[HN Gopher] Mixxx: GPL DJ Software
___________________________________________________________________
Mixxx: GPL DJ Software
Author : brudgers
Score : 608 points
Date : 2025-01-20 15:53 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (mixxx.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (mixxx.org)
| drdirk wrote:
| What does GPL stand for?
| frob wrote:
| GNU General Public License:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License
|
| It's one of several options for software licenses a developer
| or team can use when distributing a piece of software to help
| ensure that it and its derivates stay free and open-source.
| TeeMassive wrote:
| I like your "no bad questions" attitude and your
| straightforward answer!
| asimovfan wrote:
| Its like when Morpheus goes into the Matrix to free more
| people.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Matrixxx (and Trinity, of course, wears a GIMP suit)
| jrm4 wrote:
| Not sure whether to be dismayed or excited at the fact that
| this is a question on Hacker News, but those who are new to it;
| definitely worth doing your homework.
|
| It's the legal jiu-jitsu that has enabled Linux and countless
| other "Open Source" projects to remain free by preventing
| people from taking the code for free but then locking it back
| down.
| apt-get wrote:
| Been using it for the past few years, nothing bad to say about
| it, lovely piece of software. Vendor lock-in is very present in
| this field, with different brands of controllers supported by a
| myriad of proprietary DJ applications all more interested in
| onboarding you to their music subscription services rather than
| implement useful features or support open protocols.
|
| Meanwhile, Mixxx allows you to write your own adapter scripts for
| any controller you have (as long as it outputs MIDI), and there's
| a built-in library featuring scripts for the most common
| commercial controllers and MIDI devices out there.
| noman-land wrote:
| I tried it many years ago and this didn't work. Can Mixxx be
| used with the Rane mixers used with Serato back in the day?
| Mashimo wrote:
| Does the mixer speak midi? In that case probably.
|
| Is there already a mapping for you device? Check the manual
| https://manual.mixxx.org/2.5/en/
| crtasm wrote:
| specifically:
| https://manual.mixxx.org/2.5/en/hardware/manuals#hardware-
| ma...
|
| and if not there, the forum might have one:
| https://mixxx.discourse.group/c/controller-mappings/10
|
| I notice that HID is also supported: https://manual.mixxx.o
| rg/2.5/en/chapters/controlling_mixxx#c...
| SamWhited wrote:
| Even if there's not a mapping Mixxx has a "MIDI Learning
| Wizard" (I forget what they call it) where, assuming it
| speaks MIDI, you can plug it up, choose an action, and then
| move the control for that action and it will figure out how
| to wire it up. For simple configurations that don't require
| scripting (ie. no setting LEDs on the controller or what
| not) you can get a fully functional setup for a controller
| Mixxx has no knowledge of without writing any JavaScript or
| XML at all!
| input_sh wrote:
| To be fair, every commercial competitor (like Rekordbox and
| Traktor) also supports mapping MIDI devices that are not
| officially supported.
|
| But in my experience, you'll never be able to control the
| jogwheel as precisely as in officially-supported hardware-
| software combo.
| shermantanktop wrote:
| Is it latency? Or granularity? MIDI has upper limits on
| both...or is it a more subtle quality like ballistics?
| bfmalky wrote:
| In Rekordbox's case Pioneer have restricted the jogwheel
| mapping to Pioneer hardware only. So, you pretty much need
| Pioneer hardware to use Rekordbox. And seeing as Pioneer
| decks are almost industry standard in clubs and you need
| Rekordbox to organise your playlists, they have the DJ
| hardware market sewn up. Which is very frustrating because
| Rekordbox has to be the most resource intensive (& therefore
| inefficient) DJ software available.
| Onawa wrote:
| Resource intensive, and it's been crashing on me far too
| regularly to be relied on at all.
| cechmaster wrote:
| So many issues with Rekordbox and their vendor lock-in. I
| can't even reliably export songs on a flash drive and have
| it showing up in their CDJ. It's honestly time to take the
| Pioneer giant down.
| hnlmorg wrote:
| It's amazing just how badly Technics dropped the ball.
|
| At one point they were the industry standard but they shot
| themselves in the foot with their reluctance to release a
| CD turntable until after Pioneer had already got themselves
| into nearly every club.
|
| Though I can't say I'm surprised. I never thought 1210s was
| a particularly good vinyl turntable either.
| dleeftink wrote:
| A good retrospect on how Pioneer got here [0] and a
| 'feature' overview of CDJs pre/post buyout[1].
|
| [0]: https://youtu.be/LcbKcmfFCc4
|
| [1]: https://youtu.be/-4DZ47HCYWA
| cies wrote:
| I've been using this for the few DJ sets I do per year. Very
| complete software, very stable also.
|
| Sadly I have to use RekordBox now that I want to not bring the
| laptop + DJ controller, but just a USB stick. And RekordBox does
| not run well on Linux (tried VirtualBox and Wine, both failed
| attempts).
|
| Sadly there's no RecordBox clone, or "export to RekordBox USB"
| feature on Mixxx.
| diggan wrote:
| > And RekordBox does not run well on Linux
|
| RekordBox doesn't even run well on Windows, so hard to imagine
| what worse looks like.
|
| But yeah, if Mixxx (or other FOSS software) could offer writing
| playlists into USB sticks, I'd get rid of RekordBox yesterday
| because few software out there works as bad as RekordBox.
| quesomaster9000 wrote:
| I considered renting out some Pioneer equipment to add
| RekordBox playlist writing support, mainly because I'm in a
| similar situation. Mixxx does have support for reading USBs &
| SD cards, but not writing ;_;
|
| Unfortunately it's far down my priority list given the cost,
| my unfamiliarity with Mixxx development and that I rarely do
| anything without Mixx.
|
| But this is absolutely what ecosystem grants/bounties should
| be for.
| phntxx wrote:
| Could not agree more. I recently made the switch to
| exclusively using Linux on Desktop machines, yet I now have
| to have a Windows PC laying around for the sole purpose of
| updating my USB using Rekordbox.
| diggan wrote:
| > But this is absolutely what ecosystem grants/bounties
| should be for.
|
| I'd be down to fund a bounty/grant for this (and I'm
| clearly not alone), if anyone is looking for booty :)
| Mashimo wrote:
| See my other comment to parent, there are two libraries
| who started, but did not finish. Maybe they can be
| incentivized to start up again.
| wayvey wrote:
| I'm a bit annoyed by the requirement of having to use
| rekordbox exports on some DJ devices and would probably
| chip in to this because I will definitely not try to
| install rekordbox again :D
| Mashimo wrote:
| I think there are two projects who worked on it a bit:
|
| * https://github.com/kimtore/rex
|
| * https://github.com/Holzhaus/rekordcrate (Current status
| of export: https://github.com/Holzhaus/rekordcrate/pull/103
| )
| hlzhs wrote:
| Mixxx dev and main author of rekordcrate here. The issue
| is that the format is an ancient proprietary format that
| does not have been reverse-engineered to a degree that we
| can properly write Rekordbox DBs yet (Rekordcrate is
| based on the work done here: https://djl-
| analysis.deepsymmetry.org/rekordbox-export-analy...)
| copyleftdj wrote:
| Would be cool if there is Foss firmware to install on
| pioneer cdj. It just feels better for a lot DJs. Any
| projects in this direction?
|
| BTW, the DJ collective I'm with has Pioneer CDJ. If anyone
| need use the hardware let me know. I'm trying to get them
| to start using open FOSS software, but it is hard.
| Mashimo wrote:
| You could put a lot of time and effort into getting your
| own firmware for CDJs .. or you could just connect them
| via USB to an pi running mixxx.
| copyleftdj wrote:
| What you mean? Can CDJ be hooked up to a pi using mixxxx?
|
| The whole point is that the DJs in my collective are used
| to play vinal, so the pioneer CDJs just feels nice on the
| hand.
|
| Yes some of the newer dj controllers r quite nice, but
| rekorbox just got to all the clubs first, so it's
| everywhere. Kinda like how Adobe is the defector for
| graphics.
| Mashimo wrote:
| You can use CDJs as a controller. Not with Midi, but in
| HID mode.
|
| I have only tried it with traktor, but AFAIK it should
| also work with mixxx. Pi, laptop, whatever. And you can
| keep using the screens on the CDJs.
|
| And the next user can keep using the USB, no hardware or
| software modification necessary. Much easier then coding
| a new firmware.
|
| Mixxx, Algoriddim DJay, Traktor, Rekordox, probably
| Virtual DJ. Connect CDJs and mixer via USB and off you
| go. If you have an mixer with no build in audio
| interface, you would need a external sound card (a hassle
| because a lot of cables) or aggregate all the CDJs into
| one virtual card.
| nzoschke wrote:
| Haven't tried it myself but CDJ-3000s have been rooted.
|
| https://github.com/connorworley/cdj3k-root
| fragmede wrote:
| > RekordBox playlist writing support
|
| Without the Rekordbox beat analysis, you'd only be getting
| track names, and you can achieve similar functionality on
| the Pioneer side by just putting the files for a each
| playlist in a separate folder.
|
| There's a kaitai bin format parser config file for the usb
| db file but kaitai isn't expressive enough to read it
| properly from that.
|
| Pioneer (err Alphatheta)'s stranglehold on the industry is
| a shame due to lack of interoperability, among other issues
| with Rekordbox.
| nzoschke wrote:
| An export db with title, artist, album and rough BPM
| could be useful to interoperate with the native browse
| and search menus on a CDJ.
|
| Without beat grids have to best match by ear but that's
| par for the course for many DJ scenarios.
| fragmede wrote:
| https://djl-analysis.deepsymmetry.org/rekordbox-export-
| analy... (and playlist entry rows) should have a complete
| enough description if someone wants to give it a try
| quesomaster9000 wrote:
| The Rekordbox.xml format [1] is quite simple. Note the
| `<TEMPO>` and `<POSITION_MARK>` tags.
|
| But Pinoeer can be weird and there's a lot of old (even
| ancient) equipment out there, so sometimes it's a case of
| finding the lowest common denominator and sticking to
| that.
|
| [1]: https://cdn.rekordbox.com/files/20200410160904/xml_f
| ormat_li...
| helboi4 wrote:
| Somehow Rekordbox seems to run much better on my Ryzen 5 8gb
| ram windows laptop from 2019 than on my i7, 64gb ram macbook.
| It seems to only like windows?
| helpfulContrib wrote:
| >GPL DJ Software
|
| Its kind of a nuisance that, as a requirement to build Mixxx on
| MacOS, ones has to use foreign binaries, disable Gatekeeper, run
| a 'first build', and from that point on .. can treat the project
| as a regular CMake project. Re-enable Gatekeeper after the 'first
| build'.
|
| Hmm.
|
| What are the custom binaries for? Surely not cmake. Not having -
| yet - done this myself (until I can put it in a VM), I'm
| nevertheless kind of curious about this necessity.
|
| Any Mixxx/MacOs devs care to describe the contents?
| bri3d wrote:
| You can just read the source? mixxx-deps come from a build
| process sourced from:
|
| https://github.com/mixxxdj/vcpkg
|
| The same binary-backed build process is present on Windows,
| too, presumably to keep people from needing to go through
| dependency hell to contribute to the project.
| hlzhs wrote:
| That is exactly the reason. Also, some libraries we are using
| are not on homebrew (and we cannot easily pin a specific
| version).
|
| Another reason that we'd like to reduce the maintenance
| burden by using a similar setup for windows and macOS deps.
| Our dev team is small, and almost all of us use Linux. For
| macOS in particular we don't have anyone on the core team
| that uses it as their daily driver, which may also play a
| role when talking about the DX in macOS.
| brudgers wrote:
| Can you recompile Gatekeeper to allow compatibility with Mixxx?
| djaychela wrote:
| Used mixxx to do the djing for my wedding last year. Created a
| collaborative music voting site for the guests, then got all the
| music and made a mix which worked really well, even going between
| genres. Had a lot of fun playing with it getting everything ready
| and it worked with a couple of DJ controllers bought cheaply
| without any issue.
|
| I even made a little program to read the now playing track from
| the sqlite database which then allowed the lights to follow the
| music (for complex reasons I don't have time to explain).
|
| Most importantly it worked on the night without missing a beat.
| jesprenj wrote:
| Can you share the program that reads the now playing track? We
| use Mixxx at a student radio station and we could maybe try
| using something like this to show the now-playing track on the
| website.
| djaychela wrote:
| I will see... Not being evasive but I'm experiencing terminal
| illness at the moment so I'm all over the place. It wasn't a
| complex bit of code though, but I'll see what I can find.
| corint wrote:
| Wishing you well - sorry to hear that you're in ill health.
| djaychela wrote:
| Thank you. Sorry, I had a look but I didn't find the code
| (it's not in the github repo for the rest of the system I
| made, and I no longer own the laptop I wrote it on so
| it's my bad).
|
| Someone has posted something similar, but it was
| literally just about 10 lines of python that read the
| right key in the dictionary and then posted that to a
| flask web page that another part of the system read to
| know what track was being played. I'm not a great
| programmer and it took me maybe 15 minutes to do, so it
| should be easy enough!
| tomcam wrote:
| So sorry, brofus. My best to you and yours.
|
| Also, your channel is fantastic. You're a good teacher and
| your voice is excellent.
| Mashimo wrote:
| * https://github.com/erikrichardlarson/unbox
|
| * https://github.com/ViktorNova/mixxx-now-playing
| Sn0wCoder wrote:
| I have not used Mixxx nor do I have it installed, but might
| download to check it out.
|
| But..... If its always in a SQLite DB you should be able to
| use DB Browser for SQLite to inspect the DB Schema and then
| write a bash/python (whatever) script to pull the info out.
|
| RESULTS=$(sqlite-utils "data.db" " SELECT song, artist,
| duration, FROM my_table WHERE song = 'CURRENT';")
|
| RESULTS=$(sqlite3 data.db <<EOF SELECT song, artist,
| duration, FROM my_table WHERE song = 'CURRENT'; EOF )
|
| I have no idea what the schema looks like but those are just
| some examples of how straightforward it might be. Run it on
| CRON (whatever) update as needed.
| https://cronitor.io/guides/python-cron-jobs
|
| Once you have the Schema an LLM could most likely do the rest
| if you are not a programmer, but still need someone to get it
| added to the site.
| raphman wrote:
| Not sure whether that's the correct way but it seems to work.
| AFAICT, there is no "now_playing" field in the sqlite db -
| but tracks that start playing are added to the
| `PlaylistTracks` table. That means that if you started two
| tracks and then pause one or the other and restart it, no row
| will be added. Only adding a track from the library and then
| playing it will add to the PlaylistTracks list.
|
| (Is there a simpler solution I missed?)
| import sqlite3 import time from pathlib import
| Path home = Path.home() con =
| sqlite3.connect(f"{home}/.mixxx/mixxxdb.sqlite") cur =
| con.cursor() def get_track_name():
| global cur trackid = cur.execute("SELECT * FROM
| PlaylistTracks WHERE id=(SELECT max(id) FROM
| PlaylistTracks);").fetchall()[0][2] trackname =
| cur.execute(f"SELECT * FROM library WHERE
| id={trackid};").fetchall()[0][2] return trackname
| now_playing = get_track_name() print(now_playing)
| while True: if (np := get_track_name()) !=
| now_playing: now_playing = np
| print(np) time.sleep(1)
|
| Edit: FWIW, unbox [1] uses the same approach. Edit 2: yes, I
| should have cleaned up my SQL statements.
|
| [1] https://github.com/erikrichardlarson/unbox/blob/2182f227a
| 0fc...
| btown wrote:
| What did you use for the collaborative music voting - or did
| you make something yourself? For different use cases, I've seen
| everything used from collaborative Spotify playlists to Google
| forms, to those "pay a dollar to bump your song request" kiosks
| in bars! The parallels to ranked-choice voting in politics are
| relevant too - as well as how you give people a feeling of
| agency, even if you as the DJ inevitably have veto powers.
|
| I'm not surprised that startups haven't tackled this, as you
| inevitably run headfirst into licensing issues - but I'm
| curious what exists in the open-source world for this!
| djaychela wrote:
| I made something custom. I can't share the code for it (see
| my other reply for why), but here's the general deal:
|
| Wedding website was a django site, with accounts for everyone
| I invited. I had a separate part of it where the guests could
| choose an RGB colour, and then choose tracks by searching. I
| used a spotify API for this, so when they chose a track, if
| someone chose a similar one (say a specific mix) then they
| could see this and vote for that. Each guest could choose 10
| tracks. I used some HTMX for this as well (first time) and it
| generally worked pretty well. Database stored the spotify
| ID/UUID/whatever for each track
|
| Once everyone had voted, I then bought all the tracks which
| we were going to play - reason being that I couldn't rely on
| WiFi on the day, and wanted to be 100% sure it would work,
| plus I couldn't "DJ" from spotify tracks.
|
| All of the tracks were then renamed including their spotify
| ID/UUID/whatever, so the system knew who had voted for a
| specific track.
|
| I then made the playlist up in Mixxx, and trimmed tracks to
| fit better, and made it work musically (my wife is excellent
| at this, she made it really work, mix wise). Made sure it all
| played OK.
|
| The other part of the system was a custom light setup, with
| sound-reactive LED bars I made up (using ESP8266 and WLED
| firmware with 150 LEDs per 'stick') with them all being
| controlled by a custom controller. This system read the track
| from the Mixxx system (via HTTP request to a flask app I
| wrote that read the sqlite dB from mixxx to know what track
| was playing), and then coloured the lights with the colours
| of the people who had voted for the tracks. Also if you went
| onto the dancefloor you could 'swipe in' via an RFID label
| which was in the wristbands, which also reacted to lights and
| were colour-controlled over DMX.
|
| The light patterns were sometimes random, or if one was good
| for a specific track then I programmed that into the system.
|
| It was all spaghetti code, and the first time I used FastAPI.
| The code is terrible, and I'm only making it public as I
| thought it might be useful to someone.
|
| https://github.com/djaychela/wedding_controller
|
| I've just had a terminal cancer diagnosis and am no longer
| doing anything other than trying to stay alive. So please, no
| grief about the code! I'm sharing this to try to help someone
| else if they ever want to do something like this...
| ustad wrote:
| Thanks for sharing this - it's a really cool project! I
| love the creativity and thought you put into combining
| music, lights, and interactivity in such a unique way.
|
| Wishing you all the best, and thank you for contributing to
| the community with this, especially under such difficult
| circumstances.
| Projectiboga wrote:
| Best wishes on your fight. When I was facing a near death
| situation my now wife used Creative Visualization. She
| pictured us walking on our favorite walk in our local park
| with ducks, which I love to watch.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_visualization It can
| also be used to help focus your immune system. These
| suggestions are to be used combined with evidence based
| medicine not as an alternative.
| noisy_boy wrote:
| > It was all spaghetti code, and the first time I used
| FastAPI. The code is terrible, and I'm only making it
| public as I thought it might be useful to someone.
|
| Dude, that is the true hacker spirit - I am a programmer
| and frankly that setup you described is more creative than
| anything I have ever made.
|
| Fight on and keep at it - best wishes to you and your
| family!
| quesomaster9000 wrote:
| I'm really happy that 2.5 added 'beats until next marker', which
| together with a USB controller from Numark I have pretty much
| feature complete DJ setup for under $500 (including cost of
| laptop & controller) without having to rely on Windows, Mac,
| subscription licenses or feature-crippled 'lite' versions.
|
| And it's surprising how quickly people adapt to it when they're
| used to other setups, within an hour a few people have gone from
| 'oooh, can I have a go' to showing me their own tips, tricks and
| different styles.
|
| Especially combined with a youtube & soundcloud downloader
| running on a different workspace, I can get pretty much any track
| into the library within a minute or two.
| perfmode wrote:
| Which controller do you have?
| starkparker wrote:
| Mixx is sneaky good as a TTRPG soundscape mixer. You can queue
| layer multiple ambiance tracks over tempo-matched music, build
| soundboards, and hook it all to hardware controls.
|
| It's overkill, but a lot of similar tools either lock you into a
| media ecosystem, lack some power-user functionality, have a
| subscription, or don't work at all on Linux or macOS.
| VagabundoP wrote:
| I've been looking for something like this.
|
| Is it possible to stream it for an online game? I do both and
| need something for my creepy Call of Cthulhu game. Music and
| sound effects work really well with 1920s Call of Cthulhu.
|
| E: I did look at it before but got intimidated by the
| screenshots.
| apt-get wrote:
| Mixxx can stream to an icecast output or similar, you'll need
| to setup the stream server separately though.
| iammrpayments wrote:
| I thought this was Donald's Knuth Mix computer at first
| brudgers wrote:
| If only he had wanted to DJ organ music.
| treve wrote:
| Also works great with my Traktor mixer. Traktor doesn't have
| linux support for their software, so I was glad my mixer didn't
| brick after the switch
| sim7c00 wrote:
| thanks for commenting this. all i needed to know :D
| tmountain wrote:
| I've been using this to make mix tapes at home (bought a vintage
| tape player). It has awesome cross fading capabilities, and it
| does volume normalization out of the box, so it's a very nice
| piece of software for those features alone. Playlist and library
| management is also solid. My only complaint is that the UI isn't
| very intuitive for a non-DJ, and it took me some time to figure
| out how to do basic stuff, but it's all there in the docs, so you
| can certainly figure it out.
| ThatMedicIsASpy wrote:
| I've been setting up a few radio stations with playlists for
| azuracast for home use. The auto DJ with auto cue is amazing.
| Next stop is create a radio with a raspberry pi maybe with an
| amp hat as well.
| radley wrote:
| How does the auto DJ compare to something like Pacemaker?
| diggan wrote:
| Are you referring to this?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pacemaker
|
| I haven't tried that myself, but used the AutoDJ feature of
| Mixxx a couple of times. It's fairly basic, you have a
| playlist, setup how you want it to fade, and how fast, hit
| Play and off it goes matching the beatgrids and whatnot.
| bramgn wrote:
| What does GPL actually do?
| sho_hn wrote:
| In this space, probably the biggest effect might be that HW
| vendors of DJ kit cannot fork this software to bundle with
| their HW and avoid sharing their improvements back, so people
| using other HW can still benefit.
| weinzierl wrote:
| I use it simply as an audio player. I like the way I can queue up
| songs and then let the Auto DJ play. I know other audio players
| can in principle do that but in Mixx it is very explicit. I also
| like to see key and BPM just to satisfy my curiosity.
| wayvey wrote:
| Never thought of this, I use it mostly for live mixing but I
| probably never tried the Auto DJ feature. I need to give it a
| try, it would probably be a lot more inspiring to play my
| collection that way instead of in a traditional music player.
| Great tip!
| profsummergig wrote:
| I want to do scratching by pushing a button on my laptop keyboard
| (instead of dragging the spinning record with my mouse-cursor).
|
| Can Mixxx do this?
| wayvey wrote:
| Not sure if that's mappable, but I don't think that would
| provide enough control to get satisfying results.
| profsummergig wrote:
| The ideal interface of course would be to use an external
| turntable and use one's hand to rotate a physical plate or
| record.
|
| I find the mouse-cursor drag very clunky.
| rounce wrote:
| You can do that with a set of timecode vinyl, Mixxx fully
| supports that.
| chromatin wrote:
| How about a USB knob?
|
| https://binepad.com/products/bnr1-v2
| ericzawo wrote:
| RekordBox is a well known piece of s** and it's great to see
| someone try to enter the arena. Now we need a legit competitor to
| the DJM / CDJ's which cost, all told, >$10k for a standard, club-
| ready setup.
| wayvey wrote:
| I didn't know it was well known but that's exactly how I felt
| when I recently tried to use it. My local bar bought an
| integrated 2 deck Pioneer DJ player, but turns out it doesn't
| store analyzed BPMs or waveforms and to get that you need to
| use RekordBox to analyze your tracks and export that to your
| USBs. When I tried to install the software it requires signing
| up for an account and a subscription and what not. I still
| couldn't get it to work and abandoned it. I won't be going back
| to it the experience isnt worth it. I'm instead having more fun
| just beatmatching by ear with the pitch fader :)
| Mashimo wrote:
| > When I tried to install the software it requires signing up
| for an account and a subscription and what not
|
| No it does not. It will try to push it on you, but you can
| export to USB without account or subscription.
|
| Create a playlist with your tracks, insert USB, right click
| on the playlist and export to USB.
| wayvey wrote:
| Must have gone under my radar, there probably was some
| license included with the device my local bar bought too
| but I didn't have it on hand at the time.
| helboi4 wrote:
| Beatmatching by ear is great fun but you get rekorbox for
| free with any pioneer controller, which you should want for
| practicing anyway?
| wayvey wrote:
| Yeah I just didn't have the license at hand at the time. I
| usually just practice with Mixxx at home and then just use
| my vanilla USBs with whatever equipment is at the venue. I
| can play with vinyls so pretty much any equipment works for
| me. I do like all the QoL features of modern gear though.
| rounce wrote:
| Mixxx has been around for over a decade, I was mixing with it
| back in 2011. Back then I also made a controller out of an old
| HDD, a cheap hall sensor IC, and an arduino and it worked well
| as a small portable CDJ knock off. I'll try and resurrect it
| when I get some time later this year and post the GitHub link.
| I'm sure it could be made a lot fancier for even less these
| days.
| helboi4 wrote:
| It's never going to work. It would require all clubs in the
| world to throw away their expensive Pioneer gear.
| HelloUsername wrote:
| I very much like the website itself, built to work without
| Javascript, and doesn't make any external calls as far as I can
| tell
| hlzhs wrote:
| Thanks, we wanted to honor our user's privacy when we
| redesigned the website.
| officeplant wrote:
| Been using Mixxx since 2015, I haven't liked every update they
| put out, but its always been solid software.
| wayvey wrote:
| I have also probably used it on and off for 10+ years, but
| don't recall any bad updates. What did you encounter that you
| didn't like if I may ask?
| officeplant wrote:
| I forget when exactly but somewhere in the 2.x updates they
| seemingly changed how the default interface's looping
| settings worked. I mostly use mixxx to make screwed & chopped
| cuts, vaporwave material, etc. It used to be easier to juggle
| my loop length live while also jumping between set loop
| points. Just with a mouse and keyboard. I wanna say I used to
| install 1.6 or 1.8 to get the defaults I wanted back, but
| later releases ran better after a while.
| msephton wrote:
| I currently use DJ.Studio so I'm interested how Mixxx compares.
| hlzhs wrote:
| Just try it, it's completely free:
| https://mixxx.org/download/#stable
|
| Mixxx is entirely community driven: There is no company behind
| it, everything is done by unpaid volunteers.
| Mashimo wrote:
| Two different applications. Like most DJ software this is for
| .. well for DJIng live. While DJ.Studio is more of creating an
| "offline" mixxx.
| msephton wrote:
| Thanks, that's all I need to know.
| mjsir911 wrote:
| I've had a lot of fun setting mixxx up for DJing on my steam
| deck, with fully scriptable (in javascript) USB hid bindings,
| I've been able to reverse engineer the steam deck's control
| schemes to be able to mix quite portably.
| kristopolous wrote:
| Been using it since ~2006 ... it's pretty great software. Hooking
| it up to a cheap sub-$100 MIDI controller is amazing.
|
| Just looked it up - I had no idea it's from 2001 - this puts it
| in a small group of long-active FLOSS
| cpach wrote:
| What are good controllers for using together with Mixxx?
| suranyami wrote:
| I dunno whether "good" really applies to this, but I've gotta
| say I've been loving the cost, portability and reliability of
| the Numark DJ2Go Touch ($AU120):
|
| https://www.numark.com/product/dj2go2-touch
|
| I've got a cute little portable setup using it, a Raspberry Pi
| 5 with a 1TB m.2 SSD, 15" portable USB-C monitor and a Keychron
| low-profile keyboard and bluetooth mouse. Works amazingly well.
|
| I'm betting that just about any controller would be worth a
| shot.
| hlzhs wrote:
| Check the https://manual.mixxx.org/2.5/de/hardware/manuals for
| a list of built-in mappings shipped with Mixxx. There are also
| additional user mappings on the discourse forum:
| https://mixxx.discourse.group/c/controller-mappings/10
|
| Personally, I use the Roland DJ-505:
| https://manual.mixxx.org/2.5/de/hardware/controllers/roland_...
| quesomaster9000 wrote:
| Depending on how much space you have, I'm using a Numark
| MixTrack Platinum FX, with the mapping from the forum.
|
| Everything works! Even the display in the middle of the
| jogwheels, that comes with the '4 deck' version, which shows
| BPM, time left, rotation indicator, shift amount/mode.
|
| At this point almost all buttons & knobs on it are in regular
| use, although some of the deeper menu combos accessible via
| buttons aren't fully intuitive but don't seem to matter.
| poopsmithe wrote:
| I used mixxx to DJ my brother's wedding. I think it was 2013 or
| 2014. The moment I got the signal to switch to a specific track
| for the bride's first dance with her Father, mixxx locked up my
| laptop. Guests were staring at me, one offered a hushed, "they're
| waiting!" Completely unresponsive, I had to hard reboot my locked
| up computer and boot back into Ubuntu. Then I opened VLC where I
| played the tracks for the rest of the evening. Probably not
| mixxx's fault, but I will never forget that moment.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Yep, that can happen when computers are involved, and why one
| needs to practice with a new setup beforehand. Goes for
| performances or rocket launches.
|
| During my DJ sessions (and while dabbling in digital audio
| files from a computer), I usually brought an old Sony Discman
| loaded with my best tracks on a burnt CD. Kept ready at moments
| notice in case disaster struck. Sadly crashes weren't uncommon
| at all in the bad old late 90s when consumer OSs were unstable
| crap.
|
| I guess a smart phone could do that duty today, but you'll
| still need to have an adapter plugged into the mixer
| beforehand/ready to go to minimize disruption.
| encom wrote:
| >I guess a smart phone could do that duty today
|
| Not since they bravely killed off the headphone plug.
| hlzhs wrote:
| Mixxx dev here. I'm sorry you had a bad experience. We are
| spending a lot of effort on making Mixxx rock stable.
|
| Considering that this was more than a decade ago, I'm pretty
| sure that this bug has been fixed by now.
| sambf wrote:
| I do have a similar story with the 2.4.1 or 2.4.2 version
| unfortunately. Didn't take the time to debug it or fill an
| issue yet but when the library (between 100 and 200G) is on a
| USB stick it regularly hangs for 10-15s when browsing. It
| always came back to normal but made me sweat every time.
| alpenbazi wrote:
| take faster storage m(
| chromatin wrote:
| That stinks. I know professional DJs often have a backup music
| player for this very reason. Even hardware can fault.
| magicalhippo wrote:
| Went to a concert recently where the supporting band was a two
| piece which relied on a MacBook for live sequencing the drums
| as well as some MIDI inputs for various effects and such.
|
| Two and a half songs in the MacBook died and wouldn't come up
| after reboot, and that was that.
|
| Felt bad for them, but using a laptop as critical
| infrastructure is usually a bad idea.
| ghomem wrote:
| Mix is absolutely awesome. One of the most carefully organized
| open source projects that I've seen.
|
| Some years ago I made a Mixxx demo video with a DYI "integrated
| controller". It demos Linux boot to Mixxx, touch screen,
| beatmatching and some modest effects:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjHvW4OsQ2Y
|
| Mixxx devs: if you are reading this... cheers :-)
| joemi wrote:
| I used to use Mixxx a lot about a decade ago when I was DJing
| weekly in some bars and also had a weekly radio show. It was
| great. I'm glad to see it's still around and going strong.
| igor47 wrote:
| Love mixxx! I use it regular for DJing with an ancient ddj sb2
| controller
| alabhyajindal wrote:
| I used Mixxx as a teenager to feel like a DJ. Great to see it
| here!
| sneak wrote:
| c++, GPL2
| jcelerier wrote:
| and Qt :D
| Hypnosis6173 wrote:
| I use it as my main software for my Traktor Kontrol S2.
|
| Some Lights are buggy and the fix is not yet out.
|
| Also Highlighting Tracks based on a fitting Key is only availible
| in the Alpha Branch of the software, which obivously has lots of
| other issues.
|
| Besides that its an easy software which can handle all of my
| other feature requirements and it runs really nice.
|
| So i would really recommend it ;)
| marssaxman wrote:
| I was a DJ for a good few years, and once I discovered Mixxx I
| used it exclusively. High quality software, compatible with
| basically every controller, Linux support, _and_ an open-source
| license - what more could you ask for?
|
| Music has fallen out of my life since then, but I am glad Mixxx
| is going strong.
| brcmthrowaway wrote:
| How does mixx compare to rekordbox?
| scyllax wrote:
| Mixxx is great! I used it with a Nano Korg Kontrol 2 when I just
| started learning DJing a few years ago.
| rhizome31 wrote:
| Rock solid DJ software. I've used it for IRL events, streaming,
| radio shows. Higly recommended.
| Octo-Shark wrote:
| I heard about mixxx back in 2013 from someone who managed to make
| his Linux lighter ( replacing the kernel or something? ). Then he
| compiled mixxx without all the unnecessary functions he didn't
| want. He managed to lower down latency response to 4ms or maybe
| below I remember. His DJ sets where amazing!
| ctm92 wrote:
| I stumbled across Mixxx many years ago when I wanted to get
| started with digital vinyl systems (timecode vinyl records). It
| was the really hot shit back then and Serato and Traktor were the
| market leaders.
|
| Back then Mixxx didn't feel like a finished product, everything
| was not ready to actually use it in a "production" setting.
|
| Then I found xwax [1], which uses the same timecode library as
| mixxx iirc. Very unspectacular UI, no mouse support, but super
| stable and easily as good as the commercial Serato Scratch Live.
| Just needed a 4i4o audio interface for around $100 and it was
| good to go, awesome software!
|
| [1] https://xwax.org/
| Mashimo wrote:
| Impresive that xwax still gets updated.
| noisy_boy wrote:
| Hijacking this thread on a tangential - can folks share some
| guides on the basics of getting started mixing music? For a total
| noob who would like to explore this field. Obviously those using
| open source software (or atleast software that works on Linux)
| would be the most useful to me.
| qwertygnu wrote:
| You're looking for a DAW (digital audio workstation). Ardour is
| open source and works on Linux. It's not one of the "main"
| players but I'm sure it has all the important features. You can
| google "how to mix music" and apply pretty much any tutorial to
| any DAW.
| j12a wrote:
| Eagerly waiting for the Ableton Link support.. seems to be just
| around corner (or a couple).
| LWIRVoltage wrote:
| I DJ for partner dances and have used Mixxx after i discovered DJ
| software
|
| It was cool getting to explore features like the ability to
| stream to radio websites that others would follow a link to, to
| hear the music( something done in the first few years of COVID to
| facilitate DJ'ed music for 'online ' dances, which were a thing
| for a while.
|
| I tout it heavily and enjoy it, and it is pretty incredible that
| it provides all that it does for free and in a open source manner
| . I hope it continues to grow. I run into a few others who use
| Virtual DJ and hope that Mixxx eventually picks up the few things
| they do it does not yet do
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