iTunes 7 and Roku Soundbridge

I installed iTunes 7 the day it came out. And right after I installed it, I got an e-mail from a friend warning me that iTunes 7 was incompatible with Roku Soundbridge. Damn. Now, a couple months after iTunes 7 was released, Roku still hasn't gotten the Soundbridge working with iTunes 7. Things have gotten so bad on the Roku message boards that the moderator has simply had to close the thread with a curt message:

Larry, I've said it now four times, and this will be five.  We cannot comment beyond what has been stated already, clearly, several times, because of confidentiality requirements of the agreement.  Period, end of story.

Folks, I'm sorry, but this thread is no longer serving a useful purpose.

If you would like support using Firefly, please see the Firefly forums here on our site. If you have other questions related to SoundBridge, please feel free to post them. But this discussion is over. Any further discussion of who is "screwing" whom, or general bashing of either company will be deleted without comment.

So it's been a pretty sore subject. At the time I figured I would just wait for the iTunes 7 compatibility. Since it looks like that might still take awhile, I decided to check out the Firefly media server Roku suggests.

Firefly is an open source music server that Roku has co-opted since they aren't really in the software biz. And I have to say, it's done the trick, but there were a few issues with the configuration.

First, Firefly requires Apple's Bonjour technology for device discovery, even on Windows machines. Bonjour for Windows can be downloaded from Apple. Install it before Firefly.

Second, if your iTunes music files and your iTunes Music Library.xml file are in separate folders, to make your iTunes playlists available, you'll have to add each folder to Firefly. Firefly includes a slick little Web interface for configuration. On the Configuration page under Music Files, in the Music Folder box, enter the path to your music folder. Then click Add music folder and enter the path to the folder where your iTunes Music Library.xml file is (enter the path to the folder, not to the XML file itself). There's an additional Playlist File box that I just left blank.

On the Server Status page, click Start Scan to refresh the Firefly database, and your playlists should be available.

Even though I usually leave iTunes up and running, it's nice that Firefly doesn't require it. Now, even when iTunes 7 support eventually comes to the Soundbridge, I'll probably stick with Firefly.