Ruby bindings for libspotify (
)
The libspotify C API package allows third party developers to write
applications that utilize the Spotify music streaming service.
Spotify is a really nice music streaming service, and being able to interact with it in an API is awesome. libspotify itself is however written in C, making it unavailable or cumbersome to use for many developers.
This project aims to allow Ruby developers access to all of the libspotify C API, without needing to reach down to C. However, to use this library to it’s full extent you will need to learn how to use the Ruby FFI API.
The Spotify gem has:
- 100% API coverage, including callback support. You’ll be able to use any function from the libspotify library.
- Automatic garbage collection. Piggybacking on Ruby’s GC to manage pointer lifecycle.
- Parallell function call protection. libspotify is not thread-safe, but Spotify protects you.
- Type conversion and type safety. Special pointers for every Spotify type, protecting you from accidental mix-ups.
As the raw libspotify API is exposed, the Spotify gem is best coupled with a supporting library. This library would take a more focused approach to which kind of applications you can write using it. The Spotify gem itself, however, has very few opinions.
Known supporting libraries:
- Hallon, the original. Currently Hallon is simply a more convenient Spotify gem, written on top of the Spotify gem. It is diverging from its previous path, now towards a more focused and opinionated framework. If you’re unsure of what to use, start with the Hallon gem!
Do not let this stop you! Despite my harsh words the Spotify API is well suited for experimentation, and it can be awfully fun to play with. If you need any assitance feel free to post a message on the mailing list: [email protected] (https://groups.google.com/d/forum/ruby-hallon).
By default, Spotify uses the libspotify gem which means you do not need to install libspotify yourself. However, if your platform is not supported by the libspotify gem you will need to install libspotify yourself.
Please note, that if your platform is not supported by the libspotify gem I’d very much appreciate it if you could create an issue on libspotify gem issue tracker so I can fix the build for your platform.
While you’re waiting for the issue to resolve you could install libspotify manually. I’ve provided instructions on how to do this in Hallon’s wiki: How to install libspotify!
Given a version X.Y.Z, each segment corresponds to:
- X reflects supported libspotify version (12.1.45 => 12). There are no guarantees of backwards-compatibility!
- Y(major).Z(minor) follows semantic versioning (semver.org). Y is for backwards-incompatible changes, Z is for backwards-compatible changes.
Copyright (c) 2012 Kim Burgestrand [email protected]
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