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Comment by whalesalad | Hacker News Reader

This is quite a yak shave. You can run Spotify on one computer and have it output to speakers connected to another computer using Spotify. Remote control. I do it all the time.

So you can run Spotify on your desktop, and control it from Spotify on your work laptop.

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In case anyone is unfamiliar, Spotify Connect is Spotify's solution for casting and remote controlling one or more Spotify speakers from a Spotify client on the same network. Any Spotify client can act as a speaker, and the system seamlessly connects to other smart home speaker systems like Google Home.

When multiple Spotify clients connect to the same Connect session, they collaboratively control the music that plays on the clients that are acting as speakers.

It's the state of the art when it comes to built in remote control systems among the various music services. Other music services do have similar capabilities, but Spotify's is for now, unrivaled.

It's both incredibly convenient, and the most impressively disguised DRM. If two users attempt to share the same account, Spotify will helpfully make one of them a remote control for the other rather than being able to listen independently.

Two users on the same account can't listen simultaneously anyway, though, regardless of network.

Without the remote control feature, it would just have to be some generic blocked message and they would see the same account sharing outrage that Netflix had.

unless you have a multi-point bluetooth audio deviceconnected to multiple devices running the spotify app.

I don't think yak shaving is an appropriate term to describe this. Yak shaving is when you wanted to do something but end up doing something else.

Here, the author wants to do this thing, so they do it. They're not shaving yaks, they're doing the thing they set out to do.

I noticed other stories at the bottom that shave (collective name of yaks) of yaks:

- Reverse engineering and fixing a streaming app

- Bypassing anti-cheat software

- Reverse engineering and fine-tuning Asustor NAS fans

- Reverse engineering Asustor's NAS firmware

- Reverse engineering my NAS fan speed sensor (sort of)

- Reverse engineering Positivo's smart home app

- I got bored, so I hacked my TV

(speaking of yak shaving, do you know of the Yakalo¹, a cross breed between a yak and a bison?)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakalo

But then you a) need another machine, and b) can’t use the skip buttons.

The article says there is already another machine, their desktop computer which is connected to the hi-fi-- and what do you mean you can't use the skip buttons? They work fine with Spotify Connect.

> what do you mean you can't use the skip buttons?

I think they mean the physical skip buttons on the device. By presenting it as a USB device the skip buttons can work on device.

Except that: "My main next steps, in no particular order, would be... Detecting track navigation: if you go to the previous or next tracks, emit a signal to somewhere. This would allow triggering a track change on the stream source, such as Spotify."

Skip buttons on which device? The HiFi [remote] itself? I'd imagine that doesn't work in the 1-PC route either. If it does, then the problem is solved because it will have the correct effect in the 2-PC route.

It’s mentioned several times in the article that the author wants the physical skip buttons on the HiFi system to work, which can’t be done with any number of computers connected via 3.5mm

I do it all the time. The skip buttons on my Linux computer will work with my iPhone being the owner of the stream. And vice versa.

It’s mentioned several times in the article that the author wants the physical skip buttons on the HiFi system to work.

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