ernestdefoe / earshot
Podcasts that live in your forum: every episode is a discussion, the player keeps going while members browse, and shows can be hosted on the forum or follow a feed hosted anywhere.
Fund package maintenance!
Requires
- php: ^8.3
- ext-simplexml: *
- flarum/core: ^2.0
Requires (Dev)
- flarum/phpstan: ^2.0
- flarum/tags: ^2.0
- flarum/testing: ^2.0
Suggests
- flarum/tags: Puts each show's episode discussions in a tag of your choice.
Provides
None
Conflicts
None
Replaces
None
README
Podcasts that live in your forum. Every episode is a discussion, the player keeps going while members browse, and a show can be hosted on the forum or follow a feed hosted anywhere (Buzzsprout, Transistor, Spotify for Creators, Libsyn…).
What it does
- Every episode is a discussion. Replies, mentions, subscriptions, search and permissions are Flarum's own. An episode in a members-only tag stays out of lists and out of the public feed.
- A player that never stops. It docks at the bottom of the window and keeps playing as members move around the forum: skip 15/30 seconds, playback speed, chapter marks, lock-screen and headset controls.
- Everyone resumes where they stopped. On the server for members (any device), in the browser for guests.
- Timestamps become buttons. "18:42" in a reply plays from 18:42. Times inside links, code, or past the end of the episode stay text. The composer can insert the player's current time.
- Host here, or follow a feed. Upload MP3/M4A/Ogg, or point a show at its RSS feed: new episodes arrive on their own, each with a discussion. A first follow brings in only the latest few episodes and tells nobody.
- Chapters. Podcasting 2.0 chapters from a feed, or typed as
12:30 The main story. - A real podcast feed for hosted shows (
/podcasts/your-show/feed), with theitunes:andpodcast:tags Apple Podcasts and Spotify expect. - Follow a show and hear about each new episode (alert and email).
- Subscribe buttons for Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, Pocket Casts, Overcast and RSS.
- A Latest episodes widget for Bespoke and for fof/forum-widgets-core.
- Light. One small script on every page; the pages, player and styles load only where there is a podcast. No query added to any other page.
Install
composer require ernestdefoe/earshot php flarum migrate php flarum cache:clear
Enable Earshot in the admin panel. Moderators can start shows (permission Start and manage shows); a show's hosts publish its episodes.
Followed feeds are read by Flarum's scheduler: make sure php flarum schedule:run runs every minute (see Flarum's docs). php flarum earshot:fetch --show=<slug> reads one now.
Hosted audio is uploaded through PHP, so upload_max_filesize, post_max_size and your web server's body size limit (nginx client_max_body_size) must allow episode-sized files, or link to files hosted elsewhere.
Settings
| Setting | Default | |
|---|---|---|
| Show "Podcasts" in the sidebar | on | |
| Read followed feeds every | 60 min | An unchanged feed costs one small conditional request. |
| Episodes to bring in when a feed is first followed | 10 | |
| Largest audio upload | 250 MB | Within PHP's and the web server's limits. |
Earshot Pro
A paid add-on: supporter-only episodes with private feeds, scheduled and early releases, transcripts (read-along and searchable), clips, listener voicemail, guests and a studio with listening stats.
Licence
MIT. If Earshot is useful to you, you can buy me a coffee.