3 Paraslash is an acronym for
5 Play, archive, rate and stream large audio sets happily
7 It contains the following programs:
9 - para_server (obligatory):
11 This server listens on a tcp port and accepts commands such as
12 play, stop, pause, next. However, there are many more commands.
14 For audio streaming, at least one sender must be activated.
15 At the moment, paraslash contains two internal senders:
17 The http sender is recommended for public streams that can
18 be played by any player like mpg123, xmms, winamp...
20 The ortp sender is recommended for LAN streaming and for
21 private streams that require authentication.
23 It is possible to activate more than one sender simultaneously.
24 All senders have the same set of commands that allow to
25 control the access permissions of the stream.
27 para_server needs a "database tool" to work, mainly to
28 determine which song to stream next. There are three such
29 tools available: random, plm and mysql. The former chooses
30 audio files randomly and plm, the playlist manager, can handle
31 playlists. Both are always supported.
33 The (optional) mysql database tool connects to a mysql server
34 which holds information on your audio files. It has several
35 unusual features, see README.mysql for details.
37 - para_client (obligatory):
39 The client program to connect to para_server.
41 - para_recv (optional)
43 A command line http/ortp stream grabber.
45 - para_filter (optional)
47 An filter program that converts from stdin and writes to
48 stdout. This one is independent from the rest of paraslash,
49 so it might be useful also for different purposes.
51 para_filter combines an mp3 decoder an oggvorbis decoder
52 and a volume normalzer. New filters can be added easily due
53 to the modular design. If more than one filter is specified,
54 the given filters are 'piped' together in-memory, i.e. without
55 calling any of the read(2)/write(2)/select(2) etc. functions.
57 - para_play (optional)
59 A small wav/raw player for alsa.
61 - para_audiod (optional, but recommended):
63 The local daemon that starts playback and collects information
64 from para_server to be forwarded to local clients.
66 para_audiod reads the audio stream from the network if
67 para_server indicates that there is a stream available. It may
68 be sent through any of the supported filters (see para_filter
69 above) before the result is fed to the output software
70 (default: para_play) which must be capable of reading from
71 stdin, but is not restricted otherwise.
73 - para_audioc (optional, but recommended)
75 A small client that can talk to para_audiod. Used to control
76 para_audiod and to receive status info. It can also be used to
77 grab the stream at any point in the filter chain. para_audioc
78 is needed by para_gui, para_sdl_gui and para_krell, see below.
80 - para_gui (optional, but recommended):
82 Themable ncurses-based gui. It calls para_audioc and presents
83 the obtained information in an ncurses window. para_gui
84 provides key-bindings for the most common commands and new
85 key-bindings can be added easily.
87 - para_sdl_gui (optional):
89 SDL-based gui. Similar to para_gui but presents its output in
90 an X window (fullscreen mode is also available) and can display
91 jpg images on a per song basis. para_sdl_gui provides an input
92 prompt to enter arbitrary commands. However, it can also be used
93 non-interactively (e.g. as a screen saver) via the -i switch.
95 - para_krell (optional, only useful in conjunction with the mysql dbtool):
97 A plugin for gkrellm which shows small pictures of the
98 current song. It allows you to launch 27 different commands
99 by clicking in different areas of its picture (9 small squares
102 - para_fade (optional):
104 A (Linux-only) alarm clock and volume-fader.
106 - para_dbadm (optional, only useful in conjunction with the mysql dbtool):
108 Very simple curses-based frontend which uses libmenu. Useful
109 for quickly changing the attributes of the current song
110 (e.g. from para_gui as an external command).
112 - para_slider (optional, only useful in conjunction with the mysql dbtool):
114 A small X application which shows a scrollbar for each
115 attribute defined in the mysql database. It creates a stream
116 definition from the values of the scrollbars. This allows
117 to smoothly change the mood of the given stream without any
120 - bash_completion (optional):
122 A small bash script for inclusion in ~/.bashrc. It gives you
123 command line completion for some paraslash commands.
129 - gcc, the gnu compiler collection (shipped with distro): gcc-3
130 or newer is prefered, but gcc-2.95 is still supported. Note
131 that gcc-2.95 may spit out many warnings like unused function
132 parameters and missing initializers. These are all harmless
135 - openssl (needed by server, client): usually shipped with
136 distro, but you might have to install the "development"
139 http://www.openssl.org/
141 - software mixing, e.g. ALSA and the direct mixing plugin (dmix)
143 If you want to use the mysql-based dbtool (recommended), you also need
149 These are usually shipped with the distro but probably not installed
152 The mp3 decoder of para_filter is based on libmad:
154 http://www.underbit.com/products/mad/
156 If you prefer to use the libmad package provided by your distributor,
157 make sure to install the corresponding development package as well.
159 If you want to stream ogg vorbis files you'll need:
161 - libogg, libvorbis, libvorbisfile, and a command line ogg vorbis
162 player, e.g. para_filter or ogg123.
164 http://www.xiph.org/downloads/
166 Note that para_audiod still works even if neither mp3 nor ogg support
167 was compiled in. You'll have to use the --no_default_filters option
168 in this case (and e.g. "mpg123 -" as the stream write command).
170 If you intend to use the optional ortp streamer:
174 http://www.linphone.org/ortp/
177 For the optional SDL-based gui, the following packages must be installed:
179 - X (usually shipped with distro)
183 - libSDL (usually shipped with distro)
185 http://www.libsdl.org/index.php
189 http://www.libsdl.org/projects/SDL_image/
191 For para_slider, the zero memory widget library is neccessary. Get it at
193 http://www710.univ-lyon1.fr/~exco/ZMW/
195 Finally, para_krell needs
203 http://members.dslextreme.com/users/billw/gkrellm/gkrellm.html
207 Distribution of paraslash is covered by the GNU GPL. See file COPYING.
211 The mysql database tool assumes that the basenames of your audio files
212 are unique. If this is not the case, don't use this database tool,
213 rename your files, or create your own database tool.
217 Author: Andre Noll <maan@systemlinux.org>
218 Comments and bug reports are welcome.