MinimServer Forum

Hello
I use MinimServer 2 (starter edition) on a NAS Synology DSM 7 with either HifiCast or BubbleUPnP android apps.
I found out that local playlists changed when I put new music on the NAS and ask for rescan on MinimServer.
All or some of the albums saved in the playlist are changed !
What can I do ?
Thanks for helping.
Kind regards

The best solution for this is to use server-side playlists held as .m3u or .m3u8 files. These are guaranteed to continue to work as long as the file locations on the server stay the same.

Local playlists are less reliable because the control point must choose what information to store in the local playlist to reference files on the server. Depending on what information the control point uses and how the server works, this stored information might or might not be stable across a server rescan.

I discussed this with the author of BubbleUPnP some time ago. BubbleUPnP saved playlists use information that should be stable across a rescan but BubbleUPnP bookmarked folders use information that might change. Are you using BubbleUPnP saved playlists or bookmarked folders?

Hello
Thanks for your help.

I understand that I should use server playlists but I don't know how to do it ! It seems that I can't do that from HifiCast or BubbleUPnP ?
I must manually edit a .m3u on my computer or on the Synology to save it in the root folder of minimServer. Not easy to do I think. Or I haven't found how to do it.

When I use BubbleUPnP, the local playlists don't change after rescan ! It works while the bookmarks change after rescan...

On HifiCast, there is only one type of playlists.

Kind regards

It is unfortunate that there are so few tools for creating server-side .m3u playlists.

If you have a Windows PC, the best tool I have found for this is Playlist Creator from oddgravity. This is no longer supported by its author but it still works. It is available from various download sites such as this one.

To use this, you need to do the following:

1) In Windows Explorer, use Tools > Map network drive to map your music library shared folder to a Windows drive letter
2) Download and install Playlist Creator 3.6.2
3) In Playlist Creator, select Settings > Playlist Details
4) Under Saving playlist entries, select Relative and check 'Use forward slashes'
5) Create a folder on the mapped drive (see step 1) to store your playlists
6) In Playlist Creator, enter the folder you created in step 5 into the 'Save location' field
7) In Playlist Creator, enter the name of the playlist you want to create into the the 'Name and type' field and select .m3u as the type.
8) Drag the files you want in the playlist from Windows Explorer into Playlist Creator
9) In Playlist Creator, click the Create Playlist button
10) Repeat steps 7, 8 and 9 to create additional playlists

Try this first on one playlist to make sure you have the settings correct. When you do a MinimServer rescan, the playlist you have created should appear in the index under '1 playlist' and you should be able to select it and play it using your control point.

If you have any problems or questions, please post them here.

Hello !
Thanks for helping me.
I don't use a PC/Windows frequently.
My current machine is a macMini/Big Sur.

I have seen an utility called M4unify that could help to edit m3u files more easily than by hand. I should test it before buying it.
https://dougscripts.com/apps/m3unifyapp.php

Best regards.

Some time ago I moved my dad away from Sonos and set him up with MinimServer and BubbleUPnP. About 6 months later he asked if he could access his playlists from other devices, I found out that he'd created over 100 playlists in BubbleUPnP so I converted them to static m3u8 playlists and stored them on MinimServer. He still creates them in BubbleUPnP and every so often we export them, convert them and load them into MinimServer.

The script runs on Ubuntu under WSL so I have no idea if it'll run on mac OS. If you're competent on the command line you may be able to make use of it.

FYI, local playlists on BubbleUPnP are OK (see above) but might not be OK on other control points.

(13-11-2022 13:43)simoncn Wrote: [ -> ]FYI, local playlists on BubbleUPnP are OK (see above) but might not be OK on other control points.

The problem was that he wanted to share them across devices. I know you can import/export in BubbleUPnP but I couldn't find a way to save/open from a shared location.
Even if I had been able to share them somehow, I'd prefer to keep them in an open format and have them stored alongside the music, just makes it easier to keep things aligned and backed up, especially as he seems to spend a lot of time curating them!

Yes, that makes sense.

For info, it is possible to export BubbleUPnP 'Saved Playlists' to m3u8 (or XSPF), either individually, a selection of playlists, or in bulk.
m3u8 file are saved on Android local storage, in the folder chosen by user (for example 'Documents').

To export 'Saved Playlists', go into 'Saved Playlists' folder:

- in bulk: 3 dot menu in upper right corner > Export as M3U8
- individually: 3 dot menu on 'Saved Playlist' > Export as M3U8
- selection of playlists: long-press first 'Saved Playlist', tap other ones to select, 3 dot menu in upper right corner > Export as M3U8


XSPF is a more elaborate playlist format than m3u (more metadata) and can be useful to import playlists into music cloud services via Soundiiz.