~ubuntu-branches/ubuntu/precise/kubuntu-docs/precise-proposed

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<article id="audio" status="complete">
<articleinfo>
<title
>Editing, Managing, and Playing Audio in &kubuntu;</title>
&legalnotice;
<abstract>
<para
>This document is about the various audio features that &kubuntu; offers. </para>
</abstract>
</articleinfo>

<sect1 id="playing-cds" status="complete">
<title
>Playing CDs</title>
<para
><application
>Amarok</application
> is the default application for playing audio <acronym
>CDs</acronym
> in &kubuntu;. When a <acronym
>CD</acronym
> is inserted, &kubuntu; will recognize it and display default options. To hear the content with <application
>Amarok</application
>, select <guilabel
>Play Audio CD with Amarok</guilabel
> and then press <guibutton
>OK</guibutton
> button. &kubuntu; can be configured to remember this choice every time a <acronym
>CD</acronym
> is inserted by selecting <guilabel
>Always do this for this type of media</guilabel
>, and pressing <guibutton
>OK</guibutton
>. <application
>Amarok</application
> also offers other useful features. If connected to the Internet, <application
>Amarok</application
> will retrieve <acronym
>CD</acronym
> artist, title, and track data from <ulink url="http://freedb.org"
>freedb.org</ulink
>. It will also download the lyrics for the current selection if they are available by choosing the <guilabel
>Lyrics</guilabel
> tab. Other Artist information can be found on <ulink url="http://www.wikipedia.org"
>Wikipedia</ulink
> by selecting the <guilabel
>Artist</guilabel
> tab. </para>
</sect1>

<sect1 id="editing-audio" status="complete">
<title
>Editing Audio </title>

<para
>For editing audio files, &kubuntu; provides <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
>, a full-featured, free and open source software application. To use <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
>: </para>
<procedure>
<step>
<para
>Install <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
> from the package manager (Muon) </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Run <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
> by going to &menuaudacity;. </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Detailed instructions (including tutorials and weblinks) on using <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
> can be found by going to <menuchoice
> <guimenu
>Help</guimenu
> <guisubmenu
>Contents</guisubmenu
> </menuchoice
> from within <application
>Sound Editor (Audacity)</application
>. </para>
</step>
</procedure>
</sect1>

<sect1 id="managing-audio">
<title
>Managing and Organizing Music Files</title>

<para
>In addition to being the default music player in &kubuntu;, <application
>Amarok</application
> is also helpful for managing music collections. Start <application
>Amarok</application
> by going to &menuamarok;. </para>
<para
>Another useful <application
>Amarok</application
> feature is the built-in ID3 tag editor for editing the metadata of music files. For more information on the editor, please refer to <ulink type="help" url="help:/amarok"
>Amarok Handbook</ulink
>. </para>
</sect1>

<sect1 id="iPod">
<title
>iPod Connectivity via Amarok</title>

<para
>Another exciting <application
>Amarok</application
> feature is the ability to play music directly from an iPod or other portable device. <application
>Amarok</application
> can also be used to transfer music files to and from an iPod. Please refer to the <ulink type="help" url="help:/amarok"
>Amarok Handbook</ulink
> for more information on transferring and managing iPod media files. </para>
</sect1>

<sect1 id="burning" status="complete">
<title
>Burning Audio CDs</title>
<procedure>
<step>
<para
>When a blank <acronym
>CD</acronym
> is inserted, &kubuntu; will recognize it, mount it, and then ask what to do with the <acronym
>CD</acronym
>. Choose <guilabel
>Create an audio CD with K3B</guilabel
> and press <guibutton
>OK</guibutton
>. This will open <application
>K3b</application
>, the <acronym
>CD</acronym
> and <acronym
>DVD</acronym
> Kreator, and provide various options. </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>To start <application
>K3b</application
> manually, go to <guilabel
>Kickoff Application 
> Applications 
> Multimedia 
> </guilabel
><application
>Disk Burning (K3b)</application
>. </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Select <guilabel
>New Audio CD Project</guilabel
> in the <guilabel
>New Project</guilabel
> dropdown menu. </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Inside <application
>K3b</application
>, browse and select the tracks to be ripped. Then drag and drop the tracks in the white area at the bottom of the <application
>K3b</application
> window. <mediaobject>
<imageobject>
<imagedata fileref="../help:/images/C/k3b.png" format="PNG"/>
</imageobject>
<textobject>
<phrase
>K3b project window</phrase>
</textobject>
<caption>
<para
>K3b project window</para>
</caption>
</mediaobject>
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Press the <guibutton
>Burn</guibutton
> button when all tracks have been chosen. </para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>Several options are offered inside the <guilabel
>Burning</guilabel
> window. <itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para
><guilabel
>Writing</guilabel
> - provides choices related to burning an image from the files selected in the previous step. <note
><title
>No MP3 Support by Default</title>
<para
><acronym
>MP3</acronym
> is a protocol restricted by patents. In order to use it with <application
>K3b</application
>, please refer to the information at the end of this procedure. </para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para
><guilabel
>Image</guilabel
> - provides settings to write an image to a location on the disk using the selected tracks. </para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para
><guilabel
>CD-Text</guilabel
> - provides input fields to add artists and title tags to the CD. </para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para
><guilabel
>Advanced</guilabel
> - provides a choice to normalize volume if the selected tracks have different volume levels. </para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para
>When all settings have been reviewed, press the <guibutton
>Burn</guibutton
> button. </para>
</step>
</procedure>
<para
><application
>K3b</application
> can extract audio files to the following formats: <itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para
><emphasis role="strong"
>Ogg Vorbis</emphasis
> - Ogg Vorbis is a patent-free lossy audio compression format which usually produces higher quality and greater compression than MP3. See the <ulink url="http://www.vorbis.com/faq/"
>Vorbis website</ulink
> for more information. </para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para
><emphasis role="strong"
>FLAC</emphasis
> - The Free Lossless Audio Codec, <acronym
>FLAC</acronym
>, can compress audio files up to 50% without removing any information from the audio stream. For more information on this format, see the <ulink url="http://flac.sourceforge.net/"
>FLAC homepage</ulink
> on sourceforge.net. </para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para
><emphasis role="strong"
>WAV</emphasis
> - Wav is an uncompressed audio format that can be compressed into OGG Vorbis or a codec of your choice. It is often edited in applications such as Audacity before being compressed. </para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>
<para
>CD audio files can be extracted to the proprietary, non-free <emphasis role="strong"
>MP3</emphasis
> lossy format by using the <application
>lame</application
> encoder. Please refer to the <ulink type="help" url="help:/kubuntu/add-applications/"
>Adding Applications</ulink
> documentation for help with installing applications such as <application
>lame</application
>. </para>
</sect1>

</article>
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