Brennan Helix Web App

Note: This project is not owned or endorsed by Brennan in any way.

A standalone proxy system that can connect to your Brennan Helix and provides the same control of the API as the built-in application.

Why?

This project is intended to showcase changes or improvements to the Helix web application,

PHP Proxy

If you have PHP installed you can use a simple PHP router to act as the proxy between your browser and the Helix.

To use the PHP proxy run the following, replacing the IP address with the IP address that your Helix has.

HELIXIP=192.168.0.101 php -S localhost:8000 router.php

This proxy has been tested with PHP version 8.3.

Load a web browser with the address http://localhost:8000 and you will see the Helix web app. All the traffic to the helix is proxied through this server so that a custom web front end can be served.

JavaScript Proxy

If you have Node.js installed you can use a simple JavaScript script to act as the proxy between your browser and the Helix.

To use the JavaScript proxy run the following, replacing the IP address with the IP address that your Helix has.

HELIXIP=192.168.0.101 node server.js

This proxy has been tested with Node.js version 18.15.0.

Load a web browser with the address http://localhost:8000 and you will see the Helix web app. All the traffic to the helix is proxied through this server so that a custom web front end can be served.

API Docs

Here are the available endpoints for the Brennan Helix.

Always encode spaces into "%20" in your requests.

Get Status

• Path: /getStatus
• Arguments: None.

Gets the current status of the player, firmware version, ip address, zones and track information.

Example request:

curl "http://192.168.0.101/getStatus"

Example response, when playing a track from the SD card.

{
	"version":	"Feb 29 2024 10:18:10",
	"zone":	        "Office",
	"ssid":	        "Wifi",
	"ip":	        "192.168.0.101",
	"update":       "",
	"SDMounted":    true,
	"Volume":	7,
	"Playing":	false,
	"Source":	"SD",
	"artFlag":	true,
	"artUrl":	"http://192.168.0.101/sdcard/music/Bones of Minerva/Embers/art.jpg",
	"cdReady":	false,
	"Artist":	"Bones of Minerva",
	"Album":	"Embers",
	"Track":	"06 Merula.wav",
	"zones":	["Wired", "Den", "Living Room", "Office"]
}

Get Tracks

• Path: /getTracks
• Arguments: None.

Gets the track list from the currently inserted CD.

Example request:

curl "http://192.168.0.101/getFiles?path=/sdcard/"

Response, from a CD with an unknown artist.

["Track 1", "Track 2", "Track 3", "Track 4", "Track 5", "Track 6", "Track 7", "Track 8"]

Get Files

• Path: /getFiles
• Arguments: path - The path to inspect. This should always be in relation to the path "/sdcard".

Gets the file information from a given path.

Request to get the contents of the SD Card.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/getFiles?path=/sdcard"

Response, the default directory for the SD card is "/sdcard", which produces the following.

[{
	"name":	"music",
	"type":	2
}]

Here, "music" is a directory (type 2).

Drilling into a directory with files will show the files (type 1).

For example the request

curl "http://192.168.0.101/getFiles?path=/sdcard/music/Bones%20of%20Minerva/Embers"

Will respond with:

[{
		"name":	"01 Forest.wav",
		"type":	1
	}, {
		"name":	"02 Swamp.wav",
		"type":	1
	}, 
	// Tracks removed for brevity...
	{
		"name":	"11 Hands.wav",
		"type":	1
	}, {
		"name":	"art.jpg",
		"type":	1
	}]

Play File

• Path: /playFile
• Arguments: path - The path to the file or directory.

Play the file with the given path on the SD card. If a directory is given then all files in that directory are played in order.

Request:

curl "http://192.168.0.101/playFile?path=/sdcard/music/Bones%20of%20Minerva/Embers/01%20Forest.wav"

This endpoint will always respond with "OK" and a 200 response code.

This will change the response of getStatus so that "playing" is "true".

Events

• Path: /Event
• Arguments: key - The event action to perform.

The key value can be one of the following values.

• eject = Eject the CD tray.
• back = Play the previous track.
• play = Play the current track or stop the playback.
• next = Play the next track.

Example request to go to the next track.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/Event?key=next"

This endpoint will always respond with "OK" and a 200 response code.

Set Volume

• Path: /setVolume
• Arguments: volume - The value to set the volume to. A value of 0 means that the volume is off. A value of 100 sets the volume to max.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/setVolume?volume=1"

This endpoint will always respond with "OK" and a 200 response code.

Play Track

• Path: /playTrack
• Arguments: track - The number of the track to play.

This will play the designated track number from the CD. There are a couple of things to note:

• The tracks are numbered as a 0 index array. So a value of track 0 will play the first track on the CD.
• If the value of track doesn't validate to a number then the first track is played.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/playTrack?track=2"

This endpoint will always respond with "OK" and a 200 response code.

Pick Zone

• Path: /pickZone
• Arguments: zone - The zone to select.

This sets the output zone that audio output will be sent to. A zone of 'Wired' will always be available. A full list of the zones is available in the getStatus request response.

Example request.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/pickZone?zone=Wired"

This endpoint will always respond with "OK" and a 200 response code.

Get Generic Settings

• Path: /getGenericSettings
• Arguments: None.

Request to get the generic settings for the Helix.

curl "http://192.168.0.101/getGenericSettings"

This will result in the following response.

{
    "latency":
    {
        "value":    2000,
        "min":	    0,
        "max":	    10000,
        "step":	    100,
        "label":    "Buffer Length",
        "text":	    "Time in Milliseconds"
    }
}