Extending the Raspberry Pi to a miniature music center
Tuning In to Internet Radio
Radio stations are not pre-configured in MPD. To add them manually, create one or more files with the suffix .m3u
in the directory that you chose as the playlist_directory
entry in the /etc/mpd.conf
configuration file. You can then add the Internet addresses for the streams [7] line by line to the M3U file. Also, you can download stream addresses in M3U playlist format directly and save them to the playlist directory. To view the MP3 stream addresses contained in the playlist, enter:
$ echo $(wget -q -O - <M3U-URL>)
where <M3U-URL>
is the playlist of interest (don't type the angle brackets). Then, you can add the addresses directly to an existing playlist.
Smartphone Control
iPhone (iPod/iPad) MPD apps include MpdClient and MPoD, which have similar ratings, although someone noted that large music libraries crashed the MPoD app.
The Windows Phone app store offers MPDi and sevenMPC, which rates slightly higher and is reviewed by a Rasp Pi user. Also, Android apps for MPD can be found on Google Play. The bitMPC, Droid MPD client, and MPDroid apps are quite obvious candidates. In particular, MPDroid [8] leaves a good impression, measured by user feedback. Compared with the others, the app looks relatively mature and is attractive and clear-cut (Figure 2).
The configuration process is typically limited to entering the IP address of the Rasp Pi, after which MPDroid finds the MPD immediately. Selecting albums, songs, or playlists is intuitive, and adjusting the playback volume of the Rasp Pi jukebox is easy, with a slider on the main page of the app.
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