I almost filed a bug for this (great bug reporting system, btw ).

Last week upgraded to amarok 2.3.0 Using KDE 4.4.1 (KDE 4.4.1) - build date 13/3/2010.

It was suddenly taking an age to startup each time (1 to 2 minutes). I currently have 20,292 tracks in my local collection. I deleted the usual config files, rescanned collection, but no avail.

So I decided to try using an external mySQL database to see if that would help speed. Installed mSQL, got database up and running (after completely deleting all older mySQL directories and files). Using Arch linux's mysql-5.1.44-1 package, created databases as per instructions on Wiki and set amarok to use 'em.

But amarok / mySQL refused to scan my complete collection - crashing about 75% of the way through - terminal simply showed 'aborted'. That's when I was about to submit a bug report - but then I discovered that adding folders several at a time didn't crash. Slowly added folders several GB at a time, and now everything working smoothly, and startup times restored to ~30 seconds. Not sure if this is a RAM issue, or a mySQL one. Seems less likely to be an amarok one.

Specs: 2GB RAM, AMD64 3000+, lots of free HD space.

ps One confusing thing in the wiki:

One instruction (1.4.x series) says:

Code: Select all

GRANT ALL ON amarok.* TO amarok@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'PASSWORD_CHANGE_ME';

while the other (2.x series) says:

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GRANT ALL ON amarok.* TO 'amarok'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'PASSWORD_CHANGE_ME';

Note the ' 's around 'localhost' and 'amarok'. FWIW I'm currently working withOUT the quote marks.

On my gentoo system, amarok blocks mysql 5.1.xx, so I can install it only with mysql 5.0.xx. Maybe Your problem is in the mysql version, try downgrading it to 5.0

NForce: I doubt Amarok blocks a particular version of MysQL, try to make sure you have set the flacs correctly in that version, that is more likely the case.

Sultanoswing: what distribution are you using? Setting it in your profile would spare us some questions. Ditto for the MySQL version you are using.

Also make sure you don't have streams in the playlist, since Amarok will then check all the URLs on startup to make the existing playlist work.

Another reason why Amarok takes long to startup can be that you have many different mounted partitions, many Saved Playlists or a collection located on an external share.

I wonder how you upgraded to Amarok 2.3.0 last week, since it was only released on Monday this week...

Mamarok: when i try to emerge newer version of MySQL i get this:

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nforce@nforce-laptop ~ $ sudo USE="embedded" emerge mysql

These are the packages that would be merged, in order:

Calculating dependencies... done!
[ebuild     U ] dev-db/mysql-5.1.44-r1 [5.0.90-r1] USE="community embedded perl ssl -big-tables -cluster -debug -extraengine -latin1 -max-idx-128 -minimal -pbxt% -profiling (-selinux) -static -test% (-berkdb%*) (-lib32%)" 23,767 kB [1=>0]                                               
[ebuild     U ] virtual/mysql-5.1 [5.0] USE="-lib32" 0 kB [1]
[blocks B     ] media-sound/amarok[embedded] ("media-sound/amarok[embedded]" is blocking dev-db/mysql-5.1.44-r1)

Total: 2 packages (2 upgrades), Size of downloads: 23,767 kB
Conflict: 1 block (1 unsatisfied)
Portage tree and overlays:
 [0] /usr/portage
 [1] /usr/local/portage/layman/multilib

 * Error: The above package list contains packages which cannot be
 * installed at the same time on the same system.

  ('installed', '/', 'media-sound/amarok-2.3.0', 'nomerge') pulled in by
    media-sound/amarok required by @selected

  ('ebuild', '/', 'dev-db/mysql-5.1.44-r1', 'merge') pulled in by
    =dev-db/mysql-5.1* required by ('ebuild', '/', 'virtual/mysql-5.1', 'merge')
    mysql

The only missing flag is "berkdb", but it's unavailable in mysql-5.1.44.
By the way Sultanoswing mentioned he is using ArchLinux distro

@ mamarok (love the nick, btw)

Yep - Arch Linux, which provides a rolling release, so everything is up to date (but occassionally breaks!). As mentioned, I'm currently running mysql-5.1.44-1, which is Arch's latest, and I completely deleted then rebuilt the databases since it'd been a while between mysql uses (what with the embedded functionality of amarok now), and I had been getting 'server.mysql not present' errors when flushing privileges prior.

No streams in the playlist and only one mounted partition, but each of my albums has an m3u playlist in its folder, so that's probably slowing everything down on startup. Is there a way to disable amarok from automagically loading these, since I never actually use them?

OK - technically it wasn't last week - just a few days ago - March 14th to be precise - yes, Arch is pretty quick on the updates. I had previously also been using the amarok-git package from the AUR, which is build-as-you go

On the broken Gentoo build, it's probably best to take this up with your Gentoo folks. Amarok shouldn't be listed as blocking a newer MySql version.

The m3u playlists are a known issue. However, if you don't use the playlists, why not delete them? Their presence is slowing your startup time.

Valorie

I don't think it's ebuild that is broken...Check this topic out, maybe Amarok isn't compatible with mysql 5.1.44? http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-819262.html

EDIT: Ok, it's MySQL's bug, not amarok's :
http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=306315

valoriez wrote:The m3u playlists are a known issue. However, if you don't use the playlists, why not delete them? Their presence is slowing your startup time.

Valorie

Good thought, but although I don't use them, I do need to keep them in there for completeness' sake.

I'll hope a fix or workaround becomes available, then.