moosicd - the server for the Moosic jukebox system.
moosicd --help|-h|--version|-v
moosicd [--history-size|-s size] [--config|-c directory] [--quiet|-q|--debug|-d] [-S|--stdout] [-t|--tcp port] [-T|--tcp-also port] [-l|--local-only]
moosicd is the server for the Moosic jukebox system. It sits around, waiting
to respond to commands given by a Moosic client (such as the moosic manpage(1)). It
also maintains a queue of items to be played, and if this queue is not empty,
it pops off the first item from the head of the queue and executes a
user-configurable command on that item. When this command terminates,
moosicd goes on to the next item in its queue, assuming that the queue is
not empty.
moosicd is not meant to be used as a system-wide daemon that serves all users
on a system. Rather, every user that wishes to use Moosic should start a
separate instance of moosicd, and one user cannot communicate with the Moosic
server of another user without taking special measures (i.e. using the -c or
-t options to moosic).
moosicd is designed so that you normally don't need to use any of these
options.
- -h, --help
-
Prints help text and exits.
- -v, --version
-
Prints version information and exits.
- -s size, --history-size size
-
moosicd remembers the file names of previous songs that it played. This
option sets the maximum size of this history list. The default value is 50.
- -f, --foreground
-
By default, moosicd detaches itself from the current terminal and puts itself
in the background (i.e. it becomes a daemon). This option disables such
behavior.
- -S, --stdout
-
By default, moosicd logs almost all of its printed output to a file. When
this option is used, the output is instead printed to the standard output
device. This also prevents the program from putting itself in the background and
detaching from the current terminal.
- -q, --quiet
-
This option suppresses almost all printed output from moosicd. Note that, by
default, moosicd prints this output to a file, not the standard output
device.
- -d, --debug
-
This option causes moosicd to print lots and lots of messages about what
it's doing. These messages are usually quite superfluous and bothersome. Note
that unless the -S option is used these messages will appear in the log file
instead of the standard output device.
- -c directory, --config directory
-
Specifies the directory where moosicd should keep the various files that it
uses. The default directory is ~/.moosic/. This option is useful only in
extraordinary circumstances. If this option is used, any Moosic clients that
wish to communicate with moosicd must be told to use the specified directory
instead of the default.
- -t port, --tcp port
-
This option directs the server to listen to the given TCP port number for client
requests instead of using the normal communication method. Use of this option
without the -l option is highly discouraged unless you know what you are
doing because there is no guarantee that moosicd is secure against malicious
input from a remote location. Note that an instance of moosicd which is
started with this option will not accept requests from a client that is using
the normal communication method.
- -T port, --tcp-also port
-
This option directs the server to listen to the given TCP port number for client
requests in addition to using the normal communication method. Use of this
option without the -l option is highly discouraged unless you know what
you are doing because there is no guarantee that moosicd is secure against
malicious input from a remote location.
- -l, --local-only
-
This directs the server to only listen for TCP connections that originate from
the local computer, refusing connections from remote hosts. This only has an
effect when --tcp or --tcp-also is used.
moosicd figures out how to play items in its queue by consulting its
configuration file, which associates string patterns (in the form of
Perl-compatible regular expressions) with commands.
The format of this file is as follows: Every pair of lines forms a unit. The
first line in a pair is a regular expression that will be matched against items
in the queue. The second line in a pair is the command that will be used to play
any items that match the regular expression. The name of the item to be played
will be appended to the end of this command, unless the string ``$item'' occurs in
the command, in which case every occurrence of ``$item'' will be replaced with the
name of the item to be played.
The command won't be interpreted by a shell, so don't try tricks with quotes or
globbing. If you need any of these fancy features, wrap up the command in a real
shell script (and remember to use an ``exec'' statement to invoke the program that
does the actual song playing, otherwise Moosic won't be able to do things like
stop or pause the song).
Blank lines and lines starting with a '#' character are ignored. Regular
expressions specified earlier in this file take precedence over those specified
later.
moosicd makes use of several files, all of which are found in the
.moosic/ directory in the home directory of the user who invoked the
program (unless the -c or --config option is used).
- config
-
This is the configuration file that moosicd uses to associate file-types to
player commands, as explained above.
- server_log
-
moosicd logs short notices of its activities to this file unless the -S
option is used. It usually contains nothing more than a history of what songs
have been played.
- player_log
-
This file contains the output of the player commands which are spawned by
moosicd.
- socket
-
This is a socket file which is (normally) used to allow Moosic clients to
contact the Moosic server. If moosicd isn't shut down properly, this file
will need to be removed by hand. You should leave this file alone under other
circumstances.
the moosic manpage(1), the standard command-line Moosic client.
The chapter entitled ``Regular Expression Syntax''
http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/re-syntax.html from the section dealing
with the re module in the Python Library Reference, for details on the
syntax of a regular expression.
Daniel Pearson <daniel@nanoo.org>