MusicCatalogue.Entities 1.0.0

MusicCatalogue

Overview

• To be completed once the web service and GUI have been implemented

The Console Lookup Tool

• The application provides a simple command line interface for looking up albums one at a time
• The results are stored in a local SQLite database and subsequent searches for the same album return results from there rather than by querying the external APIs (see below)
• The following command line arguments are required:
  • Artist name
  • Album title
• Both should be enclosed in double-quotes
• For example:

MusicCatalogue.LookupTool "John Coltrane" "Blue Train"

• The output lists the album details and the number, title and duration of each track:

Web Service

• Under development

GUI

• Under development

Application Configuration File

• The console application and web service use a common configuration file format, described in this section

General Settings and Database Connection String

• The appsettings.json file in the console application project contains the following keys for controlling the application:

External API Configuration

• The lookup tool and web service include integration with the TheAudioDB public API for artist, album and track details lookup:

TheAudioDB

• To use the integration, a RapidAPI subscription is needed, as this includes an API key needed to acces the APIs
• Signup is free, but daily free usage is restricted with a nominal charge being made for requests above the free limit
• The integration is configured via the following keys in the configuration file:

ApiEndpoint Definitions

• An example API endpoint definition is shown below:

{
  "EndpointType": "Albums",
  "Service": "TheAudioDB",
  "Url": "https://theaudiodb.p.rapidapi.com/searchalbum.php"
}

• Possible values for the endpoint type are:

• Currently, only the TheAudioDB APIs are supported

ApiServiceKey Definitions

• An example key definition for a service is shown below:

{
  "Service": "TheAudioDB",
  "Key": "put-your-RapidPI-key-here"
}

Album Lookup

• The local SQLite database is searched preferentially for album details
• The external APIs are only used if an artist and/or album aren't found locally
• Details returned by the external APIs are stored in the local database provided the returned data is complete:
  • The artist is found
  • The album is found
  • The album has at least one track associated with it
• Consequently, subsequent searches with the same criteria will return data from the local database, not the APIs
• Artist names, album titles and track names are stored in title case
• Searches convert the search criteria to title case when looking details up in the database

SQLite Database

Database Schema

• Note that the "Duration" field on the TRACKS table denotes the track duration in ms

Database Management

• The application uses Entity Framework Core and initial creation and management of the database is achieved using EF Core database migrations
• To create the database for the first time, first install the .NET Core SDK and then install the "dotnet ef" tool:

dotnet tool install --global dotnet-ef

• Update the database path in the "appsettings.json" file in the terminal application project to point to the required database location
• Build the solution
• Open a terminal window and change to the MusicCatalogue.Data project
• Run the following command, making sure to use the path separator appropriate for your OS:

dotnet ef database update -s ../MusicCatalogue.LookupTool/MusicCatalogue.LookupTool.csproj

• If the database doesn't exist, it will create it
• It will then bring the database up to date by applying all pending migrations

Authors

• Dave Walker - Initial work - LinkedIn

Feedback

To file issues or suggestions, please use the Issues page for this project on GitHub.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.