It looks like the latest version of Sparks!'s mplayer (needed to record radio) wasn't Athalon friendly. Download and Unzip this file and save "mplayer.exe" into "C:/Program Files/BlogMatrix Sparks!/". The next version of Sparks! will ship with this version.
What's the Aha!, you ask? This version of mplayer can record Ogg Vorbis streams, such as this one (please test it for us!). Note that the resulting file is still stored as an MP3!
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.18-beta for Windows is
available. Here's what's new/fixed:
Features:
Feature #359. Must handle multiple attachments per entry
Sparks! now handles multiple attachments with a single weblog/podcast entry. Note that Sparks! also already identifies media files in entries, whether or not they have RSS 2 enclosure tags so this is really quite useful.
Feature #360. "Play in Sparks!" should initiate download
Feature #361. Display a "Download Complete" dialog when downloading is finished
Feature #381. Make command to update weblogs
Select a weblog, podcaster, category or root node and type "command:Check" in the search field.
Bug Fixes:
Bug #368. Newly added OPML nodes should be created selected
Bug #380. Radio: Sparks! doesn't record on subsequent days
A big fix
Bug #383. Open in new window button doesn't always work
Bug #384. Sparks crashes on close
You probably only saw this if you're reading massive numbers of weblogs.
Bug #386. Podcasts end up in Weblogs
Bug #387. Double click in directory doesn't Subscribe
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.17-beta for Windows is
available. Here's what's new/fixed:
Features:
#364 Subscribing from OPML should select new subscription afterwards
#366 New entries should be bold
This makes a huge difference in usability
#370 Clicking in Location Bar should select whole thing
#373 Context Menu for Location Area
Try right clicking in the Location Area above the browser, particularly if you're
reading a blog or a blgo entry.
#365 Better indicate current download or recording
The current download is now indicated with red text.
Bug Fixes:
#367 When synchronizing, podcasts are being added to My Weblogs
#374 Ensure "Automatically Download" is turned off
This shouldn't affect most people but if you're finding everything is downloading, this will help.
Also try typing command:AutoDownloadClear in the search field.
#375 "Discovered" attachments should never be automatically downloaed
Sparks! not only recognizes "enclosure" attachments, it also looks for any
media objects embedded in the text of the Podcast. This can only be explicitly
downloaded with a right-click action.
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.15-beta for Windows is
available. Here's what's new
OPML Synchronization, as described here is implemented. Briefly, not only can you add the blogs from an OPML file on the Internet but Sparks! will also track future changes to that directory, offering you the option of deleting or adding files
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.13-beta for Windows is
available.
The Download Manager is gone — all its functions are now integrated directly
UI simplification; in particular, there is no seperate concept of a "Playlist" for Podcasts and Radio Stations — the Playlist is the Category the podcaster/radio station is placed in. We will be doing some further modifications to Sparks! to ensure that the default playlist is more sensibly
Some significant performance enhancements (we've been testing with 2500 blogs in Sparks!). We'll have another post about this soon. These changes involve slight behavioural changes which we hope aren't too intrusive — for example, when using the "Next Blog" button (which you should be — this is your friend for reading blogs quickly) the entries aren't opened.
Many of the attachment related "cabinets", such as "Recent Downloads" are gone. The search list takes care of this functionality now in a much nicer way.
The "iTunes" and "Windows Media Player" items are much more functional. What's remaining is functions to clean up deleted items from the Playlists.
A lot of non-used or obsolete functions have been disabled internally, increasing performance and reducing resource needs
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.11-beta for Linux is
available. This beta catches the Linux version up with the Windows releases during the last month. You can read about how to install this on Linux here.
Notes:
We've only tested this one Red Hat Fedora Core 3
We are very interested in your feedback on this Linux version. In particular, we'd like to know more about moving the downloaded attachments from Sparks! into Linux media players.
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.11-beta for Macintosh (OS 10.3) is
available. This beta catches the Macintosh up with the Windows releases during the last month.
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.10-beta for Windows is
available.
This release mainly focused on UI issues and in particular the items being discussed here in our forums. The main change is the search list above the browser that works in much the same manner that iTunes does. We'll have some screenshots later this morning.
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.9-beta for Windows is
available. We highly recommend you upgrade, especially if you are using 1.7.7-beta.
The following changes have been implemented:
The "License" field works again. Our apologies for this.
You can now record up to 8 hours. Make sure you either have lots of disk space free or you break the recording into smaller parts
This version works on Windows 98. We've confirmed (and in fact, did several intermediate builds to make sure)
A small number of you had problems recording programs, where the conversion would fail at the last minute. This was due to a bug in the Python libraries and has been fixed.
Timezones are now extensively supported in radio recording. Go check it out
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.8-beta for Windows is
available . We highly recommend you upgrade, especially if you are using 1.7.7-beta.
The following changes have been implemented:
Recording on schedule works again (!)
This will probably work on Windows 98 and Windows ME. Testing is needed but we're very hopefully
The various cabinets under Blogs, Podcasts and Radio Stations won't appear unless there is something in them
There's been a lot of working on improving the quality of the logging
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.7-beta for Windows is
available .
The following changes have been implemented:
Radio recordings can be divided into multiple chunks
The file extension for the final output radio recording can be changed (see the Advanced Encoding panel). This will be very useful if you're trying to use FAAC
Sparks! can deal with any unicode webpage or rss feed
OPML can be imported through the Import menu
The browser location bar has a "subscribe" button
The browser location bar reflects what's actually shown in the browser window
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.7.4-beta for Windows is
available here.
If you're running an older version of Sparks! we suggest you upgrade to this version.
The following changes have been implemented:
The radio recorder will restart and/or retry if it cannot connect or if the network dies during recording. The parameters for this is controlled by the Advanced button next to the Bitrate field in the recording schedule. The documentation for this feature is here (more coming today)
It is possible now to manually configure the programs used for recording Internet streams or creating the final output files (i.e. it's possible to write MPEG-4 rather than MP3s). More details will be forthcoming on this feature.
The MP3 ID3 information written with recordings can be easily changed (using the Advanced button)
The default values for all Advanced Encoding can be changed by "My Radio Stations > right click > Advanced Encoding Defaults"
Sparks! is a first class blog reading application.
Import your OPML blogroll using "My Bloggers > right-click > Subscribe..."
Use the green >| arrow button to go to the next unread blog. All unread entries will be listed.
Use the green > arrow button to go to the next unread blog entry.
There's a cool new "blogger" icon
The "Recent Recordings" and "Recent Downloads" cabinet that was under "My Radio Stations" et al. has been moved to a single cabinet called "Recent Podcasts and Recordings" at the top level. This cabinet contains all the attachments downloaded in the last 48 hours
The browser has a status bar
There is a built in media player for audio and video files. Video bloggers take note! Use the two buttons next to the location field (in the upper right corner) to play externally
The next release will focus on BitTorrent and improving Podcast reception.
Sparks! now installs in its own directory, independent of Jäger. We are going to remove radio recording from Jäger and let Sparks! specialize in this. The 1.6 numbering will remain for Jäger versions; 1.7 will be the beta s for Sparks.
The My Directories and My Subscriptions notebook is now gone. Everything is in the one tree control.
Sparks! is now a first rate weblog reader. Use the "My Bloggers" to store your weblogs.
Import your old blogs into Sparks! by using OPML. We'll have a proper UI function for this soon, but for now just right-click on "My Bloggers", choose "Subscribe..." and select the OPML file.
You can move weblogs back and forth between My Bloggers and My Podcasters by drag and drop.
There is a control bar on the bottom which we will explain in another post. The most important button is the green triangle in the lower-left corner which will bring you to the next unread posting.
There is a search area available but its just for show! It's not quite finished yet.
The web browser has a location area above it showing what you are looking at
BlogMatrix Sparks! 1.6.25-beta available for Mac OS 10.3 is available here.
This release includes everything in the Windows 1.6.24-beta releases plus a few more minor bug fixes.
"audio/mpeg", "audio/x-mpegurl" and ".pls" streams are now recognized.
The tree is correctly resorted after renaming categories or blogs/radio stations
Under the Radio Stations folder there is a "Recent Recordings" folder; under "Podcasters" there is a "Recent Downloads" folder. These folders contain all successful downloads in the last 48 hours, the most recent at the top of the list
Video attachments get their own movie clip icon. Jäger and Sparks! have always been able to deal with video attachments, contrary to what this article implies.
"Update Read" and "Move all to Read" to keep things nice and tidy
If a radio station cannot be found, a meaningful error message is displayed
Known bugs:
The "iTunes" icon is pretty well useless. We'll fix this up for the next release.
When submitting bugs via "Help > Report a Bug" it's almost impossible to get log file attached (due to weirdness in Safari)
(which you should be — this is your friend for reading blogs quickly) the entries aren't opened.
