Just a sort of general question for you all

As more of a gear-head than programmer, I have been out looking for front end software for a bar-top jukebox I am working on. Just a simple gui in the style of an old time jukebox. Much research has revealed that 99% of the stuff out there is M$ based. Having sworn off window$ a while back, went looking for linux based pkgs without much result. I mean there are LOTS of music players/managers but nothing with just a simple interface that still has some style.

Ok I says (says I) why not use php with a mysql backend catalogue. I can set up the output with html and css to look however I want right…?

Only problem is while I have found a couple of GNU projects that I may be able to mod, they are all relatively old (3 to 5 yrs) and unsupported by their authors or users. With the exception of a few M$ based commercial products the same situation exists across the street. Any insights as to why this may be?

Not sexy enough? Its all been done? If I cant be bigger and more complicated its not worth it?
? ? ?

Not an earth shaking issue, just curious as to some outside opinions from the people who actually spend time writing code.

TIA

What your talking about is not difficult, basically you would like a database with a list of files and then some kind of web player for the files. HTML5 Comes to mind. Then it is just a matter of listing the items in the database in a paginated table that is styled to look like a juke box page. This sounds fairly simple… I think you should get started on a database and reading the information once that is out of the way the rest will be a cake walk. You will need PHP CSS HTML and MySQL. If you would like more assistance with where and how to start look up LAMP first.

@Andrew:
Tks Andrew I have started this project hacking an existing GNU pkg called TinCan that contains most of the elements I need and is written in such a fashion that the html/css hack is simple. I’ve currently got it running on CrunchBang (Debian) distro with LAMP stack no problems. If I run into questions/roadblocks along the way I will post in appropriate forums.

Original question was why are so many promising and useful pieces of software left abandoned on the side of the road? From discussions elsewhere I have concluded that many if not most are written by students who either lose interest or no longer have time once the wolves start baying at the door. Just curious as an old fart who hates to see promising projects abandoned.

Tks again for the input

Most of my projects get abandoned because they are finished for my purposes… Meaning that it does what I want it to do and if I want more I will do more at that time… I think that is where most projects end up at some point. Unless you have a development team who keeps pushing the need/demand of the assignment your stuck at some point with cosmetic changes.

@Andrew:
Makes sense… Tks

Sponsor our Newsletter | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service