Serving up music with Sockso
Sock Box
The Sockso music server offers easy listening regardless of your system or location.
The Sockso personal music server [1] lets users distribute digital tracks over a network. Sockso comes with a server and a neat front end that gives users easy access to audio data. The Sockso server supports popular audio formats such as MP3, OGG Vorbis, and WMA.
Legal Issues
The technical ability to serve music does not give you the legal ability to infringe on copyrights. If you intend to stream music on the Internet, either obtain permission from the copyright owner, or else make sure you only use tracks that are under a free license.
Configuration
It makes sense to run the Sockso server on a separate machine and use a browser to access it. The front end is programmed in Java and will thus run on Linux, Mac, and Windows.
To run Sockso, you need the Sun Java Runtime Engine and a network connection. If you will be serving up tracks to friends on the Internet, your PC needs a fast connection.
Java is included with most Linux distributions today. If your distro doesn't have Java, launch a package manager to load the package. Users with Ubuntu must additionally set the Sun Java version as their preferred version by giving the sudo update-alternatives --config java command.
Compressed archives of Sockso are available on the web [2]. Just download and unpack the archive. To launch Sockso on Linux, run the linux.sh script. Typing chmod +x linux.sh at the console makes the script executable. You can then launch the server and the front end by typing ./linux.sh.
Getting Started
Sockso lets you configure and manage tracks through a graphical user interface known as the Collection Manager (Figure 1). The Collection Manager provides five tabs for managing your music: Music, Collection, Users, General, and Encoders. The first step is to select the music directories you want to share.
To do so, change to the Collection tab and click Add Folder to pop up the Open dialog. Then browse to the directory you want to share. Open changes to the desired folder, telling the software to read the tracks in the directory and any subdirectories below it. This process can take a couple of minutes for larger collections, even if you have fast hardware. To get started, you might prefer to select less densely populated directories and avoid loading too many tracks at the same time.
The tracks you load are shown below Tracks in the Music tab, and you can use the tracks in this list to compose playlists. To do so, hold down the left mouse button and drag the desired tracks, albums, or artists to the right-hand side of the Music tab.
After finishing your selections, press Save Playlist and assign an intuitive name to the new entry. Any playlists you save are listed under Playlists.
Web Interface
After setting up a playlist, it makes sense to test whether the program is working in your browser. To do so, click on Your address at the lower edge of the Collection Manager window, where you'll see a menu in which you can select My Computer. Sockso then launches the web front end in your browser (Figure 2). A menu bar lets you browse your collection for interesting tracks.
Browsing by album cover is a visually appealing function. The software automatically loads image files for your albums off the web and integrates the images with the search function. Unfortunately, the software tries to display large cover images despite the low resolution source material: this typically means blocky graphics.
The program sometimes fails to find album covers. The identification mechanism is not entirely reliable, even for more popular albums. In some cases, Sockso displays the same cover for different albums by the same artist.
Even without covers, you can still play or download tracks. On top of this, Sockso lets you compose and manage your own playlists via the web interface – once you have registered. After authenticating, you will find your playlists below Playlists.
Sockso provides two music players for the local machine. One player is integrated with the website, and the other with a Flash popup (Figure 3). As an alternative, you can use a standalone player assigned to the file suffix.
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
New Slimbook EVO with Raw AMD Ryzen Power
If you're looking for serious power in a 14" ultrabook that is powered by Linux, Slimbook has just the thing for you.
-
The Gnome Foundation Struggling to Stay Afloat
The foundation behind the Gnome desktop environment is having to go through some serious belt-tightening due to continued financial problems.
-
Thousands of Linux Servers Infected with Stealth Malware Since 2021
Perfctl is capable of remaining undetected, which makes it dangerous and hard to mitigate.
-
Halcyon Creates Anti-Ransomware Protection for Linux
As more Linux systems are targeted by ransomware, Halcyon is stepping up its protection.
-
Valve and Arch Linux Announce Collaboration
Valve and Arch have come together for two projects that will have a serious impact on the Linux distribution.
-
Hacker Successfully Runs Linux on a CPU from the Early ‘70s
From the office of "Look what I can do," Dmitry Grinberg was able to get Linux running on a processor that was created in 1971.
-
OSI and LPI Form Strategic Alliance
With a goal of strengthening Linux and open source communities, this new alliance aims to nurture the growth of more highly skilled professionals.
-
Fedora 41 Beta Available with Some Interesting Additions
If you're a Fedora fan, you'll be excited to hear the beta version of the latest release is now available for testing and includes plenty of updates.
-
AlmaLinux Unveils New Hardware Certification Process
The AlmaLinux Hardware Certification Program run by the Certification Special Interest Group (SIG) aims to ensure seamless compatibility between AlmaLinux and a wide range of hardware configurations.
-
Wind River Introduces eLxr Pro Linux Solution
eLxr Pro offers an end-to-end Linux solution backed by expert commercial support.