gotosocial - Link to source

Maybe it's the constant turmoil of the world and/or me longing for simpler times in life, but today I found myself setting up the development environment for Rockbox, the alternative mp3 player firmware. I haven't even had a player for over 12 years.

Rockbox was the first real open source project I started tinkering with back in 2008. Obviously my skills back then weren't good enough to get any changes accepted, but learning to set up various toolchains, building my own custom patched binaries and just hanging around a well-maintained project (and getting rejected for not abiding by the rules) turned out to be invaluable experiences later in life.

Just for fun I did a simulator build (Rockbox has truly excellent simulators for all their supported players) and was at home straight away. Nothing much has changed in all this time. So much of the tech I use has been enshittified in the past 10 years that using a piece of software whose UI has been essentially unchanged since when I was a teenager felt just incredible.

This entry was edited (Saturday, January 3, 2026, 10:21 PM)
in reply to Sean Randall
gotosocial - Link to source

Tuukka Ojala

That's a good thing in my book. Never saw the point in micro over mini. I used a Clip plus for about 4 years every single day until I gave it up for listening to streamed content on my phone. Before that I had a Sansa E250. Loved both players in equal measure but for different reasons.
in reply to Tuukka Ojala
glitchsoc - Link to source

miki

It's not just that. I want access to navigation, notifications, BeMyEyes, bus / tram schedules and all that. Until we get consistent BLE everywhere and true multipoint, and that won't be anytime soon, no device except my phone is really going to work for me.
in reply to miki
gotosocial - Link to source

Tuukka Ojala

My thinking as of late has been that if I'm listening to music or a book I don't want to be distracted by anything other than really important notifications. That also includes ways to distract myself, i.e. scrolling through social media or what have you. The idea of being constrained by a device whose sole function is audio playback feels appealing to me.
in reply to miki
mastodon - Link to source

Sean Randall

I quite like voicedream and eloquence together, but given that I find what to read on a computer much of the time anyway, a card in my clip which syncs whenever I charge it works fine for me too.
Voicedream can't pause between tracks, which I find invaluable, and I also struggle to get it to reliably resume whilst wearing air pods.

I also prefer the distraction-free, single-use device, and especially when doing things around the home don't even have my phone about my person some of the time. Something weighing about 15g is a most convenient carry and I've just grown used to using these things over the last decade or so.

in reply to Tuukka Ojala
gotosocial - Link to source

Tuukka Ojala

I still remember feeling so disappointed when I got my first iPhone after 5 years of Rockbox. It felt so lacking and poorly optimised for media playback. It didn't take long for the convenience factor to win me over but my first impressions certainly weren't positive.