Burn Tools – SpaceFM Plugin

A beta version of my Burn Tools plugin is now available. This turns SpaceFM into a limited burning app, and can also be extended to include additional options, modified burn commands, etc. The idea is that I did the coding on the GUI part, so now it should be easier to use that as a base for customizing.

At present, it burns single session discs only. It makes the filesystem image first, and if all goes well, then burns it. This takes more time than the one step approach, but I find it less likely to create coasters. Maybe at some point some xorriso or growisofs support will be incorporated by me or someone else. So this isn’t the fastest burning app around – it takes its time to reduce coasters, adds checksums, etc.

I wrote this plugin mostly for my own use. Although I’m not aiming for all uses here, the flexibility comes from it being a plugin, so you can hack the script, etc. I will support the existing GUI functionality, but if you have burn problems within the burn commands, you’ll need to research and adjust those yourself. But for most cases it should work as is.

This plugin also demonstrates some of SpaceFM’s new dialog and socket abilities for plugins. Since I wanted to make it a nice little state machine, it’s not the simplest example, but nevertheless demonstrates some ways that plugins can interact deeply with the SpaceFM window.

For now I have added IgnorantGuru’s Burn Tools to the SpaceFM Wiki – details, screenshot, and download links are there. Thanks for testing and feedback is welcome on how this works for you.

Also, special thanks to Thomas Schmitt and OmegaPhil for helping me with some of the finer bash points and testing (I forgot to add you to this version of the README).

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Also, are you a GUI developer? Thomas Schmitt, author of cdrskin, xorriso, and libburn is looking for a developer to create a GUI front-end compatible with his long running xorriso, one of the most comprehensive and well-supported burn programs in development. He has added a demonstration Tcl/Tk frontend to the source. How to test:

• Install Tcl/Tk if not present yet (old versions should be ok)
• Get freshly
• Build by:
  tar xzf xorriso-1.2.5.tar.gz && cd xorriso-1.2.5 && ./configure && make

• Start xorriso and GUI script (with no need to install xorriso):
  xorriso/xorriso -launch_frontend frontend/xorriso-tcltk --stdio --

• Read frontend/README-tcltk (and if curious enough: the code of frontend/xorriso-tcltk)
• There is also example code in C provided for the fundamental communication stuff: frontend/frontend_pipes_xorriso.c
• Other than the Tcl/Tk frontend, it starts an onw xorriso process instead of being started by xorriso. This gives the freedom to keep the own stdin and stdout alive, and to use a pair of pipe(2) for communication with xorriso.

If you’re interested, please contact Thomas – he’s a very helpful person to work with!