XSqueeze - XBMC and Squeezebox, together at last!

[bossanova808]

Ok so I have begun work on integrating a Squeezebox controller into XBMC.

Very early days, but it's working.

The main idea is to run Squeezeslave on your XBMc box, and provide and XBMC integrated interface to this.

The announce/development/release/everything thread is here:

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=122199

The idea is to initially develop a nice SB controller in XBMC that uses squeezeslave for local playback for now. The SB controller can also be used with other squeezeboxen of course. Eventually, possibly, squeezeslave can be subbed out for a proper slimproto handler inside of XBMC (or possible when XBMC supports binary addons, squeezeslave itself can be effectively subsumed into this add on).

Anyway, early days as I say. Contributions, thoughts, testing etc. etc. all welcomed! It's just a toy, really, but kind of fun, and nice having the classic two line SB interface in SB if you go right back to the early days...

But given this is largely an XBMC thing -> meet us over on that thread.

That link again:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=122199

[mherger]

Sounds interesting! What platforms do you support? And we want screenshots
of course! :-P

Michael


Am 10.02.2012, 12:19 Uhr, schrieb bossanova808
<bossanova808.57pv7b1328872801 (AT) no-mx (DOT) forums.slimdevices.com>:

>
> Ok so I have begun work on integrating a Squeezebox controller into
> XBMC.
>
> Very early days, but it's working.
>
> The main idea is to run Squeezeslave on your XBMc box, and provide and
> XBMC integrated interface to this.
>
> The announce/development/release/everything thread is here:
>
> http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=122199
>
> The idea is to initially develop a nice SB controller in XBMC that uses
> squeezeslave for local playback for now. The SB controller can also be
> used with other squeezeboxen of course. Eventually, possibly,
> squeezeslave can be subbed out for a proper slimproto handler inside of
> XBMC (or possible when XBMC supports binary addons, squeezeslave itself
> can be effectively subsumed into this add on).
>
> Anyway, early days as I say. Contributions, thoughts, testing etc.
> etc. all welcomed! It's just a toy, really, but kind of fun, and nice
> having the classic two line SB interface in SB if you go right back to
> the early days...
>
> But given this is largely an XBMC thing -> meet us over on that
> thread.
>
> That link again:
> http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=122199
>
>


--

Michael

[bossanova808]

Anything XBMC runs on I think (+ squeezeslave must run on the platform if you want local playback). The add on is written (like all xbmc addons) in Python - and at the moment is so embarrassingly simply a screen shot is pointless. I have tried Win, Linux (Openelex XBMC), and OSX so far.

Imaginea 1920 by 1080 50" plasma with a two line SB interface on it (plus some cover art in the corner) and you've seen it I am just mucking about, eye candy will follow....

[mherger]

> screen shot is pointless. I have tried Win, Linux (Openelex XBMC), and
> OSX so far.

Excellent, thanks!

> Imaginea 1920 by 1080 50" plasma with a two line SB interface on it
> (plus some cover art in the corner) and you've seen it I am just
> mucking about, eye candy will follow....

Fair enough. I might give it a try if I find some time...

--

Michael

[bossanova808]

Ok screenie in the first post of that thread now - like I said, v. simple as this page. Hopefully I can tie it in nicely to the very eye candy rich XBMC experience...that's the plan. Long way to go yet, but this is at least serviceable.

[bossanova808]

Good progress on this:
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?p=1012231

...integrated squeezeslave and a bit more eye candy

[DK_Dennis]

This truly looks like great work, for sure

Just for future reference; where would you prefer feedback for this plugin?

[bossanova808]

Over at the XBMC forum thread is the best spot.

[Henry66]

I would like to ask some questions here, if you don't mind, before drowning in the xbmc forums where there is TMI for a newbie.

Will this allow me to have the client ("now playing") display on my TV?
Is there any xbmc hardware that connects to the TV/receiver via HDMI?
If so, can the Squeeze-served music go over the same HDMI?
And will it work with multi-channel FLAC files?

[bossanova808]

True, the XBMC forums are vast and intimidating at times!

Yes, this is a TV display for Squeezebox clients - it can either be it's own client, and do display and playback, or it can just be a larger display for an existing Squeezebox - I am using it as one of each at my home...I don't have a Squeezebox in my main media room, so there I use this as display & player, but in another room I do have a Squeezebox so I just use this as a larger display (as the hardware based synchronisation is always better than software synchronisation and when I am in this room I typically have other rooms playing as well).

I suspect most people will use it directly as a player, though.

XBMC runs on a bewildering array of hardware, and yes on most occasions is connected by HDMI to your receiver or TV. I personally have:
- Shuttle XS35GT using HDMI for video and audio to a Denon 2309 amp
- An ASRock ION 330 connected via HDMI to a TV and analogue audio to a digital amp
- An old Mac Mini with video via DVI->HDMI and audio via SPDIF to an amp.

So basically, hardware wise, there are LOTS of options. The XBMC hardware forum has some good example/recommended setups from a user named eskro.

In terms of output, it uses Squeezeslave, so can output to whatever Squeezeslave can. Most of the time it seems to work automatically, not sure how, and sends sound to the primary output. But if you want, you can manually run 'squeezeslave -L' and it will list the available audio outputs - you can then run 'squeezeslave -o12' or similar, to get it to use a specific output (which may or may not be different to your main/tv output, depending on what you wish to achieve). The add on lets you specify extra squeezesalve arguments if you need them....although eventually I might build a window that lets you do this inside the plugin with a GUI, it won't be for a while at least - but the manual way is easy.

As to what it can play, the depends entirely on what Squeezeslave can play. I have yet to find something it can't, but I have pretty much all MP3s and FLACs, with a few m4a etc, but I don't think I have any 5.1 stuff for audio.

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/SqueezeSlave - should tell you what you need to know, or the Squeezeslave support thread.

XBMC is of course an amazing thing in many other ways than this, if you have any interest in video and slick GUIs, it's well worth trying in and of itself - this is jut a wee little bonus on the side!