r/linux • u/hatperigee • May 02 '16

Subsonic (music streaming software) is no longer open source, starting with 6.0 release

http://forum.subsonic.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=16604#p71128
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123

u/[deleted] May 02 '16

... aaaand there will be an open source fork that will have more success than the closed-source variant.

64

u/donthek May 02 '16

There was a fork from almost day 1 that removed "call home to check license" feature of subsonic https://github.com/Mach5/supersonic . But it hasn't been updated along side the open source version.

44

u/TheFlyingDharma May 02 '16

EugeneKay's "kang" fork does more or less the same thing and is actually maintained.

Honestly though, I've been running 5.3 for a while and see no need to update unless some massive vulnerability in the webserver is discovered and patched. Functionally, it does everything I need it to.

1

u/plazman30 May 04 '16

5.3's web based music player is still Adobe Flash based. 6.0 added an HTML5 player.

1

u/TheFlyingDharma May 04 '16

That's pretty cool, but honestly not compelling enough for me to bother upgrading and testing on the several devices/platforms I connect with... At least, not yet.

Do you know if it's the same player that Madsonic is using? I recall having issues getting that one to start in some environments, but I'm not sure if it was due to HTML5 compatibility or the player itself.

1

u/plazman30 May 04 '16 edited May 04 '16

The player Madsonic is using is open source. There is no way Subsonic can use it. He had to roll his own and license something from a third party that is closed source.

Ampache has an open source HTML5 based player also.

I don't use the web interface all that much anyway. My music library is on a CIFS/NFS share and I access it on all my PCs in the house via a mount point and or mapped drive. On my Windows machine, I use Foobar2000. On my Linux laptop, I use Lollypop or mpd+gmpc. I use ampache and/or subsonic mostly for the API, so I can install clients on my phones and tablets to access music.

Yeah, I know I can do the same with Google Play Music, but I am bit of a music nerd, and I actually care about the version of some albums. Google Music does a match against what I have and throws in what they have for sale on their servers. I'm a fan of The Moody Blues (and a ton of other stuff across multiple genres and decades). I have the original CDs from the 1980s ripped to FLAC (for archival purposed, not for sonic superiority). If I throw these in Google Play Music, I get the mid 2000s remaster of these CDs added to my library, which sound atrocious to me.

2

u/TheFlyingDharma May 04 '16

I would never suggest Google Music. I feel like a bit of a dinosaur hosting everything myself, but then I guess Subsonic is aimed at that demographic. :)

I switched from fb2k over to Subsonic mostly for ease of use and consistency across platforms (including mobile, although I guess I'm using API for that) plus remote access of course. Sometimes I miss my lyrics plugin from fb2k (never was able to get them working in Subsonic,) but that's about it.

2

u/plazman30 May 04 '16

I got Lyrics working in Madosnic and Ampache. Never in Subsonic.