Streaming Playlists

[blueeye]

Hi, just bought a new license for Poweramp after a long time based on a friend's recommendation.

To my surprise, Poweramp, allegedly the best music player for Android is missing such a basic feature as is a streaming m3u/m3u8 playlists.

It works even in the stock Windows Media Player (WMP):

• In WMP, I add remote playlist URI for streaming (File -> Open URL) and save it to a playlist
• When I close/open WMP or reload the playlist, it will play newly added songs

Why I expect this to work?

1. Poweramp is the best Android music player
2. It has pretty solid support for Android Auto
3. According to my research, some people on this forum as well struggle to import remote playlists and are quite puzzled, since nothing happens

Notes:

• I've been personally using dynamic playlists via FileRun for streaming FLAC music for a few years
• I do strongly believe that other Poweramp users would also very welcome such a useful feature

Question:

• Will this feature be implemented till the EOY?

Thanks and take care!

Martin

[MotleyG]

Poweramp is designed to play music from your locally stored music. This is what it is best for, and yes it also supports Android Auto when you are in the car.

It does have one option that allows you to stream from an online music source like radio stations. See here for details. 

 

 

[andrewilley]

You can use online .M3U playlists which contain multiple streaming stations if you want. Download the required .M3U file and save it into one of your music folders. This will show in PA's 'Playlists' category on the next scan, and you can then open it to choose which streaming item you want to play - or just play or shuffle the lot if you want (assuming each entry is a finite length song anyway; if it's a streaming radio station, it will never stop unless you press the >> button to skip to the next station).

For example I have all of my BBC Radio stations contained in one M3U file:

http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_one
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_1xtra
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_two
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_three
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_fourfm
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_fourlw
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_four_extra
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_radio_five_live
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_6music
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_world_service
http://stream.live.vc.bbcmedia.co.uk/bbc_wm

Andre

[blueeye]

@MotleyG@andrewilley Guys, thanks for all the information.

However, I'm advanced user and am well aware how to use the Poweramp.

Used Poweramp on older Android devices with the rclone-mount magisk module to play music from my 1TB remote shares..

Please let me explain how I use Filerun:

1. I have several folders -> each folder is one playlist (with its specific URL - m3u file)
2. When I change (add/remove) music in a folder, its URL remains the same, yet the m3u content changes
3. I enter the m3u playlist URL to the stock Windows Media Player and it works exactly as it should - it fetches the m3u file, parses it and plays all the remote songs flawlessly

I guess this is the expected behavior. Honestly said, I didn't want to create this topic just for me, otherwise I'd stick with just the unlocked bootloader and magisk module on those devices. What I would like to achieve is to help other Poweramp users as well, since I googled and searched for several keywords on the remote/streamed playlists with no feasible solution.

I have tried serving Poweramp streams with FLAC songs using the NGINX X-Accel while testing several MIME types, Content-Disposition headers, etc. and songs can be played flawlessly.

I don't see a single point why this feature shouldn't be implemented taking into account that using remote playlists works perfectly fine even with the stock WMP and single songs are streamed flawlessly already using the Poweramp..

@maxmp Will you consider implementing the remote dynamic m3u/m3u8 playlist support in the foreseeable future or it's a no go?

Thanks and take care!

Martin

[andrewilley]

Sounds like you are not so much talking about streaming (i.e. playing remote sources that are being broadcast via the internet) but more about local (LAN) folder/file sharing.

Poweramp is primary a local library based player. You can include shared folders from external devices (e.g. SMB shares) in the library as long as you can create a symbolic link within the local Android storage setup:

 

If you change the content of a remotely accessible (e.g. LAN shared) folder, those changes should be picked up by Poweramp during its next scan - but bear in mind the scanning & updating process may be significantly slower than when dealing with fast local storage. Once the Library has been updated, you will see the new content in the Folders, Albums, Artists, etc categories.

Playlists (e.g. M3U files) must point to specific songs which already exist in the PA Library, which can include items scanned from such shared folders, but Playlists are not dynamic. You can't use wildcards or unterminated paths for example, you can only specify individual files. The M3U playlist format does not allow for varied dynamic content, however a playlist can point to specific online streaming URLs (such as shoutcast radio stations).

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M3U . Note: Example 2 in that wiki (an M3U file which contains just a single folder name) is not currently supported in Poweramp, only fully specified files.

Andre

[6b6561]

I guess @blueeye has something that serves files over http, it can be a web server, DLNA or whatever. Each folder holds a bunch of music files and a m3u8 playlist file.

The content of the m3u8 is somewhat like the example 4 in the M3U wiki page.
 

Quote

 

http://server/folder1/track1.mp3

http://server/folder1/track2.mp3

http://server/folder1/track1...

 

The m3u8 can be access as http://server/folder1/playlist.m3u8

[6b6561]

I did create a m3u8 like this and it plays nice in WMP, plays the files one by one. I tried to add it as a stream in Poweramp but that didn't work.

 

[6b6561]

This sounds a bit like

 

 

[6b6561]

I guess all this translates to: Please add the possibility to add a m3u8 as a http:// stream

[andrewilley]

2 hours ago, 6b6561 said:

I guess all this translates to: Please add the possibility to add a m3u8 as a http:// stream

Yes, that would solve this problem.

Currently, Poweramp would be able to play the http://server/folder1/track1.mp3, http://server/folder2/track2.mp3, etc content as streamed sources, and it would also be able to play multiple sources like that which are listed within an .M3U8 file. However at present that M3U8 file would need to be stored locally in PA's scannable directories, not on a remote URL, and would thus be a static file rather than a dynamically changing list.

In the meantime I can think of a couple of work-arounds:

1) Map the LAN-based NAS folder symbolically into the phone's Android file system using SMB/CIFS/etc mapping. Then PA can happily scan all of the music, and any playlists, from that folder into its Library database and they will appear as 'local' playable items. This is the ideal solution, but it might have repercussions of slow scanning speeds.

2) Set up some sort of automated sync process to copy the required .M3U8 files from the LAN-based NAS over into local storage on the phone, so PA can scan them directly. PA's scanner would update its Playlists Category whenever changes occur, which would handle dynamic alterations to the contents of the M3U8 file. The M3U8 would need to contain fully resolved and streamable links such as "http://server/folder1/track1.mp3" though, rather than local/relative paths on the NAS.

Andre

[blueeye]

Hi guys, thanks for the feedback!

3 hours ago, 6b6561 said:

I guess all this translates to: Please add the possibility to add a m3u8 as a http:// stream

@6b6561Yes, this is exactly what this topic is all about..

I do not understand why this feature should not be implemented, since PA does already support streaming. PA's streaming functionality may be improved a bit for it to be just perfect. Using the "m3u8 as a http:// stream" works even with the stock WMP on Windows. This is the expected behavior of many other PA's users as well, at least according to all my thorough PA's forum, Google & Reddit searches..

@andrewilleyThanks for the both workarounds.

However, as I pointed out, I do already use rclone-mount magisk module on some of my devices. It fetches music from my two dedicated servers remotely with no issues. The drawback is that you need to have unlocked bootloader and by this, you:

1. Lose warranty
2. Trip SafetyNet (cannot use Netflix, etc.)
3. Is not a noob friendly solution for other users

Also, I would like to use my daily driver (Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra) in my car and mirror it via Android Auto without unlocking bootloader, rooting, etc.

That being said, this feature may also be very well welcomed by other PA's users and I could finally start using PA on a stock Android device as well.

@maxmp Will you consider adding the possibility of "using m3u8 as a http:// stream" and possibly implementing the feature till the EOY or it is a no go?

Thanks guys for your support!

Martin

 

[andrewilley]

12 minutes ago, blueeye said:

The drawback is that you need to have unlocked bootloader

I know we're still in the workaround territory and I do agree reading M3U8s remotely would be a good idea, but there are methods that don't require root:

I used to root all my devices straight out of the box, but it's getting harder and harder to use essential apps such as banking etc on rooted devices.

Andre

[blueeye]

@andrewilley Thanks for all the tips!

As I've pointed out already, even the basic music player, such as the stock Windows Media Player does support "using m3u8 as a http:// stream" out of the box flawlessly. Poweramp should definitely have this feature as well without a doubt..

Hope this feature will be implemented soon, since all the workarounds have some drawbacks, be it complex setup process, voiding warranty, non-working protected apps, etc..

Thanks and take care!

Martin

[6b6561]

Continuing on the workarounds... How about using something like https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=dk.tacit.android.foldersync.lite&hl=en&gl=US to synchronize your m3u8's to a directory on your device. Poweramp would happily list them as Playlists with the content found behind the http:// links.

Whenever there is changes to the folder and m3u8, then you need to re-run the sync job and Poweramp should see that the m3u8 is updated and re-scan in.

FolderSync allows for connections over a lot of different protocols and service providers and sync jobs can be scheduled. (Might be that the scheduled jobs requires a license).

No need for root, configure once and let it run.

[6b6561]

If you go with FolderSync, then I would recommend to check "use temporary file" as that will stop PowerAmps scanner to scan a file while being copied.

[andrewilley]

I use FolderSync too, very easy to set up and works nicely with network shares too.

Andre

[blueeye]

Guys, thanks for all the workarounds.

I eventually ended up creating a shell script on my stock SGS22U which will periodically download remote m3u8 playlists using predefined URIs and save them to a playlists folder.

Hope that the possibility to "use m3u8 as a http:// stream" will be added in the near future, so there's no need to use such workarounds..

Thanks and take care!

Martin