Today's Deep-Dive: Koel

Okay, let's set the scene. You've got your music collection, right?

Maybe it's a rip CDs from way back, digital downloads you bought,

maybe some really obscure tracks. It's you stuff.

Your personal archive. Exactly. But I mean, let's be real.

Most of us listen via streaming these days.

It's just the convenience factor is hard to beat. It really is. Spotify,

Apple music, they make it so easy.

But what if you didn't have to choose between your library and that convenience?

What if you could stream your entire personal collection, you know, anywhere,

anytime with all the nice features you expect like playlists and mobile access.

Yeah. All the bells and whistles, but it was all, well, yours run by you.

That's a pretty compelling thought, especially if you feel that tension between

just renting music and actually owning and curating it. Totally.

And that's exactly what led us to look into coal. That's K O E L.

It bills itself as a personal music streaming server. Right.

And for this deep dive, we've been digging into the primary sources,

the info straight from its get a repository and the official project website.

So our mission today is basically to unpack what coal actually is,

get a sense of how it works, look at the key features,

and I think importantly explore the why.

Why would someone go to the trouble of setting up their own music server when,

you know, commercial options are literally everywhere.

We're trying to find those core reasons as essential insights.

Okay. Then let's get into it. Oh, and first,

just a quick word about who's supporting this deep dive safe server.

Let me spell it out. That's w w w dot.

That's a S A F E S E R V E R dot.

Got it. Okay, cool. So fundamentally, what are we talking about here?

Well, at its heart, think of it as a self-hosted audio streaming service.

It's web based. So you usually interact with it through a browser or maybe an

app. Okay. Web based. And the key word is personal.

This isn't some giant company service. You install this software on your own server,

my own server. So like a computer I have at home or could be,

or it could be a virtual server you rent, you know, in the cloud somewhere.

The point is you control the server and it's designed specifically for your music

files. Ah, okay.

So instead of tapping into Spotify's massive library,

I'm basically building my own private Spotify just for my music.

That's a great way to put it. Yeah.

And another really big piece is that it's open source. Right. You mentioned that.

What does that mean in practical terms here?

It means the code that makes coal work is public. Anyone can look at it,

check it for security, suggest improvements, even modify it.

If they have the skills,

it gives you a level of transparency and frankly control that you simply don't

get with closed source commercial software. No black boxes. Exactly.

And their state at all, according to the docs is pretty straight forward to be a

personal music streaming server that works. That works. I kind of like that.

Simple, functional, no crazy marketing speak. Yeah.

It suggests a focus on reliability and just doing the core job well. Okay.

You mentioned running it on your own server.

That sounds essentially technical. What's actually under the hood.

What tech is Cole built with? It uses pretty modern web technologies for the part

you actually see and click on the user interface in your browser.

That's built with Vue JS. Vue. Okay. That's a popular JavaScript framework.

Very popular. Yes. Good for building those slick responsive interfaces.

Then on the server side, which handles things like managing the music files,

database interactions, processing requests, that's built using Laravel.

Laravel. That's a PHP framework. Correct.

A very well regarded and widely used PHP framework.

Vue and Laravel. That combination.

Does it suggest who this is really aimed at? Maybe not total beginners.

Well, the source material does specifically say it targets web developers.

So yes, while the end result,

the music player itself is designed to be user-friendly for anyone listening,

the initial setup, getting it installed and configured.

That might require a bit more technical know-how.

You'd probably need some comfort level with web servers, maybe command lines,

PHP environments, databases.

Okay. So not quite a one-click install from an app store then.

Probably not for most people. No,

but they do provide documentation to help walk you through it. Right.

So assuming someone is willing to tackle that setup,

or maybe they are a web developer, what are the big draws?

Why choose call over say Plex or just sticking with Spotify?

What makes it compelling?

The source has highlighted two key things. First off, the design and user interface.

They describe it as clean, modern, even gorgeous. Okay.

Aesthetics matter. They do,

especially for something you interact with regularly.

And they mentioned it's intentionally inspired by popular music players.

So the idea is you should feel right at home pretty quickly.

It shouldn't feel alien. Plus it supports themes for customization. Nice.

A familiar feel is good. What else?

Performance is another big one. The word blazingly fast comes up.

Blazingly fast. Okay. Bold claim. It is,

but it suggests optimization is a priority because it's built with these modern

frameworks. The goal is for it to respond really quickly.

Even if you have a massive music library, which, uh,

can sometimes bog down other self-hosted solutions. Yeah.

Nobody likes waiting for their music library to load.

Speed is definitely key for streaming.

What about managing the actual music files? That's often a weak spot elsewhere,

especially if you have weird tags or formats.

That seems to be a real strength here. They call it robust media management.

It's not just playing songs.

You can upload new music directly through the web interface.

You can delete files and critically you can edit the metadata.

Metadata like song titles, artists. Exactly. Title artists,

album genre, track number, disk number, all the standard stuff. Yeah.

It also apparently handles things like compilation albums correctly manages

album art effectively lets you organize playlists into folders,

folders for playlists. That's actually really useful. Right.

And it handles cover images. The whole emphasis seems to be on giving you really

granular control over your library,

letting you clean up messy tags or organize things precisely the way you want.

That kind of control is gold. You just don't get that with the big streaming

services.

Does it connect to anything else? Any integrations? Yes, it does.

It can integrate with last.fm for scrabbling. Scrabbling.

You mean tracking what you listen to? Yep.

Automatically sends your listening history to last.fm if you want.

It can also pull extra metadata from there.

It mentions integration with Spotify, too.

Maybe for pulling in related artist info or artwork.

The sources aren't super specific on the how and even YouTube integration,

potentially for linking official music videos or related content to the tracks in

your library.

So it tries to enrich your personal library with external data.

OK, so it seems to nail the basics.

Streaming management looks good, feels fast.

But then the sources talk about batteries included features.

This sounds like where it gets really interesting. What else does it do?

Oh, yeah, this list is pretty impressive and goes way beyond just hitting play.

For starters, transparent FLAC support.

FLAC, the lossless audio format.

Exactly. Popular with audio files.

Transparent means you just add your FLAC files and Cole streams them

without you needing to do anything special. High quality audio, no fuss.

Nice. What else? Cross device playback synchronization.

So you pause a song in your laptop and you can pick it up right there on your phone.

Precisely. Seamless transition. Then you've got standard things

like marking favorites, tracking your listening history.

Yeah. But also smart playlists.

Smart playlists, like automatically generated.

Yeah. Based on criteria you set, like recently added rock songs

or most played tracks this month. They update automatically.

OK, that's pretty cool.

Then there's multi user support.

So multiple people can have accounts on the same Cole server.

An equalizer for tweaking the sound.

Visualizers, if you like those and transcoding.

Transcoding. What's that for?

That means the server can convert audio formats on the fly.

So say you have a FLAC file,

but you're streaming to your phone on mobile data.

Ah, you might want a smaller file size.

Exactly. Cole can automatically convert it to something like MP3 or AAC

for streaming to save bandwidth or ensure compatibility with the device

without changing your original high quality file.

Wow. OK, FLAC, sync, multi-user, smart playlists, transcoding.

That's a seriously powerful feature set for a personal server project.

It really does sound batteries included.

It seems very comprehensive. Yeah.

So if someone's listening and thinking, OK, I'm tempted.

What's the process?

How do they actually get started with this? Is it super difficult?

Well, as we mentioned, it might require some technical comfort,

but the project provides documentation, which is key.

There are guides covering the system requirements.

What kind of server you need, step by step instructions for installation

and also for upgrades later on and troubleshooting.

Yep. Troubleshooting guides for common problems, too.

And for the really keen folks, maybe developers who want to contribute

back to coal or customize it heavily, there's a separate development guide.

So the resources seem to be there if you're willing to roll up your sleeves a bit.

What about listening on the go? Is there an app?

There is. They have an official mobile app called CoalPlayer.

It's available for both iOS and Android.

So a proper native app experience.

That's the idea.

And the sources emphasize that it requires no extra setup

beyond just installing the app and logging into your coal server instance.

Your whole library should just be there, accessible on your phone or tablet.

That mobile piece is pretty crucial these days.

OK, so we've been talking about the main coal project,

which you said is open source and presumably free.

That's right. The core community version is free and open source.

But I definitely saw mention of coal plus on the website.

What's the story there? Is it a subscription?

This is how they seem to fund development and offer more advanced features.

Coal plus is like a premium add on package. Yeah.

But the really interesting thing, and they stress this, is the paint up model.

It's a one time purchase.

One time, really, in twenty twenty five. I know, right.

They explicitly say no subscriptions, no recurrent fees.

You buy it once, you get the plus features for that version,

potentially with updates, but no monthly bill.

That's highly unusual and very appealing

compared to the subscription fatigue many people feel.

So what do you get for this one time payment?

What's in Coal Plus?

The sources list some significant additions.

One of the biggest is expanded storage options.

What they call storage drivers, meaning where your music files are actually stored.

Exactly. The free version probably assumes your music

is on the same server Coal is running on or maybe a network drive.

Coal Plus adds direct support for cloud storage services, like which ones?

Amazon S3 is the big one mentioned, but also other S3 compatible services.

They listed Digital Ocean Spaces, CloudFlare R2 and Mineo,

which is a self-hostable S3 alternative, and it also adds support for Dropbox.

Wow. OK, so you could keep your massive music

library in, say, CloudFlare R2, which has very low storage costs,

and Coal Plus could just stream directly from there.

That seems to be the idea.

It gives you huge flexibility and scalability

for storage, separating your library from the server itself.

That's a really big deal for managing large collections.

Anything else major in Plus? Yes, it takes the multi-user

feature further with something called individual libraries.

Individual libraries. How's that different from just multi-user?

In the standard multi-user setup, everyone might log in

and see the same shared music collection.

With individual libraries in Plus, each user can have their own

completely separate music collection managed by the same cool server.

Ah, so like my library and your library could live on the same

server instance, but be totally distinct. Different files, different playlists.

Exactly. True separation, like having different accounts

on a commercial service, but self-hosted.

OK, that's a sophisticated feature.

And it adds music collaboration tools so you can make certain songs public,

maybe share them with a link, or you can invite other users

to collaborate on building playlists together.

Oh, interesting. Shared playlist building.

Yeah. And the sources also hint at things planned for Cold Plus in the future.

Even more storage options, support for custom themes,

perhaps beyond the basics, single sign-on or SSO.

SSO, like logging in with your Google account or something.

Potentially. Yeah, using one central login and also synchronized lyrics display.

So quite a roadmap for Plus.

OK, so Cold Plus really layers on some powerful,

almost enterprise grade features, especially around storage,

flexibility and user management, all under that one time purchase model.

Very interesting.

Let's zoom out a bit. What about the project itself?

Is it actively developed?

Is there a strong community? GitHub usually tells a story there.

It really does. And the GitHub stats look very healthy for Cole.

It's got over 16,500 stars.

16,000. That's a lot.

It's a strong indicator of popularity and interest.

Yeah. Over 2000 forks, meaning lots of people are experimenting with

or contributing to the code.

It lists over 86 contributors.

So not just one person doing all the work.

Definitely not. It's a community effort.

And the languages listed primarily PHP, TypeScript, and Vue

match the tech stack we talked about.

That consistency is good. Any signs of how it's sustained.

Open source projects need support.

They do. And Cole has options for financial support through GitHub

sponsors and Open Collective, which helps cover costs and fund development time

and maybe the most important sign of health.

The activity, it mentions 118 releases, which is a lot of updates over time.

And the latest release date mentioned in the sources was May 28th, 2025.

May 2025. So very recent.

This thing is alive and kicking.

Absolutely. It shows consistent ongoing development.

It's clearly not an abandoned project, which is always a risk with open source.

That's really reassuring if you're considering investing the time to set it up.

OK, let's try and tie this all together then.

For you listening right now.

What's the bottom line?

With Spotify and Apple Music being so easy, why go down this coal path?

I think it really boils down to ownership and control primarily with coal.

You control the software. You control your music files.

You control the metadata.

You're not at the mercy of licensing deals changing or services shutting down or

terms changing.

Exactly. Your access isn't dependent on a corporation's whims.

Plus, you get access to features that might be niche but important to you,

like that native FLAC support or the really detailed metadata management,

which you often just don't get elsewhere.

And the cost aspect is pretty different too.

Totally. The free community version is already quite powerful.

And if you want those advanced features in Coal Plus,

that one-time payment model could be significantly cheaper in the long run

compared to years of monthly subscription fees,

especially if you already have a large digital library you want to use.

So it's about building something tailored, something powerful based on open tech

that's just for your music, taking back that control.

That sums it up well.

It's presented as this powerful, fast, modern, feature-packed way

to stream your own music, built with solid tech

and supported by an active community.

It's really a deep dive into owning your digital music experience again.

Yeah, it definitely sounds like a compelling alternative

for people who really value their personal collection

and want more than just a temporary rental catalog,

which kind of leaves us with a final thought to chew on maybe.

In this age where streaming subscriptions are just everywhere

and we mostly rent access to these huge catalogs

curated by somebody else, what's the unique value you get

from actually building, curating and having total control

over your own accessible digital music library?

With all its specific versions, all your little metadata fixes,

maybe tracks that aren't available anywhere else.

Right, all that personal history embedded in the files.

What does that ownership bring to your relationship with music

that maybe a purely rented service just can't replicate?

That's a great question, really gets to the heart of what

digital ownership even means today.

Definitely something to think about.

And one last time, I thank you to our supporter for this deep dive.

SafeServer commits sich das Hosting dieser Software

und unterstützt dich bei deiner digitalen Transformation.

That's www.safeserver.de

That's www.safeserver.de