[gmediaserver-devel] A Few General Questions

[Hal Vaughan]

First, I apologize for asking beginner questions on a devel list, but it 
seems this is the only list for GMediaServer.  I haven't had time to 
look into streaming audio before but now I have a bit of time and want 
to be able to listen to all the music I've ripped from CDs to my hard 
drive throughout my house so I'm trying to get a feel for what is 
available.  I've got a few questions and some may apply to all media 
servers and some may focus on GMediaServer.  I'm still trying to sort 
it all out.

- I saw the list of supported files for GMediaServer.  Is there a chance 
flac will be added at some point?  I would think it'd just be a matter 
of using the flac libraries to get the needed information.

- I notice that the description says GMediaServer makes the directories 
and files available to clients.  I'm not clear on how clients handle 
files.  Does GMediaServer decode the file from whatever format it's in 
and stream the audio data to the client, or does the client just read 
the file through GMediaServer and then the client does the decoding 
before playing the file?  In other words, are the file formats limited 
by what GMediaServer can read or by what the client can read?


I've been looking at different systems and have seen some that are way 
overpriced (like Sonos -- $400 for a remote control?!).  Someone 
suggested I look at Squeezebox, which isn't UPnP, but they said it is 
good at syncing playback of the same music on different clients.  When 
I saw that and the Roku Soundbridge, I thought I might be able to not 
only find other clients out there, but possibly find an open 
source/open hardware client or kit that would combine an embedded 
system and some FOSS firmware, but it doesn't seem like there's 
anything like that.

Thanks for any answers, suggestions, or other comments.

Hal