10.2. Playing Digital
Audio Files
Digital audio has become very popular in recent years. Users
enjoy the technology because the sound quality is excellent
compared to analog tape or records, and the files are compact
(audio files can easily be transferred across the Internet).
To take advantage of this technology, Red Hat Enterprise Linux
includes the powerful X Multimedia System
(XMMS), a cross-platform multimedia
player which allows you to play several digital audio file
formats.
XMMS can be used for more than just
playing digital audio files. By default XMMS can play Ogg Vorbis, RIFF wave, and most
module formats. Additionally, XMMS can
be extended via plugins to play a number of other digital
multimedia formats.
To launch XMMS, go to => => .
To launch XMMS from a shell prompt,
type the command xmms.
10.2.1. Using
XMMS
To play an audio file with XMMS,
click the Open button 
and
choose a file from the Load File(s)
window.
In Figure
10-4, you see that there are several files to choose from. The
files that end in .ogg are Ogg Vorbis files, a popular new audio file format,
while the .pls file is an audio playlist file. You can use XMMS to add audio files into a list and then save
it as a playlist. This can be convenient if you have several audio
files and you want to categorize them (for example, by genre or
artist). Highlight the file you wish to play (if you have multiple
files, click and hold the mouse button and drag it over all of the
files you want to open) and click OK.
Notice that XMMS begins to play your
audio files immediately. To adjust the volume click and drag the
volume slider (the long slider above the Open button) to the left to lower the volume or to
the right to increase it, like you would when using a CD player.
There are also buttons to stop, pause, and skip (backward and
forward) your audio files.
To learn more about using XMMS and
its many options, refer to the man page by entering man xmms at a shell prompt.
