Making a better audio shortcode for WordPress


The Logo for WordPress.

If you use WordPress, you can get a fairly basic embedded audio player by using the audio shortcode: [​audio mp3="/path/to/file.mp3"] I didn't particularly like how it was styled so - because WordPress is so hackable - I changed it! Now my embedded audio looks like this: 🔊 Location Based QR Codes - Introducing http://xmts.mobi/🎤 edent 💾 Download this audio file. It gets a nice border, a title, displays any attached image, and uses the native HTML5 audio element. Here's the code …

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Why don't video calls have stereo audio?


Headphone box.

This is probably me being a bit dense. I'm on a video call with two other people. Alice is on the left of my screen, Bob is on the right. Why isn't the audio in stereo? (Zoom lets you send stereo audio - but only of you have a stereo microphone. Whereas I'm talking abound individuals sending mono and receiving to stereo.) Every video conference system I've used delivers the audio in mono. That's fine when one person is speaking, but gets really muddy and confusing when multiple people are…

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Review: Aftershokz Titanium Bone Conducting Headphones


Set of black headphones.

Welcome to the world of endless conference calls! My last pair of headphones broke after a few months of constant use, so I decided to treat myself to a new, sturdier pair. These Aftershokz are SEVENTY QUID! Which is about £40 more than I usual spend on a pair of cans. But these use magic to get the sound into your head. They make your cheekbones vibrate and that sends the music direct to your eardrums. This means your ears can still receive outside sounds. Handy if you're jogging and don't …

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Podcasts on Floppy Disk


Podcast on a floppy disk.

An old 3.5 inch floppy disk holds 1.44 MB of data. According to my calculations, that's 1,424 KB blocks. For a total of 1,458,176 Bytes. Once formatted as FAT, you end up with 1,457,664 Bytes of storage. But how much audio can a floppy hold? (Here I mean wave based audio of human speech. It's trivial to fit more in using MIDI or speech synthesis.) I'm going to use "A Podcast Of Unnecessary Detail" to experiment with, as this blogpost also has too much detail. The podcast is a 39MB MP3,…

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Inside a £30 record player


A circuit board.

I accidentally bought a load of vinyl records. So I decided to buy the cheapest, shittiest, turntable possible. This is the E1372. Made by Jia Yin King Technologies. This is sold under a variety of names and costs about £30 including postage from China. It's a plastic shell, motor, and ADC (Analogue to Digital Converter), which is powered via USB. It is the cheapest brand new player I could find. Here's a disassembly walkthough, an analysis of how well it works, and some Linux info. …

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Review: OpenEar Trio Bluetooth headphones


Flat headphones sat outside my ears.

This is a curious set of headphones. The OpenEar Trio by Shenzen Alex Technology. They're completely flat and designed to sit outside the ears. They're designed so you can hear your surroundings. If you're outside exercising, it's useful to hear cars creeping up on you. If you're on a conference call, being able to hear the doorbell ringing is essential. These are super-lightweight. Once on, it's easy to forget you're wearing them. They're a discreet colour - rather than the garish dayglo …

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Review: Yanmai USB Microphone


An upright microphone.

We're in the age of endless conference calls. So I decided to spruce up my audio hardware. Sadly, I don't have the budget for a professional podcaster's microphone. Luckily, I was sent this cheapo model to review. And, I'm pleased to say, it's pretty good! Comes with a reasonably long USB cord, and a pop-shield. The mic is suspended in a little elastic harness so it doesn't pick up vibrations. It's fully adjustable - which is nice. And a has a removable spoffle. There's no LED to show if …

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Wanted - audio output based on screen output for Linux


OS displaying a long list of options.

I think what I'm asking for is impossible... I have a Linux laptop with built in speakers and an external monitor with speakers. The laptop connects to the screen via HDMI. I have my Linux desktop set up for dual screens. If I drag a window from one screen to the other, I want the sound to follow the window. Is this possible? A bit more detail When I have YouTube running on my monitor, I want the sound to come from the monitor. When I have a video conference running on my laptop screen,…

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Removing default metadata from .opus files


Binary code displayed on a screen.

I'm trying to create some ridiculously tiny audio files. The sort where every single byte matters. I've encoded a small sample. But the opusenc tool automatically adds metadata - even if you don't specify any. Using the amazing Mutagen Python library I was able to completely strip out all the metadata! import mutagen mutagen.File("example.opus").delete() It edits the file immediately - so be careful! But what is it actually doing? I wanted to understand a bit more - so let's go…

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Bouncing all my music down to Opus


Headphone box.

As much as technology marches forward, there are two truths I need to accept. File transfer speeds are always going to be slower that I can be bothered to wait My ears aren't going to get any better at hearing For years, I ripped all of my music as FLAC. I collected ridiculously high-resolution audio files. I devoured disk drive space for surround sound soundtracks. "One day," I thought, "I'll have an amazing audio system to play these back on." The reality is that I spend most of my time …

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USB-C powered Bluetooth Headphones - the Life Q10 from Anker


Headphone box.

I've been waiting for these for a long time. Terence Eden is on Mastodon@edent#LazyWeb can anyone find me some Bluetooth headphones which recharge via USB-C.All the C ones I've found are wired.❤️ 0💬 3🔁 017:18 - Fri 04 November 2016 Anker, through its sub-brand SoundCore - have released the "Life Q10" headphones. They're usually about £45 - but Amazon had an instant coupon which took them down to £33. Bargain! They're exactly what I want in over-ear headphones. They're large enough for my flap…

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HOWTO: Split WAV and CUE files on Linux


A cute penguin.

Mostly notes to myself, as a follow-up to this older post. This is a 3-step process. Add the file to an MKV Use MKVmerge: mkvmerge "audio.wav" --chapters "audio.cue" -o "audio.mkv" You can see that chapter names have been added to the .mkv if you run ffmpeg -i or mkvinfo. Split the MKV by chapter This generates one file per chapter: mkvmerge -D -S "audio.mkv" --split chapters:all -o "split-%02d.mkv" The -D switch means no video will…

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