Now Playing tools for your broadcast

• Windows Media Player (9 or above) Now Playing plugin.

  This plugin creates a text file, playinfo.txt (can be changed), on your hard drive containing information about the currently playing song in Windows Media Player. This text file can be read by OBS, or any other broadcasting program, using the Text source to display this information in your broadcast. This plugin relies totally on the media file id tags, so if they are not correct, then it will not present the correct information. For the most part it works good. It was designed in the days of Windows XP, so it has a file permission problem with newer versions of Windows. It also has at least one bug. These problems can be overcome.

  You will need to download the plugin installer here. If you are using an operating system newer than Windows XP, you will also need this NowPlaying.ini configuration file. If in doubt, get this anyway. If your browser displays the contents of this link when you click on it instead of downloading it, right click on it and save (save as) it.

  Install the plugin. You may have to give permission to do this depending on you system setup. Copy the NowPlaying.ini file to the C:\Windows\ folder. You may have to give permission to do this depending on your system setup. Change the security settings of this file to allow USERS full control, so that when you change the settings, they will get saved. This page will tell you how to do this.

  Now run Windows Media Player. Open Windows Media Player Options/Plugins/Background and make sure the checkbox is checked next to NowPlaying Plugin.

  

  Click on NowPlaying Plugin to highlight it and then click the Properties button. The settings window for the NowPlaying Plugin will appear for you to change as you like. This shows my settings, your's will be different.

  

  The plugin installs a Readme.html file in the folder where Windows Media Player is installed on your computer. This contains information all the Attributes available for writing to the playinfo.txt file. The Readme.html file is also here. The links in it do not work. If you have used the NowPlaying.ini file from above, the playinfo.txt file will be located at C:\Users\Public\playinfo.txt.

  Now, start your broadcasting software, I use OBS Studio, and set up a Text source to open the playinfo.txt text file. If available in your Text source, add an outline to the text to make the Now Playing text easier to see on all colour backgrounds.

  Problems you may encounter.

  • Your broadcasting software is not displaying the now playing information: It's a good idea to have Windows Media Player running before you start your broadcasting software so that the playinfo.txt file will be there for your broadcasting software to read in case you have deleted it for some reason.

  • Title and Author not being displayed correctly: Make sure the contents of your playlist are visible in Windows Media Player. Sometimes this plugin will not display the correct information if they are not. I used Now Playing view with the playlist on the side. This seemed to work every time. Library view with the playlist contents visible seemed to work as well. I think the plugin does not always get the information in time because Windows Media Player reads the media id tags on the fly if the playlist contents are not visible. I think having the playlist contents visible causes Windows Media Player to pre-read the media id tags and cache them. This makes media id tags available sooner and the plugin gets them in time.

  • Plugin not working any more: If Windows Media Player crashes, it will disable all non Microsoft plugins. You will have to go to the Windows Media Player Options/Plugins/Background and check the box next to NowPlaying Plugin again.

  • Settings for the plugin not saving: The NowPlaying.ini file is not in the C:\Windows\ folder or the file permissions have not been set. In newer versions of Windows, the plugin can not create or modify the configuration file, so you have to create it and set the permissions, as explained above.

• VLC now playing using its Web interface.

  Displaying the currently playing file in VLC is done by using VLC's built in Web interface. This method was devised by me, so the source of the files is this page. This method displays the file name of video file being played without the extension, therefore correct file naming if necessary. For music files, it just shows the name of the song. This is due to limitations in the VLC Web interface. I use VLC to play video files, so this is exactly what I wanted. This may not be what you want. The changes I make to the files used for VLC's Web interface do not adversely affect the Web interface, if you are using it for its intended purpose. The currently playing file information can then be read by your broadcasting software using a Browser source.

  You will need to download these 3 files, controlers.js, main.css and titleonly.html. If your browser displays the contents of the links when you click on it instead of downloading it, right click on it and save (save as) it.

  Open the folder where VLC is installed, probably C:\Program Files\Videolan\VLC, and open the lua folder. There will be a folder called http there. Make a copy of the http folder in the lua folder and rename the copied folder to myhttp. Move the controlers.js file to the VLC lua\myhttp\js\ folder. Move the main.css file to the VLC lua\myhttp\css\ folder. Move the titleonly.html file to the VLC lua\myhttp\ folder. You may have to give permission to do these three files depending on your system setup. The first two files need to overwrite the original files.

  Start VLC. Open the preferences window by clicking on Tools menu and then selecting Preferences, or by pressing ctrl-p. Click on the All radio button in the Show settings pane at the bottom left of the preferences window. Click on the Main Interfaces sub-section of the Interface section. Check the checkbox next to Web. This enables the Web interface. Open the Main Interfaces subsection by clicking on the triangle next to Main Interfaces. Click on the Lua subsection. Make sure the Source directory in the Lua HTTP pane has the path to the VLC lua\myhttp\ folder, probably C:\Program Files\Videolan\VLC\lua\myhttp\. Enter a password in the password field. Save the settings and restart VLC.

  

  Now, start your broadcasting software, I use OBS Studio, and set up a Browser source to open the VLC Web interface titleonly.hml file. The URL to enter into the Browser source is http://:yourpassword@localhost:8080/titleonly.html . The Browser source will only show something if VLC is playing something. If you are using a version of OBS that does not have the Browser source, go to the OBS website and get a version that does.

  Problems you may encounter.

  • Your broadcasting software is not displaying the now playing information: Make sure VLC is started before your broadcasting software.

• Winamp What's Playing plugin.

  This plugin also creates a text file on your hard drive containing information about the currently playing song in Winamp. This text file can be read by OBS, or any other broadcasting program, using the Text source to display this information in your broadcast. This plugin relies totally on the media file id tags, so if they are not correct, then it will not present the correct information. It was designed in the days of Windows 2000, so it has a file permision problem with newer versions of Windows. This problem can be overcome. This plugin also has very good documentation.

  You will need to download the plugin installer here. If you are using an operating system newer than Windows 2000, you will also need this gen_whatsplaying.ini configuration file. If in doubt, get this anyway. If your browser displays the contents of this link when you click on it instead of downloading it, right click on it and save (save as) it. Here is a template file to use if you can't or don't want to make one. If your browser displays the contents of this link when you click on it instead of downloading it, right click on it and save (save as) it.

  Install the plugin. You may have to give permission to do this depending on you system setup. If you downloaded the template file, move it to your Documents folder. Move the gen_whatsplaying.ini file to the Winamp plugins folder, probably C:\Program Files (x86)\Winamp\Plugins. You may have to give permission to do this depending on your system setup. Change the security settings of this file to allow USERS full control, so that when you change the settings, they will get saved. This page will tell you how to do this.

  Run Winamp. Configure the plugin as per the documentation mentioned above. If you downloaded the template file, it should be located in your Documents folder. Your Documents folder is a good place to locate the output file as well.

  Now, start your broadcasting software, I use OBS Studio, and set up a Text source to open the output text file you configured in the plugin. If available in your Text source, add an outline to the text to make the Now Playing text easier to see on all colour backgrounds.

  Problems you may encounter.

  • Your broadcasting software is not displaying the now playing information: It's a good idea to have Winamp running before you start your broadcasting software so that the plugin output file will be there for your broadcasting software to read in case you have deleted it for some reason.

  • Settings for the plugin not saving: The gen_whatsplaying.ini file is not in the Winamp plugins folder or the file permissions have not been set. In newer versions of Windows, the plugin can not create or modify the configuration file, so you have to create it and set the permissions, as explained above.