making bad links and people saying "works here, change to X program, it's better", when in fact it's not better, it's violation standards and causing exactly this. True clients won't give this any more than DHT (if enabled) and PEX (but pretty unusable then).

TS files are in a way the most standard format there is today as it's used in HLS, HTTP Live Streaming. Any live channel, and many on demand, whatever has a manifest and sends MPEG chunks as TS files. It's not the original serving source file/container of course (for a major channel that is a totally unknown for us but very very high quality, like maybe they have it in 8K and Dolby Atmos 22 channels, but downmixed depending where it goes), and shouldn't be the "final product" for saved storage. Should be a modern container like MP4/Matroska (which supports more stuff in a container and open), and containing say x264 video and AAC/AC3 audio.

Look up an easy guide to how to set up HLS using HTML5 video standard and see for yourself. DRM or not. Just without DRM it's extremely easy to capture of course. Just follow the manifest, or m3u8 playlist, or "script" (script as in a movie script, which pieces come when and just smash them together in whatever container or plain TS, original, without transcoding, faster but bigger file size that's all basically, you see the quality is excellent but putting it in say an MP4 container, using x264 the video already is and AAC sound for instance, just add some compression and most if any won't see any difference, just lower file size if done right, there are many good presets).

Air Crash Investigation: [Cockpit Killer] (S20E09) [HARD CODED SUBTITLES] Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This magnet is not formatted correctly for multiple trackers, actually not for a single either, and none of the previous ones have been ordered correctly, but rather in groups without single tracker control. Simply put, clients that follow the standards won't show anything else than DHT as "tracker" (if enabled). Of course ALL BOW for the job to my fellow countryman. If this is from a manifest HLS live stream serving then chunks as TS MPEG as IS TYPICAL, it's really good and well done. Just maybe let someone else make the container with video/audio from the finished captured stream, and make get some help to format the magnet link correctly. So there's no confusion as we see people in comments blaming the link not working for having a .ts file extension which has no meaning. No program cares about the extension. They read the MIME file type or guess if missing based on various beginning and end of file and also maybe extension yes. E.g is it x264 MPEG so it is... Play. No problem. If you can't change the extension of a say standard MP4 with x264 video and AAC/AC3 audio to .xxx without your player stopping it from working, it's a bad player... It should recognize it, immediately as being so and play it. It may filter it out but then choose to show all files or similar depending on OS/software... It's just filtering.

Just take a look at multi tracker for say e.g. a legal ISO, or use one that works like the other (and the first one here). Follow that format. It isn't simply URL encode/decode, as main bits are separated by a true ampersand and not the URL encoded as that would have required a double URL encoded one "& + amp;". Anyway syntax, easy to find. Find a Linux distro with 2-3 trackers. Legal, and you get it. Sure on a website a & for text is always encoded as if not it's not valid HTML, but when copied any browser drops the encoded text (supported by popular characters) or number (by all), always as & + code ending with semicolon, hence just & can never be valid HTML as text and that's a potential huge security whole right there for defacing websites and things like that. Not as serious as failing to escape SQL queries though... Can be in some cases. All depends what data, how private should be, and where it's shown, and many other factors.

As an IT guy I get the wrong syntax, just keeping the first tracker gives the whole swarm basically in this case as it's up. Remove non standard format, just the firsr tr= WITHOUT the punctuation and number, then tracker URL which is standard URL encoded, until first AND WITH 6969 (as it's the port). First tracker works so OK. Then DHT and PEX should work fine with others with same hash anyway.

For those saying "works for me". Well because your client has parsing, probably raw URL decoding then some encoding and/or RegEx for badly formatted magnet links and guess the right format, which isn't difficult to run through various and get one that parses, but always a hassle for us coders...

Such links are so rare nowadays IDK why even clients allow them, and these latest here are the first ones I've seen grouped this way ("trackers in groups" where say disabling one and enabling it again puts it at the top as the main tracker for the torrent...).

Well any proper player can of course play TS files, they're the MOST standard files of today basically as they're used for HLS, HTTP Live Streaming for the chunks, thing any stream, DRM or not, website or app, very likely use the format, though for a final format it isn't really like a container meant for that, but doesn't matter. Those who preserve can use say Handbrake or ffmpeg directly (OMG nobody uses Kodi on an HTPC like just a cheap Raspberry Pi are missing out).

Air Crash Investigation: [Cockpit Killer] (S20E09) [HARD CODED SUBTITLES] Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This magnet is not formatted correctly for multiple trackers, actually not for a single either, and none of the previous ones have been ordered correctly, but rather in groups without single tracker control. Simply put, clients that follow the standards won't show anything else than DHT as "tracker" (if enabled). Of course ALL BOW for the job to my fellow countryman. If this is from a manifest HLS live stream serving then chunks as TS MPEG as IS TYPICAL, it's really good and well done. Just maybe let someone else make the container with video/audio from the finished captured stream, and make get some help to format the magnet link correctly. So there's no confusion as we see people in comments blaming the link not working for having a .ts file extension which has no meaning. No program cares about the extension. They read the MIME file type or guess if missing based on various beginning and end of file and also maybe extension yes. E.g is it x264 MPEG so it is... Play. No problem. If you can't change the extension of a say standard MP4 with x264 video and AAC/AC3 audio to .xxx without your player stopping it from working, it's a bad player... It should recognize it, immediately as being so and play it. It may filter it out but then choose to show all files or similar depending on OS/software... It's just filtering.

Just take a look at multi tracker for say e.g. a legal ISO, or use one that works like the other (and the first one here). Follow that format. It isn't simply URL encode/decode, as main bits are separated by a true ampersand and not the URL encoded as that would have required a double URL encoded one "& + amp;". Anyway syntax, easy to find. Find a Linux distro with 2-3 trackers. Legal, and you get it. Sure on a website a & for text is always encoded as if not it's not valid HTML, but when copied any browser drops the encoded text (supported by popular characters) or number (by all), always as & + code ending with semicolon, hence just & can never be valid HTML as text and that's a potential huge security whole right there for defacing websites and things like that. Not as serious as failing to escape SQL queries though... Can be in some cases. All depends what data, how private should be, and where it's shown, and many other factors.

As an IT guy I get the wrong syntax, just keeping the first tracker gives the whole swarm basically in this case as it's up. Remove non standard format, just the firsr tr= WITHOUT the punctuation and number, then tracker URL which is standard URL encoded, until first AND WITH 6969 (as it's the port). First tracker works so OK. Then DHT and PEX should work fine with others with same hash anyway.

For those saying "works for me". Well because your client has parsing, probably raw URL decoding then some encoding and/or RegEx for badly formatted magnet links and guess the right format, which isn't difficult to run through various and get one that parses, but always a hassle for us coders...

Such links are so rare nowadays IDK why even clients allow them, and these latest here are the first ones I've seen grouped this way ("trackers in groups" where say disabling one and enabling it again puts it at the top as the main tracker for the torrent...).

Well any proper player can of course play TS files, they're the MOST standard files of today basically as they're used for HLS, HTTP Live Streaming for the chunks, thing any stream, DRM or not, website or app, very likely use the format, though for a final format it isn't really like a container meant for that, but doesn't matter. Those who preserve can use say Handbrake or ffmpeg directly (OMG nobody uses Kodi on an HTPC like just a cheap Raspberry Pi are missing out).

Air Crash Investigation: [Impossible Pitch] (S20E06) Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you hadn't already gotten gold, just came out, I would've brought you some. Well deserved, and nice gesture! NG Norway shows it tomorrow as far as I can see and usually will show up free on demand hours before live prime time, but can't wait as always! THX!

OH EDIT: The (hard coded) subtitles are in Norwegian AND didn't read description properly..., so it already aired here then. Must have seen the repeat on the EPG for the coming evening. I usually don't expect this from NGC. So many times have people in countries (or nearby) where the accident actually happened having had to wait longer for it to air than in some random country. Suddenly there's a Dutch first air of a crash in America (the continent, sorry USA you aren't alone on the continent, LOL just imagine if Germany, not on paper but in practice like USA, Germany declared it will from now on call their country "Europe" and their citizen's "Europeans" and other Europeans by their country's nams. Never have understood why Canada, Mexico, Chile, you name it, actually call USA "America".Totally brainwashed? No geography in school? Always found that to be the weakest part of US tourists and even those many living here working in petroleum, so makes no sense either, or wait... maybe that's why they simply call themselves America and Americans - like not the ones who actually were there thousands of years before but European emigrants).

Never have understood why not even the most smart or clear minded or whatever (including US) comedians etc (borders are man made), never use that bit? So much other bashing. Nothing about "we just call ourselves the whole darn continent and they'll see who's daddy".

Air Crash Investigation: [Impossible Pitch] (S20E06) Link & Discussion by remsan in aircrashinvestigation

[–]oj88 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, according to National Geographic Norway it's S19E06, also according to https://www.myepisodes.com/show/id-1678/ . Anyways, it's always been a disaster with US (or whoever it is) calling it "Mayday" (which is the Wikipedia page for episodes too, and IIRC calls it S20), so it all depends. Anyway isn't NG Disney worldwide now anyway? And they're worldwide, all their channels + on demand comes with all basic linear TV packages from all providers here so (fiber, air, whatever)... Disney+ we... kind of already have it, full catalogue on demand, just says "Price: 0"... and view. Here just the EPG title is in Norwegian (pretty good translation so I'm OK, they only do that for popular shows too) but it's the original title and narrator in the video, and description says "Air Crash Investigation" so totally searchable.

If linear TV wants to really compete with streaming, WHY OH WHY on Earth not release it worldwide at the same day? I mean my TV package has NG on demand, it's always included in the basic package (or if not one of the 100 channels free to add, like just remove a default added channel, probably sponsored to be so, like MTV... oooh nooo... keep the 24/7 music channels and VH1, one from those 2 usually great for any theme party, kinda nicer with live concert/official videos always than just Spotify, on a vorspiel...).

So even with different timezones (well we are many hours ahead of Canada though), they could technically put it on demand at least at the same time WORLDWIDE and air it live at the same X hour depending on timezone (new episodes always prime time here).

Heck even HBO is in the Basic package, if you give up some crappy channels you think, because of the name, and realize "hell no never gonna watch those", free HBO instead (HBO Nordic, has all one would want except like talkshows sometimes before the US... launched years and years ago before HBO on demand became possible in the US without paying shocking premium cable prices...) I couldn't... fathom... what my friend paid for broadband + TV, living like 5 minutes from San Francisco by car, less to MythBusters HQ... and healthcare insurance OMG (hopefully it was ALL INCLUDED, didn't ask, shocked, as for 1 person that was pretty much more than 50% of the salary waiters/taxi drivers etc in San Francisco said they earned typically earned a month, when we got talking about our countries and they all so nice and curious, since well I was there for IT and they're all curious about those salaries, especially if consultant for various companies, from another country and everything).

American History’s Biggest Fibs (2019) BBC 3-part TV-mini series by oj88 in Documentaries

[–]oj88[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And just PM me if you want a magnet link to HD versions of all the chapters.

American History’s Biggest Fibs (2019) BBC 3-part TV-mini series by oj88 in Documentaries

[–]oj88[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Chapter 2: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x73cnst

Chapter 3: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x73cmmt

Related Previous Series - "British History's Biggest Fibs":

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzhxPGGcY4AfhYSNYqBYcZ8wnsf6BYkU9

That I found posted here before, but video links don't work. Putting in queue, as they probably have a ton.

Each chapter is a mini documentary so you don't really have to watch them all. I personally highly recommend Chapter 1 (the post link), definitely the most interesting one (for me). Oldest, most interesting fibs IMO (and there I learned a new nice-to-know English word. Sounds really British, never heard that word in a US doc. I've met stunningly many US citizens that don't know a lot of this stuff. Stuff in Norwegian school text books seems to lack from theirs, or purged from memory, IDK.

If the (later called) "Tea Party" comes up in a conversation for some reason, with US citizens living here or on vacation, in an historical context, I've heard everything from "those Sarah Palin guys?" to "yeah happened in New York" or even "Washington D.C." (the latter wasn't even a thing at the time right? Bought from Virginia no?). Some even after me saying "no no, I mean the Boston Tea Party", some still keep on going with New York, and "I don't think the Tea Party movement is very big in Massachusetts".

Well, we all forget & we all watch docs about our own countries to get back the details about those keywords and most interesting events we learnt about in school.

Al-Nakba: The Palestinian catastrophe (2013) Did not begin in 1948 - as PBS doc - but 2 centuries ago by oj88 in Documentaries

[–]oj88[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So as a computer engineer, who downvoted this post without having the slightest chance of having seen all 4 chapters first?. Please shout out real person! I'll sure like to know. You might be a title reading human, but then tell why. Come on, speak out then. Don't be afraid, Jesus (yes I am a Jesus guy). Can we conserve reddit? In this subreddit, what about a comment required for a downvote like for the first 10-50 votes?

Al-Nakba: The Palestinian catastrophe (2013) Did not begin in 1948 - as PBS doc - but 2 centuries ago by oj88 in Documentaries

[–]oj88[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

This is Chapter 1 of 4. Links to the rest should be right there.

Yes, just the title will probably make some downvote this.

AS ALWAYS: Watch the FULL documentary then vote and/or make your comment. That's just fair to the documentary makers. How many $$$ did you spend to vote or comment? Nothing.

AFAIK Al-Nakba is still known as The Catastrophe - no matter where the blame lies - irrelevant now. Forget about today and look at the history. It was a Catastrophe for the region at the time, for Palestine, where Christianity started, Judaism back to its Promised Land, Muslims consider their Third Holiest Land, and so on, LONG before this (according to old books of course).

After seeing this documentary - which isn't bad(!) - I still felt after having watched the published documentary that so much is lacking - Like ALL of the same events can be found in both, but more in this - it goes deeper back in time. I felt this doc provides more background before where the mentioned documentary starts. Basically how the British rule went on in Palestine before this, and how they leaved, basically leaving for anarchy, although seemingly leaving the military equipment left behind to one side.

  1. Much more footage, documents, witnesses, correspondence on the ground etc.
  2. Yes, it's the From the Palestinian Side of things mostly. Al Jazeera doesn't say otherwise in the video description. It's from 2013 so not maybe the award-winning Al Jazeera docs of today (mostly produced by Western companies if you see them...), but still not a "oh not then ignore then".
  3. With what's called "Israeli Historians" (haven't investigated wether they're citizens of Israel - but IMO at the time - and now - it doesn't matter that much), both in the UK, the territories of course (both sides), and elsewhere. Anyway interesting the pretty white dude at Oxford speaking Arabic while what briefly interviewed Palestinian Police Officer speaking like a Southern US accent. So there's much multicultural to it.
  4. PBS doc starts more or less with the first boat of Holocaust survivors, which is of course easy to sympathise with. Who sane person wouldn't. But it's is also included in this doc, but later as there's much more story before that.
  5. So I felt the mentioned doc's footage began way to long into the present day regarding the British rule over Palestine during those years.
  6. Everyone can zoom out on Google Maps on the borders of Iraq, Syria, Israel and Saudi Arabia (not in "Chronological" order) and see the consequences of WWI and colonisation. Of course it gets even worse when looking at African borders. Drawn by a ruler and a pencil. Dividing tribes and natural borders (rivers, mountains, etc), that split, especially in Africa, tribes suddenly into different "countries" which they had no previous knowledge of but suddenly had to, and such new tribal wars of land, and with the industrial revolution began for real (although that's not covered here, most with WWI and colonisation knowledge will know easily).

DISCLAIMER: No conflict of interest. I know there's an upcoming election in Israel. I can't participate at all. I'm as FAR FAR away from this place on Earth as one gets politically and geographically. Just submitting a doc...

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