iTunes Media Server
May 16, 2010Okay, so I got my iTunes server up and running for my local network. The following steps were done on Fedora 12, so your mileage may vary
yum install vsftpd (you can use Samba too, but for now I am going run with FTP)
yum install avahi (for the bonjour service to find my media server)
yum install mt-daapd (this is what is providing the streaming to iTunes)
yum install libid3tag (allows the files to have tags)
The configuration file for mt-daapd is /etc/mt-daapd.conf. Make sure to add a password to be able to log in via the web interface. I changed the directory of the media files to another location. Careful of where you change this too since the service may not be able to access it.
On the firewall open ports:
3689 for daap and FTP (if using) to allow acces
As a side note too, to get VSFTP running and chrooted to a users local directory I had to issue the following command:
getsetbool -a | grep ftp
setsebool -P | ftp_home_dir on
This allows VSFTP to get access to your home directory and without this set, I kept getting OOPS 500 access denied messages.
To test the configuration run the following command:
sudo mt-daapd -f
The web interface for the application is here:
http://127.0.0.1:3689
Beyond that, that’s it. The server auto populated the music files when it started up. Granted for some reason it crashed when I uploaded new files while streaming, but hopefully it was just a fluke. I’ll be running some other tests, but so far so good. With luck the server will auto scan the directory looking for new music.
Next on my list? Get Windows Media Center connected to the server.
AFAIK, this iTunes media server doesn’t allow you to stream or sync for that matter, your ‘top 25 most played list’. Personally, it are these little details which make sharing iTunes library worthwhile, because there are so many capable UPnP servers out there which pretty much do the same.
Recently, I discovered that Ps3 Media Server beta version will scan in a iTunes library, including all playlist, and then stream thins over your network to your Ps3 or Xbox 360. This really opens a window of possibilities.
Are you happy with your iTunes server? Cool blog by the way, other posts seem really interesting reads as well.
In the end I bailed out on the iTunes server. The biggest issue I had was that my iTunes client kept losing its connection for whatever reason. I’ve since moved over to ice-cast which I’ve been extremely happy with. Thank you for the comment and sorry for taking so long to get back to you.