iTunes Agent = Nokia Media Transfer (lite)

Hello Windows fans! A commenter has just put me on to iTunes Agent which looks good enough to be an equivalent to Nokia Media Transfer that I keep going on about for Macs. It allows you to sync iTunes tracks to your phone, which can then be fixed by Plus Music Fixer and played.

So that's my current recommendation:

Windows users - iTunes Agent + Plus Music Fixer

Mac users - Nokia Media Transfer (with modified profile for your phone) or iTuneMyWalkman (if you don't want the hassle) + Plus Music Fixer

Plus Music Fixer v2.0!

Here it is, and it's worth a whole version number jump.

Here's a list of what's changed in this version, which is recommended for everyone:

• Made the user interface more responsive - you can now cancel operations by pressing Exit at almost any time (the application will quit at the next safe point).
• Made the user interface more descriptive - since walking through the file system can take a while I now show you what's going on in (I think) a very clean way.
• Added the ability to copy metadata - this is for those of you with phones that don't display iTunes metadata (ie, those in the E-series or roughly earlier than S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1). The title, artist, composer, description, genre and copyright message from iTunes is copied into a location that Nokia's built-in Music player and Gallery applications will read. (Note that for completeness I also copy across the album name, but Nokia's implementation pre-dates the inclusion of album information in the spec, so you probably won't see it appear, at least I don't, sorry!) Note also that the metadata copy is lazy - it requires that there be padding in the file that I can insert the metadata into, though iTunes usually provides plenty (does so in all of the files I own).
• Should run better on 2nd Edition phones - all of the code has been reworked to eliminate recursive function calls, which don't appear to work too well on the older phones.
• The Choose lists now list only the file name - previously they included the folder as well, which effectively meant you couldn't see the track name that you were choosing.
• Give credit to the Python for S60 project in the banner at the top of the screen.

Because I've made it a bit more complicated here's a walk-through of how you should use this:

Installation: First install Python for S60 v1.4.0 or later on your phone, then install the .sis file from the links below.

Important tip! If you use the Sync metadata option, be sure that the Gallery and Music player applications are not running (hold down the Menu key on your phone to check) because otherwise they may fail to detect that you have changed the files.

1. Copy iTunes Plus music tracks to your phone. This can be achieved using a modified Nokia Media Transfer, or a card reader, or using your phone's USB mode. Just make sure the music is in a folder (and thus viewable in File manager) and not in Messaging (so regular Bluetooth sends of music won't work).
2. Launch Plus Music Fixer from the Menu of your phone. At this point it will load, and start walking through your phone and memory card making a list of all of the *.m4a files. Once it finishes scanning, it will parse each of the found files, looking for the particular glitch that stops them from playing, and looking to see if the Nokia (3GP) metadata (if any) is in sync with the iTunes metadata.
3. Once this process completes, the program will tell you the number and names of all of the files Plus Music Fixer thinks need fixing, or whose metadata tags are missing or inconsistent.
4. If there are files to fix, choose Make playable from the Options soft key. You may either Choose songs to fix (in which case mark them off the list that appears and press OK) or Fix all songs. The program will quickly fix each (or all) of the songs.
5. If you don't have a phone that reads iTunes metadata, and there are files whose metadata needs syncing, choose Sync metadata from the Options soft key. You may either Choose songs to sync (in which case mark them off the list that appears and press OK) or Sync all songs. The program will quickly sync each (or all) of the songs.
6. If you want to make sure that your changes took effect (or if you have added more songs to the phone) choose Rescan from the Options soft key. This repeats the process that automatically occurs at startup. If for example you chose to fix and sync all of the songs, and you didn't add any new songs, the rescan should report No songs to fix and No songs to sync.
7. Press Exit and confirm with OK when you are done.
8. Launch Gallery and select Tracks (or use File manager or Music player) to verify that the tracks are now playable and/or have viewable metadata.

Download links:

If you haven't already you'll need to get Python for S60 for your phone (refer to my earlier posts as to what version your phone needs).

Then download the appropriate file from here:

• Plus Music Fixer v2.0.0 3rd Edition
• Plus Music Fixer v2.0.0 2nd Edition

Happy music listening!

New Plus Music Fixer is nigh...

I'm so close to having a fresh exciting new version of Plus Music Fixer, some last minute tweaks held me back from uploading it before I had to go out. But it's looking good for being right here by Monday.

Should answer almost everything I've heard about, including copying metadata into the Nokia-friendly format so artists show up in Music player and the Gallery.

Note for those of you who have been requesting transferring the album name over, I've read over the specs of 3GP/MPEG-4 and for the version currently implemented on the phones, sorry no joy (tested on my E61). Those of you with phones in the N95 class might be able to read the album tag, seeing that they have a much newer software, but you'll have to try the new Plus Music Fixer and let me know. The same goes for album art (though at this stage Plus Music Fixer won't attempt to copy that).

Watch this space...

Quick Tip: Nokia Media Transfer's cache

A tip for anyone who changes their Nokia Media Transfer settings:

For example, if you are using Plus Music Fixer and you changed your phone's Nokia Media Transfer profile to not transcode your music, you may find some of your media stays in its converted form and doesn't get re-copied.

To fix this delete the files from your phone (use File Manager, or your computer), they are usually in Sound clips/External/iTunes Folder.

Then delete the converted versions from your computer. First quit Nokia Media Transfer from the menu bar and empty out Library/Caches/com.nokia.NokiaMediaTransfer/MediaFileCache.

Restart Nokia Media Transfer and re-transfer to your phone.

Plus Music Fixer: Global Edition

As promised: here is a new version of Plus Music Fixer which should resolve the issue of not working on phones containing files or folders in a non-US alphabet. Sorry about that.

I have also inserted the version number into the display and the error log (now that there will be multiple versions 'in the wild').

Note that if you want to take the next step in translating it, email me and I'll be excited to send you a list of strings and you'll see the result here.

Download links:

Plus Music Fixer v1.1.0 for S60 3rd Edition, S60 2nd Edition (requires Python for S60 v1.4.0 or later).

More information on this tool

Fix coming to Plus Music Fixer

I've been made aware of a somewhat nasty bug in Plus Music Fixer (via Python). It will report an error and not scan files properly if any of the accessible files or folders on your phone or memory card have special or international characters in them (ie, ASCII is not your whole alphabet).

For now I'm afraid there's no workaround (apart from renaming the files or folders) but I believe I now have a fix, which I'll package up tonight (Tuesday).

Using Plus Music Fixer with Nokia Media Transfer

Nokia Media Transfer, iTunes and Plus Music Fixer are intended to work together. However Nokia does the right thing and makes sure the file will always work by transcoding it, which is lossy and defeats the purpose of Plus Music Fixer.

This applies to Mac users only (as does Nokia Media Transfer) - I have no idea about how Nokia's tools on Windows handle iTunes.

We can fix this by editing the profile for our particular phone to tell Media Transfer that we know what we're doing and to copy the files as-is.

The profiles are Apple (binary) plist files which I've described earlier. I've found a better description here. You can use Property List Editor (from Xcode/Developer Tools - download here or from a CD in the Mac OS X Tiger box or one of the CDs supplied with your Mac) or Pref Setter (note that Pref Setter won't allow you to open the file - you will need to temporarily add a .plist extension).

You need to find the profile for your phone, either inside the Nokia Media Transfer application (right-click the application, choose Show Package Contents, and go to Contents - Resources - Profiles) or in the Library - Application Support - Nokia Media Transfer - Profiles folder.

Open it in Property List Editor or Pref Setter, and add m4a to the conformanceGuaranteedFileExtensions key, and change transcodePurchasedTracks to No. After the edits the plist file will look similar to the image.

Save the profile (rename it back if you need to) and restart Nokia Media Transfer. Now the files will be sent directly to the phone and you can fix them using Plus Music Fixer and then play them using Music player.

Minor update: Plus Music Fixer

Found and fixed the bug that caused the 3rd Edition download (at least - might apply to the 2nd Edition one too but I haven't checked - I might download the emulator and see) to unnecessarily say Python was missing. Note that nothing else has changed - just fixes the annoying warning.

So: here is the fixed download link.

Plus Music Fixer for Nokia Phones

Welcome to an extension of what a did earlier to make iTunes Plus songs play on certain Nokia phones.

This time around I've made a fixer that doesn't require you to mess around with the songs in iTunes or on your computer first.

Update #1: Fixed bug in 3rd Edition installer, updated link.
Update #2: Fixed bug with special characters in files and folders, updated links.
Update #3: New version makes this version totally redundant - check this out instead.

This is made possible by the work of the Python for S60 project which allows simple programs to written for the phone (much simpler than normal!)

This means that to use this fixer, you'll need to install Python for S60, version 1.4.0 or later, followed by my tool, on your phone. This will work for Nokia S60 2nd and 3rd edition phones, but the downloads are different so select the correct ones below.

Note: For simplicity, I'm providing direct links to Python for S60, you can view the downloads via this link (check especially for updates since this post was written). Also note that I provide the 2nd edition links as a courtesy to those of you who I know are using these phones - while the code is identical in both, the 2nd edition version has not been tested. Check here (or in my previous post) to discover the 'edition' of your phone. Lastly, note that some browser/web site combinations cause .sis files to download as text - right-click the links and choose Save/Download.

Update: Please don't download these - go get yourself v2.0 instead - thanks!

S60 3rd Edition (most E-Series, N-Series):

1. Python for S60 v1.4.0
2. Plus Music Fixer v1.1.0
   (Note that this installation is self-signed - click Continue when warned by your phone)

S60 2nd Edition (earlier models):

1. Python for S60 v1.4.0 - 2nd Edition/original or Feature Pack 2 or Feature Pack 3 phones
2. Plus Music Fixer v1.1

Now my idea with this tool is that you will run it after adding a batch of music to your phone (eg, via the memory card or USB) or after a song fails to play in Music player. When you start it from your menu, it will proceed to scan your phone and any memory card for .m4a music files that may need fixing. It will then tell you whether fixing is required. You can then choose to fix all or selectively by pressing the left softkey (Options) and choosing from the menu options. Fixing takes no time at all.

As always I advise against doing this to your master copy of your music, however I assume that your phone is not your master copy, and often has limited space, so this tool will not create its own backups and you are responsible for backing up your music.

The rescan menu item is useful for repeating the scan after fixing files to verify they were actually fixed.

If an error occurs a message will be shown. A Python error will lead to an "errors.txt" file being stored in the Documents folder of your phone memory (if this exists) which you can view (using Notes) or send (using File manager) to me (please).

Future plans:

• Also optionally convert iTunes metadata so that it may be viewed in Music player
• Working on a Music player replacement for those phones that have limited versions of the application (ie, E-series phones)
• A better icon

This application is made possible thanks mainly to AtomicParsley's description of iTunes files.

Nokia Media Transfer Profile Roundup

Below is a table showing all of the profiles I am aware of and a listing of Nokia phones. This will help me develop some more profiles because it will show which phones have which common features. If your phone isn't listed or is missing information, please let me know. Likewise if I've added a profile and it is marked as untested - let me know if you test it.

Sources for this information are the Nokia Media Transfer application, the Forum Nokia web site and the Gammu phone database.

First, all of the Nokia-supported phones (these can also be found on Nokia's download page - I provide this information for comparison to aid in modifying a profile for your own use):

Name	Model	OS	Resolution	Codecs
E90	RA-6	S60 3rd FP1/9.2	800x352 240x320	H.263 H.264 MPEG-4 Real 7-10 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ WMA MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV
N95	RM-159 RM-160		240x320
N76	RM-135 RM-149
N80	RM-91 RM-92 RM-93	S60 3rd/9.1	352x416
N91	RM-43 RM-158		176x208
N93i	RM-156 RM-157		240x320
N93	RM-55 RM-153
N92	RM-100 RM-102
N77	RM-194
N73	RM-132 RM-133
N71	RM-67 RM-112			H.263 H.264 MPEG-4 Real 7-10 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV
N75	RM-128			H.263 MPEG-4 Real 7-10 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV
E50	RM-170
E65	RM-208
E70	RM-10 RM-24		352x416
E61i	RM-227 RM-294		320x240
N90	RM-42	S60 2nd FP3/8.1a	352x416	H.263 MPEG-4 Real 7-8 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV
N70	RM-84 RM-99		176x208
N72	RM-180			H.263 MPEG-4 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV

 

Second, the rest of the Nokia suite of phones suggesting compatible profiles for download:

Name	Model	OS	Resolution	Codecs	Notes
6121 Classic	???	S60 3rd FP1/9.2	240x320	H.263 H.264 MPEG-4 Real 7-10 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ WMA MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV	Model number required. Equivalent to N95 or N76
5700 XpressMusic
6110 Navigator
6120 Classic
6290
3250	RM-38	S60 3rd/9.1	176x208		Equivalent to N91. Untested Download
E62	RM-88		320x240	H.263 MPEG-4 Real 7-10 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC AAC+ eAAC+ MP3 MP4 MIDI WAV	Derived from E61. Untested Download
E61	RM-89				Working Download
5500 Sport	RM-86		208x208		Unique resolution. Untested Download
6680	RM-36	S60 2nd FP2/8.0a	176x208	H.263 MPEG-4 Real 7-8 AMR-NB AMR-WB AAC MP3 MIDI WAV	Reported working by commenter. Download
6681	RM-57				Equivalent to 6680 Untested Download
6682	RM-58
6630	RM-1
6620	NHL-12	S60 2nd FP1/7.0s			Reported working by commenter. Download
3230	RM-51				Equivalent to 6620 Untested Download
6670	RH-67 RH-68
6260	RM-25
7610	RH-51 RH-52

 

I have stopped at the Series 60 2nd Edition Feature Pack 1 phones since they are the earliest phones I have working reports for. I do know that the N-Gage didn't work for me (that's a Series 60 1st Edition phone). There are currently no Nokia-supported Series 40 phones and I don't own one so I have no idea of the support of those.

This should put the topic of supported phones to bed for now. I'd expect that most new Nokias once released should get official profiles (if not, complain!).

Nokia Media Transfer: updated version

Woke up to this this morning:
And I thought "that's interesting, I wonder what's changed?"

So far all I can tell is that the E-Series phones that Nokia has supported are now in the application bundle (still no native E61), but apart from that I haven't seen any behaviour changes yet.

For everyone's reference this version includes profiles for the E50, E61i, E65, E70, E90, N70, N71, N72, N73, N75, N76 (one of flashy new phones), N77, N80, N90, N91, N92, N93 and N95 phones.

Updating my E-Series profiles

Thanks to an update from Nokia, I'm going to pump out some more profile updates. Since Nokia has now released more E-Series profiles (and maybe there will be more on the way) which more closely match the target devices, here are some better profiles.

Manual install I'm afraid -- never did work out the kinks in that installer.

Here is a new E61 profile based on the identical E61i profile provided by the update, with the modification of passing through .m4a files (for iTunes), and changing the video to 320x240 (don't know if this has any impact, not sure why Nokia chose 352x288 for a 320x240 screen).

If you are upgrading simply replace the old e61.profile in Library/Application Support/Nokia Media Transfer/Profiles, or if this is your first install, copy it there, delete /Users/yourname/Library/Application Support/Nokia Media Transfer/Devices.plist, restart Nokia Media Transfer and choose Add Device...

Here also are some more rough tips for you if you are manually editing profiles:

• If you want to use your phone with multiple machines for music, try making the paths different (they are in the profile) between machines. For example, change "iTunes Folder" to "iTunes Folder 2" on the second machine.


• The codecTypes under supportedAudioCodecs are FOURCC codes - you can translate these by using Mac OS X calculator (copy the number across with the Calculator in Programmer mode and toggle the ASCII button). This is useful for modifying profiles to other phones.


• To determine the correct model name and number, enter *#0000# from Standby on your phone.


• To determine the official specifications of your phone, look for it in the list here.

Willing to make more profiles -- for example this profile would work on an E62 if I got the model number. If you want to help me out, leave the results of *#0000# in the comments below.