As you probably know, Le Biniou is the #1 open-source music visualization tool designed to run on Linux systems such as Debian and Ubuntu. But what about if you happen to be a Windows user? Then I have good news for you! This is article will demonstrate how to get Le Biniou running in Windows 10 operating systems.
The writer, I (tech-yes) am not an enthusiastic Linux user. I barely grasp the basics. This guide is written by a Le Biniou user from Windows background. If you know Linux well, you surely will notice things could be done in many other ways than I describe. I have tried to choose the simplest and most straightforward way for a person with some PC skills to get to the objective.
I or Le Biniou project is not responsible for your PC exploding, wife running away or beloved guinea pig dropping dead. With these facts approved you are now free to proceed to realm of Le Biniou audio visualization on Windows 10.
You said Le Biniou was designed only for Linux? Yes. But for some times now, it has been possible to run Linux inside your very familiar Windows. The solution is called Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL).
“The Windows Subsystem for Linux lets developers run a GNU/Linux environment – including most command-line tools, utilities, and applications – directly on Windows, unmodified, without the overhead of a traditional virtual machine or dualboot setup.” -microsoft.com
What the documentation does not mention, at least so clearly, is you can also run the X Windowing system on Windows and execute the code still under WSL on Windows 10.
However, I little bit of knowledge about Linux system is recommended to everything go smoothly. Next I’m going to explain step by step insructions how to get Le Biniou running on your Win10 computer.
If during any phase of this guide you happen to encounter a problem, the web will always help you. In the section 6. I have listed a bunch of resources that will guide you trough the same steps I’ve explained in this document. Good luck!
Installing WSL can happen in two ways. Either you join Windows Insiders Program and get a required Windows build, then just run a single command and WSL is installed for you. The second way you have to go through several steps. That is the way I made it and did not encounter any problems on the way.
Both the installation methods are best described on Microsoft’s WSL documentation page Windows Subsystem for Linux Installation Guide for Windows 10. Follow those steps and once you’ve done return to this guide for further instructions. Note that these instruction steps may require that you choose Ubuntu as your Linux distro.
You can launch the Linux distro you’ve selected from the command line. Launch cmd.exe and type bash. Linux command line prompt will open up. Nice!
There are many ways to get X Server (the graphical user interface engine used in Linux) running in Windows. Many different softwares available. But I used VcXsrv Windows X Server.
Follow that link and install the application. When starting the program add a checkmark to the option “Disable access control”. This way X Server will surely accept your connection. Allow VcXsrv in your Window firewall settings.
On Linux side you will need to create a environment variable DISPLAY. In the Linux command line prompt, run export DISPLAY="grep nameserver /etc/resolv.conf | sed ‘s/nameserver //’:0"
For a Linux Desktop Environment I chose Xfce. To get it type: sudo apt install xfce4 and wait for it to download and install.
Now in the linux bash type xfce4-session and the window system should load up in the Windows’ window of VcXsrv you started earlier. Cool!
At this point there is no audio support. What you need is PulseAudio software installed both on Windows and Linux side. Download and extract the Pulse Audio to your Windows system from packages available here.
Go to “etc” directory under the pulseaudio files. Open default.pa for editing, find the line #load-module module-native-protocol-tcp and replace it with load-module module-native-protocol-tcp auth-ip-acl=127.0.0.1 auth-anonymous=1
Next, open up deamon.conf file and change the line ; exit-idle-time = 20</strong> to <strong>exit-idle-time = -1. This disables the app’s idle timer.
Remove any Pulse Audio you may have already installed on your Linux. In the Linux command line prompt, run apt-get purge pulseaudio Then follow the steps here to install a version which is compatible with WSL. Install the version with apt-get install pulseaudio.
After installation you will need to run export PULSE_SERVER=tcp:localhost to enable it run via TCP.
Now we assume you have installed Ubuntu as your Linux distro.
First install GDebi package Installer. Run sudo add-apt-repository universe then sudo apt-get update and sudo apt-get install gdebi-core and finally sudo apt-get install gdebi. Now you can simply install lebiniou versions by double-clicking on the deb and ddeb files.
To get the latest version, open your web browser, head to https://gitlab.com/lebiniou/lebiniou/-/tree/master, press the download icon on the top right next to “Clone”, choose “build:groovy”, and download and extract the package to your system. Execute the included files and install them with GDebi.
Next open up the page https://gitlab.com/lebiniou/lebiniou-data/-/tree/master, press download icon, and choose build:sid. Download and extract the file, and install it in the same manner as previous .deb file.
The easiest way to launch Le Biniou is from the Applications menu of your Linux desktop. You should find Le Biniou under the Multimedia section. Of course you need also audio. I wasn’t able to get Windows audio working with Le Biniou, so I launched Rhythmbox (from the same Multimedia menu), imported music files, and let it rock!
You can also launch Le Biniou from the command line, which is especially required when you need to pass in some special configuration settings. You will probably find information about command line configuration from the Le Biniou’s official website, wiki or other guide.
I may have made mistakes while writing this guide, or perhaps some info has outdated. Perhaps I left something out. In these cases try to find required information from these guides I followed when setting Le Biniou to run under my Windows.
That’s all I can tell you. Have fun and good luck!
– tech-yes