How Not to Build a Music Player

AMP is a homegrown, offline music player motivated by the author’s experience of internet shutdowns in Iran. After a nationwide blackout made online listening unreliable, the author began saving music and used Strawberry, but disliked its unsynchronized lyrics and visible timestamps. AMP was designed to keep a minimal feature set while offering synchronized lyrics, native-feeling system integration, no C++ dependencies, and an implementation in Zig, including its graphics shaders. Building it also provided a rewarding way to continue a hobby during a period when internet access was scarce and prohibitively expensive.

The project became a cautionary lesson in AI-assisted coding. After using a Claude subscription to generate a large portion of AMP, the author found the resulting code too extensive to review properly. When the account was banned and the hosting platform’s no-AI policy forced a decision, the author chose to replace the generated code rather than move the repository. Over four months, nearly half the codebase was removed or rewritten, leaving a more robust program with the same features and some additions. The author concludes that AI can be useful for routine editing tasks but should not replace understanding and reviewing code, especially in a hobby project. AMP’s next goals include a music server, Android and Windows versions, and Linux distribution packages.