Tracker Radio

Based on some feedback of the initial releases, and UI/UX research of similar products in the market, I've completely rewritten the frontend using Vuetify and the Google Material guidelines and styling. This feels a lot more effective and efficient from a user perspective.

Also now includes playlists.

Having spent some time getting most of they key functionality running, including an embedded version of the WeTracker engine, it's time to let it loose and see if anyone is interested. First release has a less than perfect front end, but the backend and playback is the key.

Features at first release include:

• Filtering and searching of artists.
• Embedded playback of mod files directly, not mp3 or wav files.
• Link to WeTracker to explore the track in more detail.

Having spent a month or so experimenting with putting the core functionality of Tracker Radio together with a variety of CMS systems, from Drupal to Wordpress, I have come to the conclusion that none of them are flexible enough to do what I need. It is going to be necessary to code this from the ground up, it's too specialised to be implemented easily and effectively in a CMS.

In order to test this concept, I need to keep costs to a minimum, so after some testing with various hosting platforms, including Google AppEngine, Heroku, etc. I've settled on PythonAnywhere as having the right mix of access flexibility, database offering for the free tier, and features. This clearly influences my tooling decisions, so it's going to be Flask for the backend, and Vue for the front.

During the creation of the partner project, WeTracker (https://www.wetracker.xyz), I started using the extensive FastTracker II mod archive at modland.com as a test set for the functionality of the player code and editing interface. In order to do this, I created a spreadsheet that listed all the FT2 tracks on modland.com. This grew into a more functional sheet with the ability to automatically post "Mod of the Day" (MotD) tweets every day to share the best tracks I discovered. The sheet enables me to listen to the tracks in a random order. Some friends mentioned that some of the music that made it to MotD was very impressive, especially given the limitations of the format and tools, and got quite interested.

At this point, I realised it's a shame that more people can't easily listen to some of this historic music, created by talented and driven amateurs, often in their bedrooms, during the height of the 8/16 bit gaming, and demo scenes. This was the realisation that there might be an audience for Tracker Radio.