Music Caster Elijah Lopez
winget install --id=ElijahLopez.MusicCaster -e A modern music player that supports Google Chromecasts, Home Mini's, etc.
Music Caster is a modern music player designed to cast audio files, system audio, and URLs to Google Chromecasts, Home Mini's, and similar devices. Offering features such as seamless streaming of various audio formats, support for multi-room setups, and customizable playback controls, it provides users with enhanced flexibility and control over their audio experience.
Ideal for music enthusiasts seeking a wireless solution, Music Caster enables easy management of audio playback across multiple devices, ensuring a synchronized and immersive listening environment. Its intuitive interface and robust feature set make it an essential tool for anyone looking to enhance their audio streaming capabilities.
Music Caster can be installed via winget, ensuring a smooth setup process for users.
README
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Music Caster is a modern music player with the ability to cast audio files, system audio, and URLs to Google Chromecasts, Google Home/Nest Minis, etc.
Display languages: English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Russian*, and Ukrainian*
Unique users as of April 23rd 2023: 3,800
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- PayPal
- Translate Music Caster to other languages
Install
Windows Download Music.Caster.Setup.exe
- IMPORTANT INFORMATION: The tray icon will be in the tray, so you will need to move it to your taskbar
- Command line installation:
winget install "Music Caster" - VirusTotal scan
- If Music Caster is auto-removed, open "Virus & threat protection", then "protection history," and restore all files related to Music Caster
Linux
Not maintained, but I did get it to work on Ubuntu once. Music Caster is not straight forward to package, so you can invoke a sudo-free install script.
mkdir -p ~/bin && git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/elibroftw/music-caster.git ~/bin/music-caster
cd ~/bin/music-caster
./linux_install.sh # use sudo for non-interactive install in case a dependency needs to be installed
Demo
Limitations
- Chromecasts only support the AAC version of WMA files
- Emojis might not work well. There's always settings.json + WEB GUI though
- Road Map
Power User Features
- Global media hot-keys are supported
- Web GUI (QR code in Settings window)
- Command Line Arguments
Here are Music Caster specific keyboard shortcuts aside from the global media hot-keys.
| Shortcut | Window | Behaviour |
|---|---|---|
| Ctrl + Shift + Alt + M | Global | Activate Main Window |
| Ctrl + (Shift) + } | Main | Toggle mini-mode |
| Esc | Main | Close Window |
| Ctrl + Shift + Q | Main | Exit Program |
| Scroll | Main | Volume and Progress Bar |
| ⬆ / A | Main | Decrease Volume by 5% |
| ⬇ / D | Main | Increase Volume by 5% |
| # | Main | Set Volume to # * 10% |
| K | Main | Pause / Resume / Start Playing |
| Shift + N | Main | Next Track |
| Shift + P / Shift + B | Main | Previous Track |
| J | Main | Rewind 5 seconds |
| L | Main | Fast-forward 5 seconds |
| Ctrl + R | Main | Cycle Repeat |
| Ctrl + M | Main | Mute |
| Ctrl + 1 | Main | Go to Tab 1 (Queue) |
| Ctrl + 2 | Main | Go to Tab 2 (URL) |
| Ctrl + 3 | Main | Go to Tab 3 (Library) |
| Ctrl + 4 | Main | Go to Tab 4 (Playlists) |
| Ctrl + 5 | Main | Go to Tab 5 (Timer) |
| Ctrl + 6 | Main | Go to Tab 6 (Metadata) |
| Ctrl + 7 | Main | Go to Tab 7 (Settings) |
Editing settings.json
- I do not recommend editing unless you know what you are doing
- Music Caster will detect changes within 10 seconds of editing
settings.json - Some settings values are hidden from the GUI for good reason
Data Collection / Privacy Policy
Below is the reasonable data that is collected when errors are encountered. I'm sure other programs collect way more than necessary.
# in handle_exception,
payload = {'VERSION': VERSION, 'FATAL': restart_program, 'EXCEPTION TYPE': exc_type.__name__,
'LINE': exc_tb.tb_lineno, 'TRACEBACK': trace_back_msg, 'LOG': log_lines,
'MQ[0]': playing_uri, 'PLAYING_STATUS': str(playing_status), 'DEVICE': device,
'CWD': os.getcwd(), 'PORTABLE': not os.path.exists(UNINSTALLER),
'MAC': hashlib.md5(get_mac().encode()).hexdigest(), 'OS': platform.platform(), 'TIME': current_time}
In addition, I collect MD5 hashed MAC addresses and IP addresses in a Google Excel Sheet. Only I have access to this data, I will NEVER give it to anyone else. Will stop collecting analytics once I stop caring about the number of users.
- Hashed MAC so that I know how many users without knowing the actual MAC addresses
- IP because I can map out the IPs to a visual map to see where my users are located
Linux Build Guide
- Define correct PY variable (requires rebuilding the image)
- Obtain the mc-builder Image
- Option A:
docker pull elibroftw/mc-builder - Option B:
docker build . -t elibroftw/mc-builder- Remember to have Docker desktop/daemon running already
- Option A:
- Build source code using:
docker run --rm --volume .:/var/music-caster elibroftw/mc-builder
Virtualenv
python3.12 -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate # Windows
source .venv/bin/activate # Non-Windows