A web application (for mobile) to allow lazy users to control the playback of videos remotely. Users are able to:
- Pause/Play
- Go forward/backwards
- Increase/decrease volume
Lazy controller uses socket.io to establish a connection between the host machine and the mobile client, allowing real-time control. Note that it does not manipulate videos directly, but rather, inputs keystrokes into the host machine.
Both frontend and backend instances must be running. Importantly, the backend instance must be running on the main operating system (ie. backend cannot be running on WSL or a virtual machine).
The setup below assumes that you are running this over the LAN. Alternatively, localtunnel can be used to expose your server to the public.
Packages for both front and backend are managed by npm. Run npm install to install dependencies. For backend, take not of installation of Robotjs which may not be straightforward. Refer to the Robotjs docs for info.
By default, the frontend listens on port 3000 and the backend listens on port 8080. Open these ports on your firewall.
If frontend is running on WSL, in order for the frontend to be reachable over the LAN, traffic must be forwarded from the Windows IP to the WSL IP address. Instructions to do this can be found here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/61002681/connecting-to-wsl2-server-via-local-network.
The backend server expects the HOST environment variable. This is simply the IP address of the host machine.
The frontend server expects the REACT_APP_BACKEND_URL environment variable. Provide the URL to reach the backend server.
This script assumes that the frontend is on WSL, and does the necessary port forwarding as indicated above. It also sets the HOST environment variable. Run it using:
./BackendSetup.ps1
This script sets the env var REACT_APP_BACKEND_URL. Run it using:
source ./FrontendSetup.sh