Quasar

A self-hosted browser-based media player for a personal MP3 collection.

• Ultra-lightweight (search backend written in C++ with a SQLite database) so it can be hosted even on a low-power NAS box

• Supports cover art in cover.jpg, albumart.jpg or folder.jpg files

• Responsive design for mobile use

• Keyboard shortcuts

• Works with music formats supported by your browser, including MP3 and M4A (no transcoding)

Dependencies

To compile Quasar, you must have Inkscape, ImageMagick, wget, and Handlebars installed. These programs are used to render the logo, download JavaScript libraries, and compile the templates file. To create or update the database, you need Perl with the Image::ExifTool and DBD::SQLite modules. These steps are platform-independent and can be done on any computer, so you don't need to install Inkscape or Handlebars on your NAS device.

You need SQLite and a C++ compiler (g++) to compile the search backend.

Installation

1. Use make to download library dependencies, compile the backend, and generate static files.

   This requires Inkscape, ImageMagick, wget, and Handlebars. It is recommended to have pngcrush as well, but that is optional.

2. Update the library database by running updatedb_sql.pl with two arguments. The first argument is the path to the database file to create or update; the second is the Music directory to index.

   perl updatedb_sql.pl quasar.db /media/music
   

3. The Quasar daemon supports either CGI or FastCGI. The environment variable QUASAR_DBFILE specifies the path to the database file; if it is not set, Quasar will use quasar.db in the current directory.

4. Configure Quasar by creating the file quasar.config.js. An example configuration file is provided in quasar.config-example.js. The QUASAR variable gives the URL to the search backend. The MUSICDIR variable specifies the URL to the Music directory.

   The BRANDING and LONG_BRANDING variables allow the visible name of Quasar to be customized for your installation.

Local Testing

You can test Quasar locally using the basic Python web server. Assuming QUASAR = '/cgi-bin/quasar' in your quasar.config.js:

mkdir -p cgi-bin
ln -s ../quasar cgi-bin
python -m CGIHTTPServer

Then open http://localhost:8000/quasar.html.

Keyboard shortcuts

Key	Action
Space or X	Toggle playback
C or Shift+→	Next
Z or Shift+←	Previous
digits 0 - 9	Seek to position
[ and ]	Seek 30 seconds back and forward, respectively
; and '	Seek 10 seconds back and forward, respectively
, and .	Seek 5 seconds back and forward, respectively
/	Search
Shift + A	Go to current artist
Shift + B	Go to browse tab
Shift + D	Go to current album
Shift + N	Go to Now Playing