fast light recorder

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versione italiana

Flrec (Fast and Light RECorder) is a simple audio hard disk recorder written using FLTK toolkit (www.fltk.org). It can directly record in wav, mp3, ogg-vorbis, ecc. I've written it mainly for my needed, couse there are no other hard disk recorder (free, light and without desktop environment dependencies) that can record in compressed formats with no time limits.

Uses sox (sox.sourceforge.net) that is command line program for sound conversion. Sox must be installed in the system (verify with the command 'sox -h'). Flrec should works on every system where SoX can play and rec (then not on Windows).

Flrec works, but, like most free software, is still under development. The functionality for the future 1.0 version are exposed at the bottom of this page. If some feature you need is not present don't hesitate to write me.

Flrec is free software, released under the terms of GNU GPL.

Screenshot

Download

• Sources v0.13: flrec-0.13.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.12: flrec-0.12.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.11.1: flrec-0.11.1.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.11: flrec-0.11.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.10.1: flrec-0.10.1.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.9.2: flrec-0.9.2.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.8.2: flrec-0.8.2.tar.bz2
• Sources v0.7: flrec-0.7.tar.bz2

• Debian Lenny package v0.13 (thanks to Beni Reber): flrec_0.13-1_i386.deb
• Debian Lenny AMD64 package v0.13 (thanks to Beni Reber): flrec_0.13-1_amd64.deb
• Debian Etch package v0.12 (thanks to Martin Zelaia): flrec_0.12-1etch_i386.deb
• Debian Sarge package v0.11 (thanks to Martin Zelaia): flrec_0.11-1_i386.deb
• Slackware package: flrec-0.10.1-slack.tgz
• RPM Packages for Suse 9 and 10 (thanks to Oc2pus): HERE

• Binary v0.12: flrec0.12.gz
• Binary v0.11.1: flrec0.11.1.gz
• Binary v0.11: flrec0.11.gz

Installation from source package

• Untar the archive: tar xjf flrec-x.x.tar.bz2
• Enter in extracted directory: cd flrec-x.x
• Launch the compilation: make
• Install (as root user): make install

Usage

Main Window:

(in parentheses keyboard shortcut)

1. File open button (CTRL+o)
2. Current file
3. Launch an external mixer (configurable) (CTRL+m)
4. Sample rate of the file
5. Number of channel of the file (mono,stereo,etc)
6. Format of file (currently: ogg,mp3,wav,au,raw,cdr)
7. Elapsed time during recording or playing, or file dimension
8. Stop button (z)
9. lock/unlock recording button (protection) (s)
10. Recording button (x two times)
11. Play button (c two times)
12. Pause button (v)
13. Show settings (CTRL+s)
14. Show effects (CRTL+e)

Mp3 and ogg support depends by sox. If a format is disabled in the format-field then you just not have the support for it in sox. Mp3 format can be supported in read-only mode (only play). To verify your settings read the output of the command `sox -h` (and eventually download libmad and libvorbis and rebuild sox).

Sample rate, mode and format are autoadaptive on file opening. On play, often, sox ignore uncorrect values (sox autorecognition is better than flrec one!).

Effects Window:

1. Exclude effects
2. Apply effects on recording
3. Apply effects on play
4. Apply effects on copy to file (copy starts whith button play on main window)
5. Effects tab. Every effect have his own tab, containing activation button and necessary controls.
6. File selection for copy mode (works like main window one)
7. Swap file name between effects and main windows
8. Copy file name to main window
9. Copy file name from main window

Closing window does NOT exclude effects.

After a copy operation effects panel returns in exclude mode.

You can easily try effects selecting "apply on play" (pfl).

Copy mode can be used to convert files between supported formats.

Modify effects during a operation (rec o play) have no effect. Effect applied are those selected when the operation starts.

Settings Window:

1. In Device: path of record device (/dev/dsp works with both OSS and ALSA)
2. Out Device: path of play device (same of input for half duplex board)
3. Type: ossdsp for /dev/dsp, alsa for /dev/snd/pcm..., sunau for sun hardware.
4. Max Freq: Maximum sampling rate. 48000 is a rasonable value. ('A' button try to obtain this value from OSS API).
5. Data Size: Samples resolution ('A' button try to obtain this value from OSS API).
6. Channels: Number of channels available ('A' button try to obtain this value from OSS API).
7. Starting Directory: Starting directory of 'open file' dialog.
8. Mixer command: command to execute external mixer.
9. Autoname on pause: during recording the pause button causes the change of destination file. The file name changes whith an autonumbering method (the program will append a increasing number to filename).
10. 'Reload' button: reload saved settings.
11. 'Discard' button: close settings window and reload saved settings.
12. 'Save' button: save and closes settings window.

It is possible that in the first recording the audio quality seems awful. In this case the default settings are not right (expecially data size).

On the first execution flrec will save its settings in the file ~/.flrec.

Settings panel is real time (then you can try diffrent settings immediatly). Refer to sox's manual to modify it.

Sample rate inserted in settings panel is used as maximum value. Then insert the maximum possible for your hadware.

Dependencies

• sox - sound exchange (sox.sourceforge.net)
• file - file recognition command (standard)
• fltk - fast light tool kit (www.fltk.org) - only to compile from sources

Todo

• Vumeter
• Translations

Contribution

Users testing is really important in Open Source development. If flrec works well on your system, if it doesn't work at all, if you find bugs, if you find it useful... write (sinthetic) details to matteo(at)matteolucarelli(dot)net.