• 9 Posts
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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: October 18th, 2023

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  • You’ll need a Windows or Mac computer with the iTunes software (NOT WEB), a CD burner and at least one blank CD. You also can’t have an Apple streaming subscription.

    Once you’ve met the prerequisites, buy the album, download it to your computer using the iTunes software and burn it to a CD using the iTunes software. From there, rip the newly minted CD to whatever format you fancy.

    That’s been the work flow since the beginning of iTunes and should still work. Admittedly, I haven’t tested it in more than 10 years.

    As far as I know there isn’t a bypass available. Haven’t checked in a while though.

    You may be able to simulate burning to a CD and burn to .iso instead, but I haven’t done that since Windows XP, so you’re on your own there.

    Edit: forgot to add that you have to use the iTunes software to burn the CD.









  • I’ve bounced between a bunch of different ones. Each time I switched and moved the directory over the formatting and linking tended to break. In the end, I settled on just a raw hierarchical directory structure using raw markdown (using a basic text editor) for typed notes and whatever other relevant media (pictures, pdfs, whatever), and GoodNotes for handwritten notebooks with PDF backups saved to directory on my Nextcloud.

    I don’t know, maybe my needs are odd but I’ve just never found a single application that could handle all of my note-taking and documentation needs. Everything is close, but frustratingly annoying in one missing feature or another. And all of them seemed damned slow compared to just opening up a file browser or a terminaland doing what I needed.

    As for file syncing, Logseq was pretty easy to handle syncing for. I just put the logseq notes directory on my Nextcloud and Bob’s you’re uncle. Access on my desktop, laptop and mobile devices. Don’t have to use Nextcloud though, just something that would allow you to sync the directory between devices. Syncthing would probably work. Just don’t bounce between devices too fast. Causes conflicts you have to correct manually.



  • Nowadays, Apple is only really big for digital music if you are (or were) already really deep in their ecosystem. Not sure I’ve heard of any devices that play nice with their DRM in a while and last I had looked (admittedly many years ago) they did not have a compatible app for Android.

    Apple music was bigger back 15 or 20 years ago for digital downloads due in large part to the iPod, though I occasionally hear of some odd band or another that only releases their stuff on iTunes.

    And since this is a linux community, as a heads up, iTunes is only marginally functional, last I heard, in linux. Apparently it can’t detect connected devices. You’ll probably need a Windows or Mac system to run iTunes if you want to go that route.


  • For CDs, Amazon, ebay, or discogs. Digital music I usually get from the artist’s webstore if possible, otherwise I’ll buy it from Amazon or BandCamp.

    One heads up, Buying and downloading digital music from Amazon is a pain in the butt if you have an Amazon Music subscription. Easy and straightforward though without.

    Apple music is also possible but you have to burn the tracks to CD using itunes to move it out of Apple’s ecosystem.

    I also hear good things about Tidal but I’ve never used them.