Introduction
- VLC🔗
- is a VideoLAN's media player, that, among other cool features, facilitates command-line mode of operations and a web interface for remote control
- Multiroom🔗
- is an audio system that allow for playback and control of music throughout an entire home or building.
- SystemD🔗
- is an init system used in Linux distributions to bootstrap the user space and to manage system processes after booting
- ALSA🔗
- is a software framework and part of the Linux kernel that provides an application programming interface (API) for sound card device drivers.
Prerequisites
- A computer running Linux OS with one or more ALSA-compatible audio cards (devices)
Preparations
Recent Linux distro use PulseAudio as the main audio interface. Unfortunately, PulseAudio is not operable in a system deamon mode and VLC has to be switched to use ALSA audio interface. The script does it via command line, but ALSA drivers initially comes muted and have to be unmuted before using.
Install ALSA tools
sudo apt-get install alsa-base alsa-tools alsa-utils
If the graphical environment available, you may also install ALSA GUI tools
apt-get install alsa-tools-gui
Unmute all audio outputs
In a graphical environment you may run qasmixer, otherwise run alsamixer and follow instructions from this post
For pure command-line approach please refer to this post
Ensure VLC makes audible output via ALSA
With GUI
Switch VLC to use ALSA interface, please follow this link for instructions how to do this Start playback and try every hardware card via Audio > Audio Devices menu options
With command line
List all available ALSA devices:
aplay -L
From this list the script will use only direct hardware output devices, selected as the following
aplay -L | grep plughw:CARD
Test an audio device
cvlc --novideo --no-sout-video --aout alsa --alsa-audio-device="plughw:CARD=Generic,DEV=0"
Repeat this test for every audio device you plan to use.
Setting up VLC as systemd services
Obtain files from this project
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hutorny/vlc-multiroom/master/vlc@.service wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hutorny/vlc-multiroom/master/install-vlc-services.sh chmod u+x install-vlc-services.sh
Make a dry run
./install-vlc-services.sh
It should list mapping of VLC instances to audio devices.
Run the script
sudo ./install-vlc-services.sh <password>
where <password> is the password to be used for the http interface
On success it should print the map VLC instance -> audio device and the list of VLC services
Each instance should be accessible via http://hostname:909N
where hostname is the computer's host name or address and N
is instance number, e.g. http://192.168.0.100:9090/
Troubleshooting
Open vlc@.service in a text editor and uncomment lines
#ExecStartPre=-/bin/mkdir -p /var/log/vlc/ #ExecStartPre=-/bin/chown -R vlc /var/log/vlc/and
# -vvv --extraintf=http:logger --file-logging --logfile=/var/log/vlc/vlc-%i.log
Restart VLC services
systemctl restart vlc@{0..9}
Analyze log for errors
Take corrective actions
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