Crate

Cross-platform DJ library manager with music discovery, track analysis, and USB export

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🎧 Overview

Crate is a cross-platform desktop application for managing DJ audio libraries. It handles everything from discovery, organization, analysis, and USB export.

🎵 Features

• Library management - Import and organize audio files (MP3, FLAC, WAV, AIFF, M4A/AAC) with automatic metadata extraction, search, and filtering
• Tagging - Categorize tracks with a flexible tag system for fast filtering
• Playlists - Build playlists manually or with smart rules
• Track analysis - Waveform generation, key detection, BPM analysis, and energy profiling
• Music discovery - Browse and preview releases from Bandcamp, SoundCloud, YouTube, and Discogs
• Audio playback - Preview tracks with waveform display and cue point management
• USB export - Export to Pioneer CDJ/XDJ devices with full Rekordbox database generation
• Device sync - Detect connected USB devices and sync library changes incrementally
• Metadata editing - Edit track metadata in bulk or individually
• Customization - Themes, accent colors, and font preferences
• Localization - Available in 11 languages (EN, JA, NL, FR, DE, ES, IT, SV, KO, PT, ZH)
• Auto-updates - Stay on the latest version with minimal effort

🚀 Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js 22.x or higher
• Yarn (package manager)
• Rust nightly toolchain

For Tauri development dependencies, see the Tauri v2 prerequisites guide.

Windows

Windows requires Strawberry Perl to build SQLCipher with OpenSSL:

choco install strawberryperl

Or download the installer from https://strawberryperl.com/. Restart your terminal after installation.

Installation

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/blackboxaudio/crate.git
cd crate

Install dependencies:

yarn install

Development

Start the development server with hot reload:

yarn dev

This launches both the Vite dev server (port 1420) and the Tauri application window.

Building

Build for production:

yarn build

Build for staging (with devtools):

yarn build:staging

Output binaries are placed in src-tauri/target/release/bundle/.

Platform targets:

• macOS - .dmg, .app
• Windows - .msi, .exe
• iOS - TestFlight / App Store (via CI)
• Android - signed .apk (via CI, attached to GitHub Releases)

Mobile (iOS)

The iOS app reuses the Rust backend in src-tauri/ and renders the mobile frontend from apps/mobile/. iOS development requires macOS.

Prerequisites:

• Xcode + Command Line Tools, and CocoaPods (brew install cocoapods)
• Rust iOS targets: rustup target add aarch64-apple-ios aarch64-apple-ios-sim
• An Apple Developer Team ID for code signing (find it under Membership details)

See the Tauri iOS prerequisites for the full list.

Code signing is not committed to the repo — supply your own team ID via the APPLE_DEVELOPMENT_TEAM environment variable (it overrides tauri.conf.json's bundle.iOS.developmentTeam). Export it in your shell profile so every tauri ios command picks it up:

export APPLE_DEVELOPMENT_TEAM=XXXXXXXXXX   # your Apple Developer Team ID

The Xcode project is generated and not committed (src-tauri/gen/apple is gitignored), so scaffold it once (with APPLE_DEVELOPMENT_TEAM set):

yarn tauri ios init

Run the app in the iOS Simulator (or a connected device) with hot reload:

yarn dev:ios

Build for production:

yarn build:ios                # default iOS build
yarn build:ios:appstore       # App Store Connect (TestFlight / App Store)
yarn build:ios:adhoc          # ad-hoc distribution
yarn build:android:apk        # Android APK
yarn build:android:aab        # Android App Bundle

For signed release builds via CI, see .github/MOBILE_DISTRIBUTION.md.

The iOS scripts first generate src-tauri/Info.ios.plist (adds background-audio mode for preview playback, and the OAuth callback URL scheme for cloud sign-in). The scheme is derived from ios_oauth_client_id in src-tauri/cloud_sync.config.json (see cloud_sync.config.example.json); without it the app still builds, but cloud sign-in is unavailable.

🔗 Links

• Website & Downloads
• Issues
• Releases

⚠️ Disclaimer

Crate's discovery features interact with third-party music services for browsing and previewing content. These features are intended for personal use only. Users are responsible for ensuring their usage complies with applicable terms of service.

📄 License

This project is source-available under the PolyForm Shield License 1.0.0. You can read, learn from, and contribute to the code, but you can't use it to build a competing product.