Moode Audio Player for Raspberry Pi

[TimCurtis]

Hi,

 

Moode 2.5+ Test Release 1 (TR1) is available for download at moodeaudio.org under the TEST CODE button :-)

 

This TR represents a substantial rewrite of the entire 2.x codebase including the addition of some Moode 3.0 code thus the "+" after the version number. Testing has indicated a significant performance increase across the entire UI, faster boot and reliable USB hotplug for audio and storage devices resulting in a big improvement in ease of use.

 

The enhanced metadata that appears on the UI is all server-generated, volume config is automated when hardware volume controller is detected, there are new, smart poweroff and reboot screens that make it easy to reconnect to the UI and all the config screens have been streamlined.

 

Refer to the updated Setup guide for the new initial setup procedure. Links to the guide are located in Moode About popup and under TEST CODE.

 

Release notes are attached.

 

Enjoy!

 

Regards,

moodeaudio.org

Moode Twitter feed

Tim Curtis

 

=======================

2.5+ Release 2016-01-DD

=======================

 

New features

 

- NEW: Hotplug for USB audio and storage devices

- NEW: Server generated enhanced metadata for UI, LCD and external applications

- NEW: Automatic volume configuration when hardware (ALSA) volume controller exists

- NEW: Smart poweroff and reboot screens with reconnect btn and reboot-ready ticker

- NEW: Allow-hotplug eth0 interface for faster boot on Wifi

- NEW: Vol.sh command line interface (CLI) for volume knob and mute

- NEW: Web interface for volume and mute via http://moode/command?cmd=vol.sh <arg>

- NEW: Moode application programming interface (API) guide

 

Media

 

- NEW: KCMP 89.3 FM - The Current

- NEW: MPR - Minnesota Public Radio

- NEW: SomaFM - Logo for DEF CON Radio

- NEW: SomaFM - Metal Detector - From black to doom, prog to sludge, thrash to post, stoner to crossover, punk to industrial.

 

Audio devices

 

- I2S: IanFIFO II

- I2S: IQaudIO Pi-DACZero

- I2S: Soekris DAM1021

- I2S: Suptronics x400

- USB: Audiolab M-DAC

- USB: Audiophonics PCM5102 DAC

- USB: Customworks DAC-1

- USB: CEntrance DACmini CX

- USB: DEQX XS-1 USB-Audio 24/192 v4

- USB: Gustard U12

- USB: Halide Design USB-S/PDIF Bridge

- USB: HRT Microstreamer

- USB: Lukit WaveIO USB-I2S/SPDIF Bridge

- USB: Meridian Explorer 2

- USB: Musical Fidelity V90-DAC

- USB: Teac UD-H01

- USB: Trends UD-10

 

Updates

 

- UPD: Pre-3.0 rewrite and restructure of entire 2.x code base :-)

- UPD: Revised SQL schema, data elements and data

- UPD: Changed CIFS mount rsize/wsize to defaults rsize=61440 and wsize=65536

- UPD: Add help text for MPD audio buffer fields

- UPD: Validate MPD volume control field (don't present "Hardware" if hdwr vol controller does not exist)

- UPD: Validate Hardware volume control section on Customize popup (disable if hdwr vol controller does not exist))

- UPD: Deprecate Kernel Select, Kernel Profiles, CMedia Fix, Automatic MPD DB update

 

Bug fixes

 

- FIX: Network throughput issue when using original code CIFS mount rsize=8048 and wsize=8096

- FIX: WiFi configuration fails when SSID or password contain spaces or special characters

- FIX: Time knob not cleared after last item in playlist finishes

- FIX: Vertical page position (at top of knobs or coverart) on small screens moves when song changes

- FIX: Samba invalid security option causing warning when MPD starts

- FIX: MPD init.d start removed since its already started by Moode worker daemon

- FIX: MPD config missing restore_paused "yes"

- FIX: Volume up/dn buttons not being disabled when knob disabled

- FIX: Logic causing unnecessary UI updates even though song does not change

- FIX: Warnings from legacy CSS "*element" statements in certain CSS files

- FIX: Incomplete Google search string for Radio stations that provide song title

[michelemezza]

Thanks and happy new year

[lcg]

Dear Tim,

 

thanks for your work & happy new year - two problems with the webUI:

 

version Release: 2.4, 2015-10-30

 

(1) Firefox version 39, Win 7: Using 'http://moode.local/' everything's looks ok - if the IP is used (e.g. 192.168.1.10) - the UI does not show all buttons and the colors look like the ones from volumio (grey/ green). I can send a screenshot if necessary. Using Chrome on the same OS/ computer it works for IP as well as moode.local.

Same problem with iceweasel on Debian jessie using the IP access, but it works for Midori on the same OS/ hardware.

 

(2) IPad 1 (v 5.1.1) -> using the IP shows everything correct, but the coverart is heavily distorted (stretched) on the vertical axis - almost double of its original size which looks rather ugly. This is true for the safari as well as the chrome browser on the IPad 1. I can send a photo if necessary. (How) can this be fixed? Thanks! The access via moode.local does not work for IPad 1, but that's not important, I assume it has no avahi/bonjour.

 

best regards,

leo

[TimCurtis]

Dear Tim,

 

thanks for your work & happy new year - two problems with the webUI:

 

version Release: 2.4, 2015-10-30

 

(1) Firefox version 39, Win 7: Using 'http://moode.local/' everything's looks ok - if the IP is used (e.g. 192.168.1.10) - the UI does not show all buttons and the colors look like the ones from volumio (grey/ green). I can send a screenshot if necessary. Using Chrome on the same OS/ computer it works for IP as well as moode.local.

Same problem with iceweasel on Debian jessie using the IP access, but it works for Midori on the same OS/ hardware.

 

(2) IPad 1 (v 5.1.1) -> using the IP shows everything correct, but the coverart is heavily distorted (stretched) on the vertical axis - almost double of its original size which looks rather ugly. This is true for the safari as well as the chrome browser on the IPad 1. I can send a photo if necessary. (How) can this be fixed? Thanks! The access via moode.local does not work for IPad 1, but that's not important, I assume it has no avahi/bonjour.

 

best regards,

leo

 

Hi Leo,

 

Likewise happy holidays, and enjoy the new year!

 

Based on user reports I receive, Firefox has been problematic, probably due to its implementation of Javascript/HTML5.

 

I've tested Chrome on Windows 7 and it works well. The UI appearance when using Chrome can be improved by enabling "overlay-scrollbars". The setting can be accessed via chrome://flags.

 

The UI distortion is probably being caused by old Safari. What version of IOS and Safari are running on iPad1?

 

Regards,

Tim

[Phil261575]

Hi Tim

 

First of all, happy new year to you and every one ! Hope the best to all.

 

I've downloaded and installed the 2.5+ beta: so far, so good. I just missed the Playlist stored and alphabetically ordered, and the use of more metadata to filter songs ! but you work hard for it, so thanks a lot. There are some interface problems (i.e. horizontal scroll bar in the Library tab using Win1 Edge or Chrome) but nothing horrible.

 

If you need any feedback to help, feel free to contact.

 

Best regards !

Phil

[TimCurtis]

Hi Tim

 

First of all, happy new year to you and every one ! Hope the best to all.

 

I've downloaded and installed the 2.5+ beta: so far, so good. I just missed the Playlist stored and alphabetically ordered, and the use of more metadata to filter songs ! but you work hard for it, so thanks a lot. There are some interface problems (i.e. horizontal scroll bar in the Library tab using Win1 Edge or Chrome) but nothing horrible.

 

If you need any feedback to help, feel free to contact.

 

Best regards !

Phil

 

Hi Phil,

 

Likewise, happy new year!

 

Try chrome://flags and enable "overlay-scrollbars".

 

Regards,

Tim

[lcg]

Hi Leo, Likewise happy holidays, and enjoy the new year! Based on user reports I receive, Firefox has been problematic, probably due to its implementation of Javascript/HTML5. I've tested Chrome on Windows 7 and it works well. The UI appearance when using Chrome can be improved by enabling "overlay-scrollbars". The setting can be accessed via chrome://flags. The UI distortion is probably being caused by old Safari. What version of IOS and Safari are running on iPad1? Regards, Tim

Dear Tim, iOS Version 5.1.1 (9B206) - I do not know the Safari version, but it is the one shipped with the latest iOS on iPad1 ~2012. Where can I find in /var/www/ where the image/ cover artwork is scaled? btw - Firefox 44.0b4 (beta version) on Win 7 works rather well. The latest stable (non-beta version) Firefox version does not work very well. best wishes leo

[TimCurtis]

Dear Tim, iOS Version 5.1.1 (9B206) - I do not know the Safari version, but it is the one shipped with the latest iOS on iPad1 ~2012. Where can I find in /var/www/ where the image/ cover artwork is scaled? btw - Firefox 44.0b4 (beta version) on Win 7 works rather well. The latest stable (non-beta version) Firefox version does not work very well. best wishes leo

 

Hi Leo,

 

img.coverart selector is in:

/var/www/css/panels.css

/var/www/themes/alizarin/panels.css

 

Regards,

Tim

[TimCurtis]

Just a brief update on TR2 :-)

 

A new caching Library loader with enhanced capability for large collections is done.

 

Once cached on the server, the Library loads very fast. A couple seconds for 20K tracks from USB HDD. Page refresh or reboot won't cause reload of Library, the cache will be used until it's manually cleared, then Library will reload (to get new or changed music for example) and new cache created. The cache creation only adds a small amount of overhead to Library load.

 

Enhanced large collection capability is courtesy of diyAudio user "anewnadir" :-)

 

 

Regards,

Tim

[TimCurtis]

Hi,

 

Here is screen shot of new Source config showing "Clear Library Cache" feature.

 

Regards,

Tim

[lcg]

Hi Leo,

 

img.coverart selector is in:

/var/www/css/panels.css

/var/www/themes/alizarin/panels.css

 

Regards,

Tim

 

 

Dear Tim,

 

in /var/www/css/panels.css changing the value for cover art height 100% to 50% does the trick for IPad1 - btw it does not seem to change anything on Chrome Win7 or Firefox beta or Iceweasle (Debian Jessie) or Android 4.

 

best regards,

leo

[TimCurtis]

Dear Tim,

 

in /var/www/css/panels.css changing the value for cover art height 100% to 50% does the trick for IPad1 - btw it does not seem to change anything on Chrome Win7 or Firefox beta or Iceweasle (Debian Jessie) or Android 4.

 

best regards,

leo

 

Hi Leo,

 

Thanks, I'll test it out :-)

 

Regards,

Tim

[fpa]

Hello Tim, congratulations, good job.

My question: I can not operate the links of web radio with extension .m3u8. Which version should I use for Moode?

Here is a link to an example of an Italian radio: http://radiocapital-lh.akamaihd.net/i/RadioCapital_Live_1@196312/master.m3u8

Attention I tried Safari and it works perfectly.

 

 

Thank you

Greetings

Francesco

[Cebolla]

The m3u8 internet radio station URLs are normally used for the HLS AAC format. Does Moode support HLS streams?

 

If not, you could try using the MinimServer UPnP media server with it's optional MinimStreamer component for now, as that is supposed to support HLS AAC streams by transcoding them to 'normal' AAC ADTS streams and you should then be able to use Moode as a UPnP renderer for them with MinimServer, see:

Playing BBC HLS radio streams on a UPnP renderer

 

MinimStreamer was originally updated to be used with the BBC radio HLS streams, but has recently been updated to get it to work with other internet radio providers of HLS streams:

Malformed stream URL

[TimCurtis]

Hello Tim, congratulations, good job.

My question: I can not operate the links of web radio with extension .m3u8. Which version should I use for Moode?

Here is a link to an example of an Italian radio: http://radiocapital-lh.akamaihd.net/i/RadioCapital_Live_1@196312/master.m3u8

Attention I tried Safari and it works perfectly.

 

Thank you

Greetings

Francesco

 

Hi Francesco,

 

MPD does not support decode of HLS format yet. People including myself have asked for it on the MPD forum so hopefully at some point the MPD dev's will add it. Its already supported in in avconv lib that MPD uses for other formats.

 

Regards,

Tim

[resampler]

Not sure about integrating streaming services. I understand the appeal of a "universal" player but currently, if Moode Airplay receiver is on Moode nicely stops what it was playing from its playlist and starts playing the Airplay stream.

 

This enables full featured Tidal, Spotify, or Qobuz to run in one Browser tab while Moode runs in another. ...

 

... It could be viewed as a "best of both worlds" configuration

Dear Tim

 

Sorry for bringing this up again. Just discovered Moode and like it very much. It seems the best Raspberry audio player solution to me at the moment. The only thing I struggle with, is integration of Spotify...

 

While the airplay solution might be comfortable, I think it also brings disadvantages as well...

 

 

• I am on a linux machine. Setting up Pulseaudio-Airplay is rather tricky here, and is not very reliable (similar on Android).
  
• I am also concerned about audio quality, sending the signal all the way through spotify app, pulseaudio, airplay and again through the raspberry seems not very good from a audiophile's point of view.
  
• There is always the need to run a second machine as the player.
  

 

I think it would be great to have Moode stream directly from Spotify (or other services like Tidal, Deezer etc if possible) as a standalone player for the above reasons. Would make it just perfect for me.

 

Thank you.

 

Patrick

[TimCurtis]

Dear Tim

 

Sorry for bringing this up again. Just discovered Moode and like it very much. It seems the best Raspberry audio player solution to me at the moment. The only thing I struggle with, is integration of Spotify...

 

While the airplay solution might be comfortable, I think it also brings disadvantages as well...

 

 

• I am on a linux machine. Setting up Pulseaudio-Airplay is rather tricky here, and is not very reliable.
  
• I am also concerned about audio quality, sending the signal all the way through spotify app, pulseaudio, airplay and again through the raspberry seems not very good from a audiophile's point of view.
  
• There is always the need to run a second machine as the player.
  

 

I think it would be great to have Moode stream directly from Spotify (or other services like Tidal, Deezer etc if possible) as a standalone player for the above reasons. Would make it just perfect for me.

 

Thank you.

 

Patrick

 

Hi Patrick,

 

I get roughly equal number of requests for Youtube, Qobuz, Tidal, Deezer, Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, etc, and since Moode Airplay receiver provides a more or less universal way of playing content from all of these music services using their full featured native interfaces I've chosen to stick with that approach for now.

 

Regards,

Tim

[resampler]

Thanks for your quick answer.

 

I perfectly understand the reasoning behind your choice to stick with the airplay solution. Especially as far as equality between the services is concerned (but at the same time airplay is Apple propriety and a pretty bad example in this respect).

 

As far as fully featured clients are concerned though, I rather care about audio quality and a reasonable ease of use. I guess this might be true for many users tinkering with raspberry audio. Volumio for example allows a simple access to spotify playlists, which I find sufficient.

 

And as far as equality is concerned... hey, it is possible for everyone to stream via airplay

 

Just wanted to voice these concerns from a users point of view.

 

Best regards

 

Patrick

[TimCurtis]

Thanks for your quick answer.

 

I perfectly understand the reasoning behind your choice to stick with the airplay solution. Especially as far as equality between the services is concerned (but at the same time airplay is Apple propriety and a pretty bad example in this respect).

 

As far as fully featured clients are concerned though, I rather care about audio quality and a reasonable ease of use. I guess this might be true for many users tinkering with raspberry audio. Volumio for example allows a simple access to spotify playlists, which I find sufficient.

 

And as far as equality is concerned... hey, it is possible for everyone to stream via airplay

 

Just wanted to voice these concerns from a users point of view.

 

Best regards

 

Patrick

 

Hi Patrick,

 

I hear ya :-)

 

Btw, the Airplay receiver that Moode uses is the wonderfully engineered shairport-sync by Mike Brady.

https://github.com/mikebrady/shairport-sync

 

Shairport-sync enables Moode to be used as endpoints in multi-room audio scenarios where perfect to-the-ear synchronized audio is required. Hardware can be Pi-1B, 2B or Zero plus any of the really nice DAC's or AMP's for the Pi boards.

 

For Mac OS X clients, Airplay multi-send capability is built into iTunes. Rogue Amoeba's Airfoil app for Windows or OS X provides OS level multi-send for Airplay that can be used with any app/source. I've used both solutions and they are robust.

 

The missing piece for Linux clients is Airfoil. If Rogue Amoeba were to dev a version of Airfoil for Linux, ease of use would greatly improve :-)

 

Regards,

Tim

[TimCurtis]

Hi,

 

Here are some screen shots of Audio info popup with new "Encoded at" field. Its the actual bit depth and sample rate used to encode the song file. Note that for radio stations this field will always contain the string "VBR compression".

 

Having the "Encoded at" metadata could allow a selective resampling feature to be developed whereby files encoded at 16/44.1 are resampled to higher rate while "Hires" files are left alone.

 

Regards,

Tim

[TimCurtis]

Hi,

 

Testing Linux kernel 4.1.15+ and its looking pretty solid. Might make it into test release 2 (TR2) :-)

 

Regards,

Tim

[lcg]

Dear all,

 

has anyone successfully used the official 7" touchscreen for the RPi along with moode on the same machine?

 

I tried with limited success`(matchbox, unclutter, midori/ iceweasel), the following problems arose:

 

(1) For the touchscreen - best would be to remove the playlist and place the buttons next to each other (i.e. horizontally).

 

(2) What is the best practice to completely hide the mouse cursor? Create a transparent cursor? unclutter is not my option, I do not want to see a cursor even while touching the screen (that's the reason I use a touchscreen).

 

(3) How to configure the-not-necessary-mouse and touchscreen in a way that touching the screen and moving the finger on the touch really moves the screen (e.g. top->bottom) NOT via scrollbars but just via touch?

 

Additionally, it looks ugly if one touches the screen, moves the finger and it looks like drag'n'drop (e.g. touch the cover artwork and it looks like moving the artwork). The result should be scrolling, not moving objects. Can this be fixed and how (browser?, window-manager? X?)? How does this work technically? Touching the screen should result in scrolling without changing anything of what-is-visible. On Android etc. this is normal behavior. It would be ok to have scrollbars but they should look smaller compared to what is part of matchbox-window-manager. Can this be done via css?

 

(4) Without keyboard/ mouse it would be good to add a "F5" button for page-refresh.

 

(5) On-screen keyboard? Any experiences?

 

Thanks for any experiences!

 

best

leo

[TimCurtis]

Dear all,

 

has anyone successfully used the official 7" touchscreen for the RPi along with moode on the same machine?

 

I tried with limited success`(matchbox, unclutter, midori/ iceweasel), the following problems arose:

 

(1) For the touchscreen - best would be to remove the playlist and place the buttons next to each other (i.e. horizontally).

 

(2) What is the best practice to completely hide the mouse cursor? Create a transparent cursor? unclutter is not my option, I do not want to see a cursor even while touching the screen (that's the reason I use a touchscreen).

 

(3) How to configure the-not-necessary-mouse and touchscreen in a way that touching the screen and moving the finger on the touch really moves the screen (e.g. top->bottom) NOT via scrollbars but just via touch?

 

Additionally, it looks ugly if one touches the screen, moves the finger and it looks like drag'n'drop (e.g. touch the cover artwork and it looks like moving the artwork). The result should be scrolling, not moving objects. Can this be fixed and how (browser?, window-manager? X?)? How does this work technically? Touching the screen should result in scrolling without changing anything of what-is-visible. On Android etc. this is normal behavior. It would be ok to have scrollbars but they should look smaller compared to what is part of matchbox-window-manager. Can this be done via css?

 

(4) Without keyboard/ mouse it would be good to add a "F5" button for page-refresh.

 

(5) On-screen keyboard? Any experiences?

 

Thanks for any experiences!

 

best

leo

 

Hi Leo,

 

There are a couple users on diyAudio in the Moode thread that have the 7" touch screen working. There is a Youtube video in a post from the last couple of days.

 

Biggest issue with the 7" touch is that its based on 16:10 aspect ratio and Moode UI is designed for 4:3 a/r (iPad). This means the bottom part of the UI is cut off on the 7" touch.

 

There is already a "Refresh" selection on Moode menu :-)

 

Regards

Tim

[TimCurtis]

Hi,

 

Here are some screen shots of the new Library panel menu that is displayed after clicking on cover art.

 

The menu items Add, Play, and Clear/Play apply to whole Genre, Artist or Album, or the entire collection. The track count is highlighted when the menu is displayed as a cue.

 

I've also used a tint of Flat UI "Wet Asphalt" color to lighten the artist name so it stands out a bit more from the background.

 

Regards,

Tim

[Tribon]

Thank you for update. I just installed 2.5 TR1. It is working very reliable.

Small album cover under Library is very good idea.

 

As for now everything works as it should but I didn't test unplugging of DAC. I will test that feature during daily ON/OFF of DAC.

I can not see "Encoded at" field. Probably will show up in newer version.

I'm always turning OFF volume control under MPD Configuration (I'm using USB DAC). Is it OK?