Rockbox is an alternative firmware/OS/UI for MP3 players, mostly iPods and Archoses. Given that my wife has various demands of an MP3 player that aren't met by our iPod's Steve-given interface, I thought I'd try it out.
Note: I have not got as far as actually installing anything yet. I am already having doubts, based on their packaging. The firmware and associated files come down in a single ZIP file, which somehow ended up on my Mac's Desktop despite Firefox's download settings explicitly telling it to download to my Downloads folder. (I can't send a hates-software mail of any kind without a Firefox mini-hate in there somewhere) The ZIP file was auto-unpacked by Firefox too, which is always great, because it usually means I have exploded files all over my desktop with their own creation dates giving them no easy way to sort them from the rest. Not in this particular case, however: I couldn't see any unpacked files at all. Tried again - progress bar flashes a bunch of filenames too fast for me to read them, and once again I see nothing on the desktop. After a few more experiments and resorting to the command line, the truth is revealed: rockbox.zip expands to create a ".rockbox" folder. Yes, there's a dot at the start there. Someone thought that what you really want from an installation package is less visibility. I'm not sure I want to install it now. -- Yoz
