News - Nov 9 2017
Ubuntu builds are now hosted in a proper ppa. Please see the openkj.org website downloads page for details.
News - Sep 13 2017
Preview/beta version of the requests server is live at https://songbook.openkj.org. This is currently free while in testing, but will eventually cost a small amount per month to cover the hosting fees. I'm not sure how much yet, as I don't really know yet how much it's going to cost in Google App Engine usage fees once it scales up to usage beyond my testing.
You can sign up using any google account. Once the account is active, you will receive an API key which you can plug into settings in the latest version of OpenKJ. Once you've done that, you can update the remote songbook database and set the venue to "accepting" in the incoming requests dialog and users should be able to submit songs to you via the web search/submission forms. I think things should be fairly self explanatory beyond that, but feel free to reach out for help here, via the facebook page https://facebook.com/OpenKJ, or via email to support@openkj.org
Downloads
If you are looking for installers for Windows or macOS or binary packages for Fedora, RHEL, Debian, or Ubuntu, please visit the Downloads section at https://openkj.org
Note: There is a known issue while running under Windows that prevents you from changing the output audio device from the default. This is due to a limitation in the GStreamer directsound audio sink. Until that changes, the Windows version will always output audio via the default sound device set in the OS.
If you need help with OpenKJ, you can reach out to support@openkj.org via email.
Cross-platform open source karaoke show hosting software.
OpenKJ is a full featured karaoke hosting program. A few features:
- Save/track/load regular singers
- Key changer
- Tempo control
- EQ
- End of track silence detection (after last CDG draw command)
- Rotation ticker on the CDG display
- Option to use a custom background or display a rotating slide show on the CDG output dialog while idle
- Fades break music in and out automatically when karaoke tracks start/end
- Remote requests server integration allowing singers to look up and submit songs via the web
- Automatic performance recording
- Autoplay karaoke mode
- Lots of other little things
It currently handles media+g zip files (zip files containing an mp3, wav, or ogg file and a cdg file) and paired mp3 and cdg files. I'll be adding others in the future if anyone expresses interest. It also can play non-cdg based video files (mkv, mp4, mpg, avi) for both break music and karaoke (EXPERIMENTAL!).
Database entries for the songs are based on the file naming scheme. I've included the commone ones I've come across which should cover 90% of what's out there. Custom patterns can be also defined in the program using regular expressions.
OpenKJ is experimental but usable at this point. I'd consider it to be around beta quality. I am using it to run my shows, but if you do so and it kills kittens or eats your firstborn don't come screaming at me ;) Some features are still incomplete. To any other developers looking at this code, please don't laugh too hard, as I'm self taught primarily for the purpose of writing this. Well, okay, you can laugh, but only if you're willing to fix the code that you're making fun of ;)
Screenshots
Requirements to build OpenKJ:
- Qt 5.x
- gstreamer 1.4 or above
Linux
I develop the software and host my shows on Linux (Fedora specifically), so it is known to build and work there. (It "should" work similarly on any Linux distro or the BSD's.) Everything needed will most likely be available via the package manager on any common distro. On Fedora the packages are gstreamer-devel gstreamer gstreamer-plugins-good gstreamer-plugins-bad and the Qt5 stuff (I just yum install qt5-* because I'm lazy). On Fedora you will also need to have the rpmfusion repo enabled to get mp3 support, as the app is pretty useless w/o it. "qmake-qt5" or possibly just "qmake", depending on your distro, followed by a "make" should get it built. A "make install" will put the binaries in /usr/bin and copy .desktop file and icon into the appropriate places for it to appear in the app menu. Tweak the OpenKJ.pro file to enable or disable OpenGL support prior to building. One thing to note, you'll probably need to turn off flat volumes in your pulseaudio config if you're using it, otherwise the applicaitons may mess with your system-wide volume instead of just the application volume.
Contributed notes for building on Ubuntu 16.04 courtesy of Henry74
sudo apt install qt5-qmake
sudo apt install libqt5svg5-dev
sudo apt install libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-dev
In a terminal switch to the OpenKJ/OpenKJ directory in the repository.
/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/bin/qmake make
Suggest installing and using checkinstall to create a .deb file
sudo checkinstall
Install the .deb file.
Mac
Building now works on OS X in Qt Creator using the native xcode compiler. Use the latest stable version of the GStreamer SDK from http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org. There is an extremely experimental installer for OS X on the main website at http://openkj.org/ in the downloads section. If anyone tests this, please let me know, as I only have one Mac to test with, and it's the machine I build it on, so it's not a good test case as to whether or not it runs on machines without all of the devel packages installed.
Windows
Building now works on Windows in Qt Creator using the msvc build system (both 32 and 64 bit). Use the latest stable version of the GStreamer SDK from http://gstreamer.freedesktop.org. You will likely need to modify the paths in the OpenKJ.pro file to match your devel environment. Experimental build installers can be found at http://openkj.org/ if you just want to run the software and not build it yourself or help out with development.
The goal is to have it work consistently across all three platforms.
Things that are still work in progress or to do:
libCDG:
- Handling of CDG scroll_copy instructions. Right now these are pretty much unhandled, but the impact is minimal. The only professionally produced CDG's that I've seen use this functionality only use it in the title sequence at the beginning of the song, and it has zero effect on actual lyric display. Basically not a priority for me.
- Make libCDG only hand off the "safe" area of the CDG frames. Right now it returns the whole thing, including the cdg border area. Also not a big deal or priority, has virtually zero effect on what the singers see. The background is just one CDG cell larger around the perimeter of the frame (6px on sides and 12px top and bottom before scaling)
- I plan to break off libCDG into its own repo at some point and get it out of the KaraokeHost source tree