RadioPlayer

A lightweight, cross-platform radio player built with Tauri and Vanilla JavaScript. Features local playback and Google Cast integration.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have the following installed on your machine:

1. Node.js: Download Node.js (LTS version recommended).
2. Rust: Install via rustup.rs.
3. Visual Studio C++ Build Tools (Windows only): Required for compiling Rust. Ensure "Desktop development with C++" is selected during installation.

Installation

1. Clone the repository:

git clone <repository-url>
cd RadioPlayer

2. Install dependencies:

   npm install
   

3. Verify Rust environment: It's good practice to ensure your Rust environment is ready.

   cd src-tauri
   cargo check
   cd ..
   

Development

To start the application in development mode (with hot-reloading for frontend changes):

npm run tauri dev

This command will:

1. Compile the Rust backend.
2. Launch the application window.
3. Watch for changes in src/ and src-tauri/.

Building for Production

To create an optimized, standalone executable for your operating system:

1. Run the build command:

   npm run tauri build
   

2. Locate the artifacts: After the build completes, the installers and executables will be found in:

   • Windows: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/msi/ or nsis/
   • macOS: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/dmg/ or macos/
   • Linux: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/deb/ or appimage/

Project Structure

• src/: Frontend source code (Vanilla HTML/CSS/JS).
  • index.html: The main entry point of the app.
  • main.js: Core logic, handles UI events and communication with the Tauri backend.
  • styles.css: Application styling.
  • stations.json: Configuration file for available radio streams.
• src-tauri/: Rust backend code.
  • src/main.rs: The entry point for the Rust process. Handles Google Cast discovery and playback logic.
  • tauri.conf.json: Configuration for the Tauri app (window size, permissions, package info).

Customization

Adding Radio Stations

To add new stations, edit the src/stations.json file. Add a new object to the array with a name and stream url:

[
  {
    "name": "My New Station",
    "url": "https://stream-url.com/stream"
  }
]

Adjusting Window Size

To change the default window size, edit src-tauri/tauri.conf.json:

"windows": [
  {
    "width": 360,  // Change width
    "height": 720, // Change height
    "resizable": false
  }
]

Troubleshooting

• Command tauri not found: Ensure you are running commands via npm run tauri ... or global install @tauri-apps/cli.
• WebView2 Error (Windows): If the app doesn't start on Windows, ensure the Microsoft Edge WebView2 Runtime is installed.
• Build Failures: Try running cargo update inside the src-tauri folder to update Rust dependencies.

FFmpeg (Optional) for Native Playback

Local/native playback uses an external FFmpeg binary to decode radio streams.

How the app finds FFmpeg

At runtime it searches in this order:

1. RADIOPLAYER_FFMPEG environment variable (absolute or relative path)
2. Next to the application executable (Windows: ffmpeg.exe, macOS/Linux: ffmpeg)
3. Common bundle resource folders relative to the executable:

• resources/ffmpeg(.exe)
• Resources/ffmpeg(.exe)
• ../resources/ffmpeg(.exe)
• ../Resources/ffmpeg(.exe)

4. Your system PATH

Optional: download FFmpeg automatically (Windows)

This is opt-in (it is not run automatically during build/run). It downloads a prebuilt FFmpeg zip and extracts ffmpeg.exe into tools/ffmpeg/bin/ffmpeg.exe.

npm run ffmpeg:download

Then run npm run dev:native (or npm run build) to copy FFmpeg into src-tauri/resources/ for bundling.

License

[Add License Information Here]

Release v0.2

Public beta (v0.2) — updates since v0.1:

• Android build support: Project includes Android build scripts and Gradle wrappers. See scripts/build-android.sh and build-android.ps1. Prebuilt native helper binaries are available in src-tauri/binaries/ for convenience.
• Web receiver & webapp: The receiver/ folder contains a Custom CAF Receiver UI (HTML/CSS/JS) and the webapp/ folder provides a standalone web distribution for hosting the app in browsers or PWAs.
• Sidecar improvements: sidecar/index.js now retries launches when devices return NOT_ALLOWED by attempting to stop existing sessions before retrying. Check sidecar logs for Launch NOT_ALLOWED messages and retry attempts.
• LIVE stream: The app continues to support the LIVE stream https://live.radio1.si/Radio1MB (contentType: audio/mpeg, streamType: LIVE).

Included receiver files:

• receiver/index.html
• receiver/receiver.js (CAF Receiver initialization + LOAD interceptor for LIVE metadata)
• receiver/styles.css
• receiver/assets/logo.svg

Quick testing notes

• The receiver must be served over HTTPS for Cast devices to load it. For quick local testing you can use mkcert + a static HTTPS server:

# create local certs
mkcert -install
mkcert localhost

# serve the receiver folder over HTTPS
npx http-server receiver -p 8443 -S -C localhost.pem -K localhost-key.pem

• Use the Default Media Receiver App ID while developing, or register a Custom Receiver App in the Cast Developer Console and point its URL to your hosted index.html for production.

Sidecar / troubleshoot

• If a Cast launch fails with NOT_ALLOWED, the sidecar will attempt to stop any existing sessions on the device and retry the launch (best-effort). Check sidecar logs for Launch NOT_ALLOWED and subsequent retry attempts.
• Note: the sidecar uses castv2-client (not the official Google sender SDK). Group/stereo behavior may vary across device types — for full sender capabilities consider adding an official sender implementation.