This is huge release that brings a ton of new Play/Scrobble modification options to MS!

What's New?

Simpler Config For Teal/Rocksky Sources

App Password has been removed from required config for Teal.fm and Rocksky Sources. It still required for Clients (scrobblers).

Simpler Config for Musicbrainz Transformer

Due to the lack of required config since the change to the Musicbrainz API in 0.18.0, explicit setup of the Musicbrainz transformer is no longer required. It is now built-in to MS with a default configuration that can be used without needing to specify apis or anything in your AIO/ENV config.

You can still configure rate limiting for the default server, or add additional servers, using the same config. It's just not required to explicitly set anything anymore.

{
  // ...
  "transformers": [
   // your empty musicbrainz transform 
    {
      "type": "musicbrainz",
      "name": "MyMB",
      "data": {
        "apis": [
          {
            "enable": true
          }
        ]
      },
    },
   // ...maybe more transforms here
  ],
 // ...
}

      "playTransform": {
        "preCompare": [
          {
            "type": "musicbrainz",
            "name": "MyMB"
          }
        ]
      }

      "playTransform": {
        "preCompare": [
          {
            "type": "musicbrainz",
            "name": "MSDefault"
          }
        ]
      }

Rocksky PDS Client

The Rocksky Client has been rewritten to use the sdk agent for scrobbling rather than scrobbling through the Rocksky server.

This change, along with using the new Rocksky matchSong metadata API, means Multi-Scrobbler can now:

• give you immediate feedback on when a scrobble does not meet Rocksky's standard of quality and
• directly write scrobbles to your PDS repository

This is a huge improvement in user experience over the old "submit scrobble to rocksky server and find out later if it was accepted" approach. Use this in conjunction with the new Rocksky Transformer to get (essentially) guaranteed scrobbles to Rocksky with verifiable writes.

An additional benefit of the PDS client is that MS now supports Now Playing for Rocksky.

Rocksky Transformer

A new scrobble enhancement stage is available, the Rocksky Transformer.

This stage uses Rocksky's metadata API to match multiple providers (deezer, spotify, etc...) and returns an enriched metadata result that Multi-Scrobbler can use to add Musicbrainz Recording MBID, ISRC, artists, etc... similar to how the Musicbrainz Stage works.

Rocksky's metadata API is still a work-in-progress so the resulting transformation is limited for now, but it is extremely fast and provides good results!

Use this in conjunction with the Rocksky PDS Client to guarantee scrobbles for Rocksky or as a fast-and-cheap alternative to Musicbrainz.

Spotify Transformer

A new scrobble enhancement stage is available, the Spotify Transformer. All of the research, config options, and initial implementation was contributed by @DigitalStarSys 🎉

This stage works similarly to Rocksky and Musicbrainz transformers in that it is useful for fixing/enriching your scrobble data.

It is advantageous to use, over Musicbrainz, if you prefer a simpler setup with fast API responses and formatted data that is familiar to a mainstream audience (vs. having to configure Musicbrainz and filter through all the different release types).

Note: This transform requires a premium Spotify account (same as the Spotify Source) to use the Spotify API.

Cover Art Archive Transformer and Art Transforms

A new scrobble enhancement stage is available, the Cover Art Archive Transformer. This is standalone version of the Cover Art Archive functionality found in Discord.

When this Stage is used, if your scrobble data has Musicbrainz' MBIDs for album or release-group and is missing album art, MS will use the CAA API to fetch an album art URL.

Art In Other Transformers

As part of this improvement, both the Rocksky and Spotify Transformer can also populate album art URLs when they are missing. This is enabled automatically as part of Stage Rules and can be explicitly disabled with a rule "art": false.

Device Info for Listenbrainz-Compatible Scrobblers

Thanks to @rpschube reported device info from Sources can now be safely submitted as scrobble data to listenbrainz-compatible clients (Listenbrainz and Koito) without leaking any PII by using an allowlist of scrubbed identifiers to match with real device ids.

See the Scrobbling Device Data expandable section on Listenbrainz and Koito clients to see how this works.

Reduced Docker Build Size

More cleanup done after 0.18.0 revealed a large number of files in docker file build layers that could be easily pruned. A minor rewrite of the Dockerfile has eliminated these and improved build times as well. The cleaned up docker image is 20% smaller than 0.18.1.

Typescript Strict Mode

The entire project has been refactored to compile with typescript strict mode on. This "enables a wide range of type checking behavior that results in stronger guarantees of program correctness" which in laymen's terms means that ongoing development of Multi-Scrobbler is less likely to introduce new bugs. Just moving to strict mode fixed at least 30+ undiscovered bugs!

Dynamic Transformer Loading and Usage

The logic that loads code for tranformers has been refactored so that all transformers and their dependencies loaded just before a Source/Client actually uses them instead of on startup. This should result in less memory usage for all users but especially those that don't use any transformers at all.

Additionally, the names of built-in transformers and the order they are used in has been changed to be deterministic and give you more options for which you would like to use, between built-in, ENV configured, or file/aio configured. See the Breaking Changes section below for these changes.

Breaking Changes

Rocksky Auth API Key Removal and Token Deprecation

• The previously-deprecated API Key authentication for Rocksky has been removed
• Access Token authentication for Rocksky is now deprecated in favor of handle/app password auth that uses the new functionality from above.
  • Review the Rocksky Client docs for how to set this up

Discord Cover Art Archive Deprecation

The automatic Cover Art Archive usage currently found in the Discord Scrobbler is now deprecated and should be replaced with a Cover Art Archive Transformer.

DISCORD_TRANSFORMS=coverartarchive

  { 
    "name": "MyDiscord",
    "data": { /* ... */},
    // add this
    "options": {
      "playTransform": {
        "preCompare": [
          {
            "type": "coverartarchive",
          }
        ]
      }
    }
  }

A new Kitchensink example shows a more complex example, here.

Transform Names and Fallbacks

Transform stages are specified by type and name when used in a Source/Client, however the name is optional.

[
  { 
    "name": "MySubsonic",
    "data": { /* ... */},
    "options": {
      "playTransform": {
        "preCompare": [
          {
            "type": "musicbrainz",
            "name": "MyMB" // name is optional
          }
        ]
      }
    }
  }
]

Previously when name was omitted MS used the first non-default transformer, then tried the default.

Now, names and order of selection (when name is omitted in configuration) looks like this:

1. MS looks for a non-default, non-ENV config first
2. MS falls back to ENV config (name is MSEnv) if it exists
3. MS falls back to default config (name is MSDefault) if it exists

Steps to migrate:

• If you only use named configs that aren't MSDefault there are no changes necessary
• If you only use ENV configuration there are no changes necessary
• If you use the name MSDefault but do not mix ENV transforms with AIO/File config, no changes are necessary
• If you use the name MSDefault and also have ENV transforms configured (musicbrainz)
  • Rename name to MSEnv

See more about Stage Names and Defaults in this new section in the docs.

Logs Directory for Non-Docker Users

More attention has gone into the Data Directory Standardization work that began in 0.15.0. Now, the directory logs are written to has been standardized, alongside the existing data and config directories.

This change only affects non-docker users.

The logs directory is now determined by, in order of priority:

• LOGS_DIR ENV
• LOGS_DIRECTORY ENV (used by systemd)
• OS-specific standardized path

You can see OS-specific paths here in the documentation.

If you are running multi-scrobbler locally with nodejs you'll likely want to set LOGS_DIR=./config/logs

Other Changelog Highlights

• fix(endpointlz): Missing 'import' enum for listen_type on submit payload #732
• fix: Update dbcomponent at runtime when name changes #721