Posted by Admiral on 2010-03-18 04:44:32

This post is pretty much only for other Mac owners out there Googling for a super-fat Universal binary of LAME 3.98.3 for Mac OSX 10.5 and greater. What do I mean by super-fat? I mean that I compiled it for PPC, PPC64, i386 and X86_64 architectures. None of the previous versions of any LAME binaries that I've come across seemed to have 64 bit versions in there, so for those of you want it, this version has it.

For those not familiar with the LAME MP3 encoder, you can get a pretty good idea of what it is over at Wikipedia.

Why did I bother compiling and posting this? Because about a month ago when the LAME project released the latest version of their encoder, it only came out as source. Now, typically, someone else out there is kind enough to compile a Universal binary of both the command line executable and the dynamic library for each version that comes out. This time though, it has been about a month since the release and I haven't been able to find one online yet, so I decided I'd bake one myself. I also happened to need a PPC version of it for my aging 12 inch G4 laptop, and I didn't really see any easier way of getting that.

Here's the link to obtain it:

lame-3.98.3_universal_mac_os_x_10.5_plus_64bit.zip

Who can use this? Any Mac user running OSX 10.5 or greater who wants the latest version of the "lame" command line program, or the dynamically linked shared library "libmp3lame.dylib" based on the LAME 3.98.3 source, released on 2010-02-27.

How does one make use of either one these files?

• Users of iTunes-LAME can right click on that program and show it's package contents, navigate to the "Resources" folder and replace the "lame" executable in there with the one that I've compiled.
• Users of Audacity can use "libmp3lame.dylib" to enable Audacity to export MP3s by going to their Preferences, going to the "Libraries" tab and using the "locate" button to select this version of the file.
• Users of other applications that require the dylib will be able to take advantage of this new version of LAME by copying the file to "/usr/local/lib/libmp3lame.dylib" and chmodding it to 755.
• One can learn how to use the command line version of the "lame" program by simply dragging it's icon to an open Terminal window and typing "--help" at the end of that line and hitting return.

I'd like to make a quick shout out to Gee over at his blog, and thank him for the excellent post he made explaining how to use the Mac OSX command line to cross compile for other processor architectures. I'd not have been able to figure that out nearly as quickly without finding that post.

In case anyone's interested, here are the command line arguments I used to configure the LAME 3.98.3 source and compile a super-fat Universal binary version of it.

./configure --disable-dependency-tracking CFLAGS="-arch ppc -arch ppc64 -arch i386 -arch x86_64" LDFLAGS="-arch ppc -arch ppc64 -arch i386 -arch x86_64" make

I promised myself that I'd never make a post on Nuclear Pixel 5 without at least some kind of pretty looking imagery in it, I created the above candyfied version of the LAME MP3 encoder logo. In the spirit of open source and awesomeness, anyone interested in playing with the photoshop document I used to create this version of the logo can download it here. (Original logo source: Wikipedia)

Enjoy!

Tags: audio | download | lame | mac | mp3 | open source | universal

Posted by Admiral on 2010-03-09 23:58:16

HOLY CRAP! DINOSAURS ALL UP IN MY HOUSE!!!!
No, seriously! I'm not kidding! Dinosaurs happened! Two of them! A Red one and a Green one! In my own front room! On my birthday! I had no idea this would happen! I was just so excited that I just kept yelling 'WOOOOAAAAAAAHHHH!' over and over again for about 30 minutes! I didn't even know that they MADE a red one!

About a year or two ago when I first saw Spike the Ultra Dinosaur, I almost couldn't believe that such an awesome toy was on the market yet! That same night, I went home and updated my Amazon Wish List thusly:

"It would ROCK so hard to have one of these. It would rock even more if I could have 2 of these. One to keep original, the other to control with my own Arduino Programming; Just imagine, I could program my own dance moves for it!"

Yeah. That's right. Adruino. Robot Dinosaur. Dance moves. When I finally have the time to sit down and start hacking one of these two, there will be very few boundaries to just how much awesome I'm going to be able to derive from this toy. I plan on programming my own whole collection of behaviors in on one of these guys, and from that point... well, let's just say that I'm hoping that this will not be my only bout of experimentation with robotics.

Boy, when Shelley, my love, my sweetheart, told me that she had a big surprise waiting for me at home when I got off of work today, she wasn't kidding! I had no idea she had gone so far out of her way to make this day so special for me! I mean, one would have been FANTASTIC, but two Dinosaurs? My goodness! She sure knows how to spoil a kid. I MEAN, A MAN. I just got another year older. A man. Yeah. (Tee hee... Dinosaurs!)

Shelley had also contacted some of my friends, and invited them over for the event. Adam Heath, Dmitri Carapezza (NSFW!) and Influx were able to show up and experience some of this dinosaur-y awesomeness. Everyone had a turn at making the dinosaurs stomp and tromp around my front room, eat miscellaneous odds and ends on the floor (like playstation controllers), then finally, get themselves stuck in corners(sadly, these dinosaurs have no reverse arrows on their controllers). It was the most prehistoric fun I'd had in ages!

The rest of the celebration was very nice and relaxing. Everyone ate food until everyone agreed that everyone had eaten far too much food. Except me. I was still so super stoked to have two new dinosaurs that I had little to no interest in eating. Which is okay, because my Boss had been really nice and taken everyone in the office out to a buffet for lunch to celebrate my birthday, so I wasn't at a loss for calories at all. Man, talk about great days!

After everyone else took off and Shelley went to bed, Adam and I stayed up a bit later and took some photos of my awesome new toys/pets.

In other news

---

I have updated Picture-Rama 2 once more. Head on over to the "Photos / PR2" page and download a copy to see some of the other recent activities I've been participating in.

Now, usually, with each significant update to Picture-Rama 2 that I make, I like to pick a recent photo that I've taken to represent the collection. I even mentally had a runner-up for that photo, BEFORE TONIGHT HAPPENED! OH YEAH! Anyway, I thought I'd just share that photo with you now, as it won't likely be seen any other way. This photo happens to be of two particularly great Fortune Cookie fortunes that a friend and I got at lunch recently. The first fortune reads:

"We don't know who we are until we see what we can do."

I don't know about you, but I find that piece particularly inspiring. The second fortune read:

"Every one has a photographic memory. Some just don't have film."

Every time I look at that one, I end up having quite a few laughs. I hope it gives you a case of the LOLs as well.

Anyway... it seems I'm overdue on heading off to bed. Adios for now!

Tags: dinosaurs | personal | picture-rama 2 update