Updates: ffDiaporama 1.2, GNOME Pie 0.5, SMPlayer 0.7.1

ffDiaporama is a multi-platform application for creating videos from photos or movie clips. It supports various transition effects, titles/annotations, music and more.

ffDiaporama 1.2 introduces tags and chapters as well as lossless rendering. There are also more supported formats (flac, wma, etc.), performance improvements and bug fixes. Check out THIS page for a complete changelog.

Download ffDiaporama (There are no Ubuntu 12.04 packages yet)

GNOME Pie, a slick circular application launcher for Linux, has reached version 0.5. The new version introduces slice labels (a caption for each slice), making the slices more discoverable. The labels can be enabled/disabled from the GNOME Pie preferences.

Other changes:

• a new theme
• a wobble-effect was added to all existing themes
• sub-pies are now opened at their parent’s location
• slices which open another pie have a little arrow in front of their name, indicating that’s just a link but no final saction.

For more info, check out the official GNOME Pie 0.5 release announcement.

To install GNOME Pie in Ubuntu, use the following commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:simonschneegans/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-pie

For other Linux distributions, see the GNOME Pie page @ Github.

SMPlayer 0.7.1 has been released with improved YouTube support: the previous version has added support for playing YouTube videos and the latest SMPlayer 0.7.1 comes with a new tool that lets you search for YouTube videos too. This is done through an external application called SMTube, which should now be installed automatically with SMPlayer.

Other changes in the latest SMPlayer 0.7.1 include:

• Now it's possible to change the opensubtitles server
• By default the screenshots are saved in the user's pictures folder instead of the SMPlayer's config folder
• bug fixes

To install the latest SMPlayer 0.7.1 in Ubuntu, use the following commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rvm/smplayer
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install smplayer

For other Linux distributions and Windows, see the SMPlayer download page.


There were also some recent updates in the WebUpd8 PPAs, like Minitube 0.7.1 or gThumb 2.14.2 - check out ppa.webupd8.org for WebUpd8 PPAs updates.

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Updates: Audacious 3.2, Gnome Pie 0.4, Xnoise 0.1.31

Audacious 3.2

Audacious 3.2 has finally been released. You probably already know what's new since Audacious 3.2 beta was already available in our unstable PPA, but here's the changelog again, just in case:

• New music library plugin which lets you search your whole music collection and easily create playlists.
• MPRIS v2 support which allows Audacious to integrate with the Ubuntu Sound Menu or GNOME Shell (via extensions like GNOME Shell Mediaplayer).
• GTK interface improvements: a new button to toggle the new quick search on/off, buttons to close and add new playlist tabs, a drop-down menu to enable and disable visualization plugins, and a menu item to remove unavailable files from the playlist
• Many changes related to handling large playlists (tens of thousands of entries) efficiently
• Startup time, memory usage, and disk writes reduced signigicantly

To install the latest stable Audacious 3.2 in Ubuntu 11.10 or 12.04 from our main PPA, use the commands below:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install audacious

Gnome Pie 0.4

Gnome Pie 0.4, a slick application launcher, has been released a couple of days ago and the new version brings support for GTK3 as well as a new settings dialog which makes it much easier to add new pies and slices. Check out the video below to see the new settings dialog in action:

Unfortunately, there are a few issues in this release:

• if there's a modal window with overlay scrollbars, the dialog is not modal anymore
• the Ubuntu AppIndicator didn't show up for me in this release, although there is a regular systray icon. If this occurs for you too and you haven't whitelisted the systray in Ubuntu, here's how to access the settings: after running GNOME Pie for the first time, run it again and the settings dialog should pop up. Update: the bug has been fixed and the AppIndicator works again.

To install Gnome Pie 0.4 in Ubuntu, use the commands below:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:simonschneegans/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-pie

More info about Gnome Pie 0.4 @ http://www.simonschneegans.de/?p=503

Xnoise 0.1.31

Xnoise Media Player, a lightweight audio/video player that uses a tracklist centric design, has reached version 0.1.31 and the major change is that it has finally been ported to GTK3. A complete list of changes can be found here.

Install Xnoise in Ubuntu 11.04 or 11.10 (there's also an Ubuntu 10.10 version in the PPA, but it's quite old) using the following commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:shkn/xnoise
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install xnoise

thanks to / via: dmtlsv, Simon Schneegans, Lffl.org

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Gnome Pie 0.3 Released With Mouse Bindings, More

Gnome Pie, an application launcher with some really cool effects, has reached version 0.3. The new version brings a much requested feature: mouse bindings, so you can bind "pies" to any mouse button. To assign a mouse button to a pie, open the Gnome Pie settings and on the Pies tab, click on the "Command" field next to a pie, then click the mouse button you want to assign for that pie.

Note: Don't bind a "pie" to your left or right mouse buttons even if you activate "delayed bindings". There is a bug that will make left/right mouse click to stop working!

If you haven't seen Gnome Pie in action yet, check out THIS video.

Other changes in Gnome Pie 0.3:

• Turbo bindings: you can select if the pie should automatically close when the hotkey is released. To activate it, double click on the key binding ("Command" column) and select "Turbo mode".
• Delayed bindings: adds a delay before opening a "pie". This is useful if for instance you want to assign the left or right mouse buttons to a pie: if you enable delayed bindings, you can execute normal left/right mouse clicks, but if you hold it down for a while, a pie will open instead.
• A new slice group which displays open windows
• new elementary theme
• less memory usage
• bug fixes

New elementary theme

Also, starting with this version, the Gnome Pie PPA provides Ubuntu 12.04 Precise Pangolin packages too.

To use the new Window List slice, open the Gnome Pie settings and on the Pies tab, right click and select "Add new Pie". Then, assign a keyboard shortcut for the new pie (by clicking on the "Command" field). Now right click the newly created pie and select "Add new slice" and for the new slice, under "Action type" select "Slice group" and under "Command", select Window List.

This seems a bit hard to configure, but it actually only requires a few clicks. Simon says he'll implement a more intuitive configuration gui in the future so creating new pies should be a lot easier.

To install the latest Gnome Pie in Ubuntu, use the commands below:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:simonschneegans/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-pie

If you're not using Ubuntu, get Gnome Pie via GitHub.

Thanks to Simon for the tip / info via simonschneegans.de

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Gnome Pie 0.2 Released

Gnome Pie, a cool launcher we've talked about a few weeks ago has reached version 0.2. The new version lets you control the "pies" using the keyboard: holding ALT, a number is displayed on each slice (and if there are too many slices, letters are assigned too) and pressing that number launches the corresponding application / action:

Other changes in Gnome Pie 0.2:

- you can drag and drop a pie from the configuration dialog to the desktop to create a launcher for that pie:

- fake transparency which should fix ugly background issues on non-composited desktops
- you can assign custom icons to the slices
- a tips slideshow is displayed at the bottom of the pie list in the settings dialog
- libappindicator is no longer a dependency so you can now install it on non-Ubuntu systems. Also, libgnome-menus-3 can be used instead of libgnome-menus
- bug fixes


To install Gnome Pie in Ubuntu Maverick, Natty or Oneiric, use the commands below:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:simonschneegans/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-pie

If you're not using Ubuntu, get Gnome Pie via GitHub.

For more info and a video, check out gnome-pie.simonschneegans.de.

info via simonschneegans.de; thanks to Simon for the tip!

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Gnome Pie: A Cool New Visual Application Launcher

Gnome Pie is an application inspired by a World of Warcraft addon called OPie, that tries to offer a different way of launching applications in Gnome.

Gnome Pie - visual application launcher

Gnome Pie consists on multiple "pies", and each one is triggered by a keyboard shortcut you set.

Each "pie" has it's own role: a category of applications, a media control "pie" (play/pause/previous/next), a "pie" that allows you to control the focused window (maximize, unmaximize, close, etc.) and so on.

You can of course create new or delete some of the already existing pies so you have full control on what each pie does.

With Gnome Pie you can basically add as many commands that can be accessed using keyboard shortcuts to a single "pie" so you only have to remember one keyboard shortcut, which some of you might find useful.

The application is Ubuntu-friendly and comes with a PPA for easy installation, an Ubuntu application indicator and even a Unity theme:

Unity theme

Some of the other built-in themes:

Adwaita theme

Glossy theme

Gnome Pie video

Here is a video I've created with Gnome Pie in action (you can also see all the available themes):

What's missing?

"Pies" can only trigger applications / commands and run various keyboard shortcuts but you can't combine applications with actions - for instance, you can't select a file and perform some command or do any other fancy stuff that's available in Synapse or Kupfer.

Gnome Pie is eye-catching and fun, but is it useful? What do you think?

Install Gnome Pie in Ubuntu

Gnome Pie worked great in my test but before proceeding, please note that Gnome Pie is experimental so it may not work for you, it may crash, etc.

Install Gnome Pie in Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot, 11.04 Natty Narwhal or 10.10 Maverick Meerkat using the following commands:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:simonschneegans/testing
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-pie

If you're not using Ubuntu, you can download Gnome Pie via GitHub.

Once installed, launch Gnome Pie from the menu and then use CTRL + ALT + A to launch some applications, CTRL + Alt + B for bookmarks, etc. You can find all these keyboard shortcuts, change them or create new "pies" in the Gnome Pie Preferences (which you can access via its AppIndicator / Notification Area icon).


To submit a bug or help with the project, check out its GitHub page.

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