lauantai 24. toukokuuta 2014

How to make Ubuntu play music over bluetooth

After installing latest Ubuntu version 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) I found out by accident that Ubuntu is able to play music from bluetooth source. Here's how it works on my laptop (Sony Vaio VPCEA2S1E, perhaps there's differences in the bluetooth adapters?).

Check has PulseAudio already loaded module-bluetooth-discover.
$ pactl list | grep -i module-bluetooth-discover

If this command does not return anything, you should load the module with the following command.
$ pactl load-module module-bluetooth-discover

Now the first command shows that the module is loaded.
$ pactl list | grep -i module-bluetooth-discover
Name: module-bluetooth-discover

After executing the command, you should be able to add your for example your phone as the source of audio. In my Windows Phone Lumia 1020, I navigate to Settings -> Accessories -> add using bluetooth. If you have music playing on your phone and you connect to your Ubuntu via bluetooth, your phone will show text connected music. And the music is coming out of your computer's speakers!

I also discovered that in the latest Ubuntu version my bluetooth keyboard Logitech diNovo Edge settings have to be adjusted manually. The mouse pointer does not move fast enough when using keyboard's touchpad. In the previous version Ubuntu 12.04 I was able to set the speed and acceleration of pointer fast enough from System Settings UI. In 14.04, I cannot. However, it's easy to change the acceleration and speed of pointer from command line. Here's the command.
$ xset m 3 1

All in all, I'm very happy with the latest Ubuntu release!