Spotify FAQ

Spotify support for Phoniebox

With the integration of #2315 in Version v2.7.0, Spotify will be usable again 🎉. The implementation is based on the prerelease package of Mopidy-Spotify (5.0.0a2). From the description there are currently not supported functions in this package. Please see there website for further details.

Mopidy-Spotify currently has no support for the following:

• Seeking
• Gapless playback
• Volume normalization
• Saving items to My Music - possible via web API
• Podcasts - unavailable
• Radio - unavailable
• Spotify Connect - unavailable

This document is a MUST read for all users of the +Spotify Edition

(If you have new information on using Spotify with Phoniebox, please create a ticket)

If you want to integrate Spotify:

• You must have A Spotify Premium subscription. Mopidy-Spotify will not work with Spotify Free, just Spotify Premium.
• You need a non-Facebook Spotify username and password.
  • If you created your account through Facebook you'll need to create a "device password" to be able to use Phoniebox. Go to http://www.spotify.com/account/set-device-password/, login with your Facebook account, and follow the instructions. However, sometimes that process can fail for users with Facebook logins, in which case you can create an app-specific password on Facebook by going to facebook.com > Settings > Security > App passwords > Generate app passwords, and generate one to use with Mopidy-Spotify.
• MP3 (local music) handling has completely changed for the +Spotify Edition. The tracks need to be indexed by Mopidy & Mopidy-Spotify (this is the part of Phoniebox, which gives you spotify support) and the created M3U files do have another structure than normal M3U files.
  • You have to scan your library every time you upload new local tracks to your Phoniebox (without restart).
  • You can scan local files under "Folders & Files" (Top Navigation).
  • For the future we try to integrate automation for that.
• Some users have reported a bug where Spotify wouldn't start playing the very first time. When this occurs to you, check out this post #1758 to approach the problem.

---

Old "spotify broken" message:

Spotify has disabled access to libspotify on May 16, 2022.

This means Spotify in Phoniebox doesn't work at the moment, as Phoniebox can not communicate with Spotify via libspotify (and mopidy-spotify) anymore. The problem is not our code but the cut off by Spotify.

We want Phoniebox users to be able to connect their box to their Spotify accounts and play their content. The possibilities Spotify offers are -- at first glance -- not supporting an integration with Phoniebox.

Third party projects like librespot-java enter a grey zone regarding violation of Spotify's Terms of Services (ToS). For a potential Spotify re-integration, we are committed to a Spotify ToS compliant way of doing so (both in Version 2 and Version 3). This means looking into the (relatively new) Spotify Playback API, which is going to take an unknown amount of time.

This leaves us in a pickle and we are happy to hear from developer talent in the Phoniebox community on how to move forward regarding Phoniebox. We are also curious to learn about alternative services we can connect with and which you would like to see supported -- or have developed support for already: https://github.com/MiczFlor/RPi-Jukebox-RFID/discussions/1835

Old Documentation

Installation

Your best start will be to start a FRESH INSTALLATION, please read more here.

The one-line-install should detect an existing installation and ask you if you want to keep the content. Please create a backup upfront, just to be sure :simple_smile:

Keep up to date with the latest versions

There have been issues in the past with the +Spotify edition regarding the speed on startup and delay time when launching audio. I had feedback from an avig Phoniebox user that updating the underlying packages (mainly mopidy) helps a lot. Here is something you might want to try:

1. Upgrade the software db and packages

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

This takes a longer time. Don't get confused. It updates, downloads, and installs the latest packages.

This will update mopidy to a version 3.x

Once the Phoniebox has started and the "startup" sound was played, wait another 45-60 seconds to make sure mopidy is running.

To make sure mopidy starts when booting the Phoniebox, you can also once type:

sudo systemctl enable mopidy

This should work after installation. However, it's the manual way to tell your Phoniebox that it must start mopidy when booting.

Bug reports and testers

Testers needed for the Spotify integration Please read more in this thread.

If you open an issue on GitHub, please provide as many pieces of information as you can. What is you Edition (Classic or +Spotify)? Which version do you have? What is the problem and what did you try to solve this? And so on...