Hey everyone. After my HP laptop died recently, I've been in the process of moving everything to my Linux laptop, including my music collection. Up until now, I've always had at least a Windows partition on my HP for CAD programs and other assorted stuff, including syncing my music to my iPod. Now I've just embraced going full-on Linux, but I still need to keep my iPod synced I do have Rockbox installed on it, but I prefer to use Apple's default software. That means I have to use Apple's "syncing" procedure, instead of simply dragging and dropping songs into the device.

Now, my question is, does any Linux program perform said task? Will Banshee do it?


Cheers

You are fortunate that your ipod works on linux at all.
My brother has one of these little dinky ipod touch devices:http://www.apple.com/ipodnano/
I have never been able to do anything with it on Linux. It seems that Rockbox, gtkpod, or Amarok can not manage to write to this little bugger. Trying to write to this ipod from the terminal is out of the question. It seems I do not have "permission" to use the device, even as the root user.

See this for ipod management on Ubuntu: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/PortableDevices/iPod
This is what I dislike about Apple products. They try to lock you into their systems and software.
The way I understand it, Amarok, Banshee, and gtkpod will work with at least some ipods, mostly the older ones and possibly not the newer ones. I don't think you will ever be able to use Apple's software on linux though.

As for me, I just love my Sandisk Sansa Fuze Plus. It works perfectly in Linux since Sandisk actively supports Linux. I can just copy and remove stuff from my Fuze right from the terminal on Linux using the default firmware on the player! I can also just copy and paste or drag and drop to the Fuze if using a GUI is needed.

you can also google ipod manager in linux and you will have a good list. Banshee and rhythmbox work well also amarok does.

Good luck to you.

I don't think you can get past the apple lock on the database.

Isn't that technically illegal? O.o I'm sure I've read something about companies being fined for doing things like that in the past. And I'm pretty sure one of them was Apple.

I have a 6th Generation 120GB iPod Classic and it works with Banshee and GtkPod.

I forgot to mention, I have a 5th generation 60 GB iPod, so it's on the older side...

Well, yesterday I did sync my iPod through Banshee, it worked pretty much flawlessly, I was surprised
I did decide to play it safe, and restored it previously using iTunes on my father's Windows PC, so I had to actually sync ~45 GB of music.
The Apple firmware on the iPod recognizes the songs as its supposed, as it always did when synced through iTunes. Rockbox is also working good, recognizing the songs.

Cheers