Create DVD on which videos are played sequentially

This is a followup to my previous post on DVD Authoring with tovid on Linux. One thing I really don't like is that after one video is played, it always jump back to the menu. My desired behavior is playing the next video instead unless it is the last one. (Here is one example: I create DVD for videos taken at classes. Each sub-menu on my DVD corresponds to a lesson and contains all videos from that lesson. )

To achieve the desired behavior, I have two choices:
1) group videos from a lesson together so that they will be played one after another but I lose the chapter markers.
2) edit the XML. Each of my video (the proper term is PGC) has a post-action, which is written as "call menu;" by tovid. I simply need to change them to "jump title X;" where X refers to the number of the next video.

My Ubuntu Experience: VCD/DVD Authoring

At first I thought about trying DeVeDe but I read that DeVeDe is incompatible with the MPlayer shipped with Ubuntu Feisty Fawn so I tried tovid instead.

I) Installation: follow the instructions from here.

II) Start the App: simply type tovidgui under any writable directory (e.g. your home)

[1. Layout]: you add videos here. The simplest VCD or DVD requires 1 menu and all videos could go under the menu. Name your source and destination files without spaces and underscores if you can.

[2. Encode]: just hit "Start encoding" and let it finish.

[3. Burn]: this is where I ran into trouble. If I simply hit "Start", both VCD and DVD failed.

VCD trouble: the cue and bin files were created successfully. However, when it tried burning them using cdrdao, nothing happened. I had to kill that process and repeat the cdrdao command in Terminal. Then it burned the VCD. However, I could only play the resulting disc on computer but not my VCD player. Your mileage may vary.

DVD trouble: again, the files were created successfully. However, when it executed dvdauthor, it does not like the titleset with -noask in the XML. So the solution is re-run the last command right after [2. Encode]: i.e., the makexml command, but take out the -noask option. This will generate a good XML. Then I could hit "Start" under [3. Burn] without problem.

(Link to the official Tovid GUI guide .)

My Ubuntu Experience: 1 Month Anniversary

I have been using Ubuntu on my desktop workstation for one monthly already! I still can't kick the habit of booting to Windows from time to time (See reasons mentioned later) but that's something I'm determine to avoid doing (Ever since I got Frethog and removed it, my anti-virus keeps finding worms, e.g. Winko/auto.exe, which seems to come from the usual suspect, judging by the fact that a number of posts analyzing these worms were written by Chinese experts. Anyway, I digressed)

Let me summarize a few more things I was able to do on Ubuntu successfully since last time:
1) Burn music CD from MP3: simply use Applications -> Sound & Video -> Serpentine. Works like a charm.

2) Remote Login to Windows. Yes I know there is RDP for Linux but my remote server runs TightVNC. There is no native TightVNC client on Linux but the Java Applet TightVNC Viewer does the job.

3) Mount Windows NTFS directories in Read/Write mode: they are mounted as Read-only by default. The easiest way to mount them as Read/Write is using NTFS Configuration Tool.

4) Mount remote directories in Read/Write mode: if you setup Windows to share a directory on the network, it is accessible using SMB on Linux. These are the steps to mount them permanently and read/writable (Note: VLC could only play remote files on the LAN this way)

Not so successful:
1) SlingPlayer on Wine (link to WineHQ): the sound gets choppy when I work on other windows and the video is grainy as the video tuning wizard refuse to run.

2) VMWare: I ran the free VMWare Converter to create an image of my existing Windows installation but VMWare Server had problem running this image (got a black screen after starting momentarily and then it just quit)

In any case, for day to day web browsing/blogging/e-mail/office app, Ubuntu has done a pretty good job. I heard some people commented that Ubuntu's "budding" relationship with Dell is not very dissimilar to that of Microsoft and IBM and other early PC clone manufacturer! I am not sure if that is a positive comment.

[Update: I ran into this bug (and the solution provided in the same link worked for me) for my SMB mount. An example of STOP_SERVICE line looks like this:
STOP_SERVICES="mysql samba-shares "
(modified from the mysql only line)
]

Baseball All Star Week in SF Part III: The Game

The MVP of the game, Ichiro Suzuki, led off.



Two local All Star, Barry Bonds and Dan Haren, faced off.



Ken Griffey Jr was about to drive Jose Reyes home from 2nd base to score the 1st run of the game.

Baseball All Star Week in SF Part II: Home Run Derby

Vladimir Guerrero, before hitting his winning home run in the final round.

Baseball All Star Week in SF Part I: Fan Fest

Charlie Brown @ Moscone Center

Watch DVD on portable device

I just found another use of my Pocket PC: watch DVD. I got my instructions from the always helpful VideoHelp.com. Of course the ripped AVI will work on any computer. You could download AutoGK from here.