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Topic: Suggestions for Playing From a Networked Music Library (Read 1816 times) previous topic - next topic
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Suggestions for Playing From a Networked Music Library

I was trying to toss around some ideas for a set up for my digital media library across my several devices.  Right now, I just have a Linux box serving a directory via Samba and NFS to desktops, a laptop and a Windows Mobile Phone.  I've put together some features I'd like my set up to have, but I've been a little overwhelmed getting over some inertia in actually tooling around with all the software out there.

So far, I'd like to see:

One main repository for files to serve the desktops

Portable devices like the laptop and phone sync'ing their local copies to the main repository

Portable devices, especially the laptop when docked and thereby wired into external speakers or even a home audio system, being able to sense when they are at the home network so they can use the main network library either instead of or in addition to it's local copy

The first condition I think I have covered with simple file sharing and setting the media player to monitor those shared directories.

The second condition I have covered using sync software like SyncToy to manually sync all lossy compressed files like WV and MP3, but exclude WVC's and other stuff that takes up too much space for portables

I have no ideas for the 3rd condition.

I'd like the ability for my set up to let portables be aware if the home network is available so I could use WVC's and other stuff I have excluded as well as having easy, immediate access to new files in the library without needing to sync first.

So, those are the main things I'm shooting for now.  I had some other minor ideas like an easy way to sync files from the clients, desktop and portable, to the library for the random stuff I pick up aside from my normal ripping - like online music purchases or stuff I picked up from friends while I was on their WiFi network or whatever.  Similarly, it would be nice for clients to see each others local library without the need to sync the remote client to the main library and then from the main library to the local client.

Also, I was thinking of what would be easiest in maintaining each client's library metadata.  Right now, making sure the library files are properly tagged via id3 or ape and letting the client's automatically parse them on detection. 

I'd be open to using Windows and/or Linux apps as I'm sort of ambivalent to which I use (most of my work can be done with any text editor, ssh client and web browser.)  I'd even be able to patchwork something using both Linux and Windows, as I lately have been having fun tooling around with seamless virtual machines like colinux and virtualbox.

So, ya, I doubt finding a solution that meets all my wants would be cumbersome if not impossible, but I'd appreciate any ideas you could offer to get me started on something.


tx