Some File Server Fun, MC Improvements, and DynDNS

I’ve been playing with CrushFTP 5 over the past few days here, and I have to say, I’m pretty impressed. It has a ton of features, and the Web Interface is quite slick (and completely iOS compatible). I’ve really been quite happy with it so far. If you want to run a file server off of your computer at home (FTP, HTTP, WebDAV, or any of those types of things), you should really check it out. I also had the opportunity to contact the developer via the support web forum. While the web forum itself is a hosted-by-Yahoo deal (ugh), I must say I was impressed with the turnaround time on the response. I got a personal, helpful reply from the application’s developer within 15-20 minutes of posting my question.

That said… My CrushFTP experiment has not been flawless. I first ran into trouble with, I believe, a permissions issue. CrushFTP is a Java application (which makes it beautifully cross-platform), but it really comes with no installer for Windows of any kind. Just a ZIP file and limited instructions. I installed it in my C:\Program Files\ directory, figuring it would live happily there. It seemed to work fine for a while, but the user management screen was a little flaky, sometimes not saving or applying my changes. And it seemed prone to crashiness. Then, last night I went to add a new user, and I found that the whole user management dialog wasn’t working properly at all. I eventually traced this back to permissions issues with the install directory itself. It seemed like writes to many (but not all) of the configuration files was not working correctly, so changes were getting… I don’t know, weird. It was saving a TON of “temp” configuration files to it’s working directory, and apparently eventually broke down completely. I’ve since reinstalled it elsewhere out of the system-owned Program Files directory, and it seems to be working better than ever now. I am also having a bit of trouble installing my SSL Certificate on it (to allow the HTTPS mode to not use a self-signed Cert with all of the user pain that entails), but I think my helpful reply from the developer is going to make short(ish) work of that problem, once I get a chance to implement it.

In related developments, I also spent some time setting up a “real” account at DynDNS. Since I’m actually using quite a few little services off of my network at home, it is nice to have a reliable FQDN to use. I’m not going to link it here, because none of you can get access anyway. Setting up the DynDNS account was a bit of a comedy of errors entailing two separate product purchases and then order cancelling. I kept picking the wrong product or entering the wrong info (only to find that you couldn’t fix the problem without deleting and re-adding the service). All-in-all I’m pleased, but it took a bit of learning about the intricacies of setting DNS records properly. But, I got it all sorted out.

Lastly, the great folks over at J. River have added something wonderful to Media Center 15 recently: tagging changes made by Library Server Clients now automatically sync back to the server (if this option is enabled). I immediately jumped onto the Library Server bandwagon, and switched all my MC clients over to that system. Up until this change, I had been sharing my library via direct access on the network share (which meant that only the “first” copy to open the database was granted read/write access). This was manageable, but did mean I needed to actually walk down to the basement (or fire up VNC) occasionally when I’d accidentally left a copy of MC running down there.

I’ve been using it now since the very first build that offered it. There are still a few rough edges, but I’m overall quite pleased. It is very nice to be able to access my entire media library remotely via the Internet. Music and Images work great. Video…. Less so, but it is passable for what it is. I generally use AirVideo for remote video watching anyway, though I do wish that placeshifting video playback was as seamless on MC as it is with AirVideo. I think only having to support very small screen sizes probably helps quite a bit, though.

More importantly, no more worrying about what copy of MC was opened first, or which one was in read-only mode. If we’re watching something on the HTPC, I can be tagging music files or other stuff on my lap at the same time. Great new development, but that’s not all. The On Screen Display used for full-screen playback has improved dramatically in recent builds, the search and tagging methodology got a bit of an overhaul and has smart suggestions now, and they’ve continued to work towards DLNA perfection. Plus, there was this gem from the current build’s change log:

1. Internal: If logging itself causes a slowdown, it will be logged.

Classic!

Fair Warning: I’m a huge J. River Media Center fanboy. If you take your media collection seriously, it is absolutely worth the effort to go try it out. There’s a 30-day free trial. It is audiophile quality, wonderful for large video libraries, and absolutely perfect for anyone who obsesses over their media metadata. Nothing else even compares. I’ll eventually do a full write up on it and how I use it for my home media consumption and management, but not tonight. But, seriously… Check it out. And then come visit the user forums (called Interact) and say hello. There’s also a great community over there.

You’ll Not Feel the Drowning

Wow. It is moist today (and was torrential yesterday).

While you are toweling off, go and download the new track from the Decemberists. There’s nothing useful here anyway.

Rain, rain go away.

Yesterday

So, finally, we had A New Hope. But now it is two years later and the Empire Struck Back. Unfortunately, now all we have to look forward to are the fucking Ewoks.