xmmsao 0.5 is now available. The main addition in this release is support for file-output. Unlike xmms-diskwriter, this plugin allows the use of effect plugins on the output.

For version 0.6, I doubt there will be many changes under the hood (the only one I can see at this point is maybe allowing simultaneous disk and live output), but there will probably be a change or two to the configuration dialog, with allowing selection of output file format leading the list.

Getting some type of software premixing is still on the TODO... I haven't forgotten about that!

Writing this has allowed me to see some of the misfeatures of xmms, and given me some ideas for improvements, to wit:

• system-wide default configuration: at this point, the only options for an admin needing to have a custom configuration for multiple users are:
  • hacking xmms' source to set different defaults. This is butt-ugly and shouldn't be necessary.
  • somehow copying a default configuration file to each user's ~/.xmms directory. This is easy to do for existing users, but requires hacking user creation scripts for new users.
  I have a simple patch which allows a default configuration file to be stored in /etc/xmms if no user config file is found.
• braindead EQ implementation: xmms leaves application of EQ settings to input plugins, while EQs are more properly the domain of either output or effect plugins. Look at any component system with an equalizer and note that there's one EQ for the entire system, not an EQ for each component. Unfortunately, this braindeadedness [probably] can't readily be fixed without massively changing the output plugin API.
• no support for multiple effect plugins: There is a patch to xmms to allow this, but it requires a change to the way that output plugins are written. It seems to me that a meta-effect plugin (a single effect plugin which does nothing more than run its input through a sequence of other effect plugins) is a much better solution which does not break compatibility. I'll probably start work on this at some point this summer.