Bad Apple ASCII Player

Interactive ASCII video player built with HAProxy and Lua. Streams the famous "Bad Apple!!" video as ASCII art through a TCP connection.

Quick Start

1. Place your video.mp4 file in the project directory
2. Run with Docker:

   docker-compose up --build

3. Connect via socat:

   socat - TCP:localhost:8888

Controls

• Space: Play/Pause
• R: Restart
• Q: Quit
• < / >: Previous/Next frame (when paused)
• - / +: Adjust playback speed
• 0: Reset speed to normal

Ports

• 8080: Web interface with connection instructions
• 8888: TCP player (main service)
• 8404: HAProxy stats (admin:badapple123)
• 8999: Health check

How it works

1. video_converter.py converts the MP4 to ASCII frames using OpenCV
2. HAProxy loads the frames via Lua and serves them through a TCP service
3. Players connect via socat/telnet and receive real-time ASCII video

Local setup (without Docker)

Install HAProxy 3.2 with Lua support:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:vbernat/haproxy-3.2
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install haproxy=3.2.* lua5.4

# Convert video
python3 video_converter.py

# Copy files
sudo cp bad_apple.lua /usr/local/etc/haproxy/
sudo cp frames/bad_apple_frames.lua /usr/local/etc/haproxy/

# Start HAProxy
sudo haproxy -f haproxy.cfg -db

Files

• bad_apple.lua: Main HAProxy Lua service
• video_converter.py: Converts MP4 to ASCII frames
• haproxy.cfg: HAProxy configuration
• docker-compose.yml: Docker setup

Based on HAProxy's interactive Lua capabilities introduced in version 3.2.