Dear isoundcom,
The solution to your problem is a pair of free software packages published
by the Shoutcast crew.
The first is the Shoutcast streaming server, downloadable as a precompiled
Linux binary. See the third entry on the following page.
Shoutcast: Downloading
http://www.shoutcast.com/download/files.phtml
The Shoutcast server itself doesn't do any mp3 decoding or transcoding,
since it expects a stream from a separate audio player or from one of
its input plugins. One such plugin is Shoutcast DSP (Digital Signal
Processing). The DSP plugin comes as part of a package variously called
the Shoutcast Broadcasting Tools or Shoutcast Trans. You can download
it using the first link below the header at the following address.
Shoutcast: Shoutcast Broadcasting Tools
http://www.shoutcast.com/download/broadcast.phtml#posixdownload
What you get with the package is a precompiled Linux binary called
sc_trans_linux, which will take care of launching the Shoutcast server and
feeding it an audio stream at the bitrate you specify. You'll also have to
make one or more playlists to specify the directories from which you wish
to stream files, and specify other settings in the configuration file.
Full details are given on the following page. The pathnames in this
tutorial may differ from those on your machine, but the principles are
the same. See section 3, "Setting up SHOUTcast Trans". The Bitrate setting
lets you specify the streaming rate of your mp3 files in bits per second.
Gentoo: Chris White: Streaming Radio With SHOUTcast
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/shoutcast-config.xml?style=printable
It has been a pleasure to address this question on your behalf. If you
find fault with my answer, please inform me through a Clarification
Request so that I may fully meet your needs before you assign a rating.
Regards,
leapinglizard |
Request for Answer Clarification by
isoundcom-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 16:36 PDT
From what i understand Shoutcast allows streaming of playlists.
I need to be able to stream the individual files when clicked upon.
I don't believe this would satisfy our needs.
These files are being served from an internet site and the solution
needs to be changable and adaptable based on those needs.
Not just a bundled package like shoutcast.
|
Clarification of Answer by
leapinglizard-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 16:53 PDT
Shoutcast is still a good solution for you. Although it is often used
to stream a large playlist, it is not limited to these radio-like
applications. You shouldn't think that a playlist is some kind of
heavy-duty apparatus.
To stream a single file, you need merely provide a three-line text
file with a .pls extension. Thus, you can crawl your music directories
and make a .pls file for each file you wish to stream. As an
alternative, you can dynamically generate a .pls file for the
listener's selected file using a .cgi script.
leapinglizard
|
Clarification of Answer by
leapinglizard-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 16:59 PDT
The .m3u approach you mention, by the way, is exactly the same as that
of using .pls files. A .m3u is itself just a playlist, so you would
have to make one for each song in your collection.
It occurred to me that an alternative to using CGI is to exploit the
URL-rewriting capabilities of Apache. You can add rewriting rules to
your httpd.conf file so that whenever a user requests a .mp3 file from
your server, the request is forwarded to a custom program that
generates or points to a .pls file and launches Shoutcast Trans to
start streaming the .mp3 at the desired bitrate.
leapinglizard
|
Clarification of Answer by
leapinglizard-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 17:01 PDT
Here is a handy tutorial on using Apache rewriting rules.
A List Apart: URLs! URLs! URLs!
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/urls/
leapinglizard
|
Request for Answer Clarification by
isoundcom-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 19:44 PDT
Thanks for the clarifications.
I'm playing around with it right now.
My only problem now is that it seems that shoutcast limits the music
files that you can use to only a directory named "content" and doesn't
allow subdirectories under this dir.
Let me know if I'm missing something here or if there's a way around this.
The mp3s on our server are sorted in many diff. directories and just
one content dir. wouldn't work.
Thanks!
|
Clarification of Answer by
leapinglizard-ga
on
06 Apr 2005 20:07 PDT
From what I understand, the directory specifier is recursive.
Shoutcast should recognize .mp3 files located anywhere in the file
hierarchy below the content directory.
Another possibility is to make one flat directory containing softlinks
to all your .mp3 files. As a preliminary step, you would write a
script to crawl your music files and link them all from that directory
using "ln -s".
leapinglizard
|
