I don't understand how Amarok is handling iPod's with the new 2.4 update. Amarok copies files direct to the device and does not write to iPod_Control.

This means that the files that were on before the update are still there when seen in iTunes, although I removed them in Amarok and that the newly transfered files are only seen in Amarok but cannot be accessed on the iPod since they are only stored there and not actually written to the DB.

BTW it is a 5G iPod Video.

Can someone please clear this up for me?

Furthermore, what is this checkbox "Use as collection"? Only when I uncheck it, it lists the contents (that is, the audio files which were moved to the device but not actually seen or playable on the iPod itself). And each time I connect the device, the checkbox is always checked.

hello
I also I have the same problem.
I need help, thanks.

rubyinthedust wrote:Furthermore, what is this checkbox "Use as collection"? Only when I uncheck it, it lists the contents (that is, the audio files which were moved to the device but not actually seen or playable on the iPod itself). And each time I connect the device, the checkbox is always checked.

If you "use as collection", the tracks in your device will be remembered in the database. The checking/unchecking behavior you report sounds wrong.

Are you using Amarok to safely detach your device each time?

Are you quitting Amarok using the menu or Control Q? That might sound like an odd question, but if you only use the X, Amarok isn't shut down, but only sent to the taskbar. It is at shutdown that settings are saved.

So the "use as collection" option is intended only for storage devices, got that now. Thing is, it's an iPod and I want Amarok to write to the db as it did before.

I've detached it in every way imaginable, I've since reset it, checked permissions and copied music to it in iTunes to set up the directory structure. Still Amarok only recognizes it as a HDD.

I could try gtkpod to see if there is similar behavior, but can't see how this would fix it in Amarok.

Same here with iPod Video 5.5Gen. Worked under Amarok 1.4, but not under Amarok 2. Support for Apple devices is still not working for the average user, who wants to plug in a player and copy music. Works on Gnome/GTK apps fine, btw.
But this is not necessarily Amarok's fault, simply too much components/libraries and KDE4.

With gtkpod it worked, even copied the artwork. Afterwards Amarok recognized it, I attempted to copy music but the device disappeared! I had to reboot to get KDE to find the device again, but then the device was mounted read-only. The tracks were there minus the artwork.

I'm suddenly thinking this has something to do with the way KDE 4.6 handles devices now. My iPod always worked well with Amarok 2, much better than with 1.4 but now with 2.4 and KDE 4.6 it is AFU.

KDE 4.6 doesn't use HAL anymore, but udev/udisk. Here I get the message, that the iPod can't be mounted, because of wrong/no/not supported filesystem. It only gets mounted as a mass storage device, which obviously doesn't work for an iPod. Therefore "copying tracks to collection iPod" does nothing else than copying. iPod Video has 2 partitins, one is a vfat, the other is the system.
Atm only the vfat gets mounted.
The problem are the udev rules, which don't work correctly with KDE 4.6.

m0nk

I've tried to find some logic in this but I can't. I reset the iPod again, Amarok sees it as an iPod only if I add tracks from iTunes or gtkpod first. However, Amarok will not write to the DB correctly. The tracks are shown in the list but below "Transferring Tracks to Device" shows no progress. Same with deleting, the progress never gets beyond 0%. You actually have to quit Amarok and restart to see any changes. How lame is that? And no artwork.

Is there any way to make HAL works only for Amarok and iPods? Or may we wait to get Udev working on iPods?

If there is any project working on it, maybe I can help.

@neocore
openSUSE 11.4 in March will contain KDE 4.6. Perhaps the rules will work until then.
I'm using gtkpod to fill my iPod atm

Some more strange behavior I've noticed, when the iPod is recognized as a storage device it is mounted by it's label, /media/ipod, also in Dolphin. But as soon as I get Amarok to see it as an iPod it shows up as "disk" and is mounted by it's UUID, something like /media/92b259d6-c886-4b09-856d-f28f2ce9e6c9.

I'm having issues with this as well.

I have an iPod 5G (video) with all of my music loaded onto it. I drag the thing around between lots of machines and listen to the music through the machine from the iPod.

In KDE 4.5.5 with Amarok 2.4 this worked fine, Amarok detected the device as an iPod, got the track information for each track and showed it as a separate collection.

In KDE 4.6 with Amarok 2.4 it doesn't work. Amarok sees the device as a mass storage device and doesn't see any music on it at all.

Did somebody open a bug on this yet?

You might find some help here: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Porta ... one#Amarok

Does that apply to iPods other than iPhone/iPod Touch?