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Prest Server puts your show on the band’s phones, tablets, and laptops. It runs on the computer that plays the show and serves three views to any browser on the same private network:

• Editor: songs and setlists.
• Performance: the stage view, with transport, lyrics, and chords.
• Setup: screen preferences, the show library folder, backups, and network settings.

It works with three hosts: REAPER, Ableton Live, or Prest, the desktop app, which has Prest Server built in. The host plays the audio. Prest Server shows what it plays and sends your button presses back to it.

Which version you have

You use	You get
REAPER or Ableton Live	Prest Server 0.1.1, the current release, in early access: ask on the download page.
Prest, the app	A newer Prest Server, built in. Nothing else to install.

The newer Prest Server inside Prest comes to REAPER and Live with Prest Server’s next release. These pages describe 0.1.1 and label what only the newer version does In Prest and the next release, or In the next release where it concerns REAPER or Live alone.

Names in 0.1.x

Prest Server 0.1.0 and 0.1.1 were published before the product took its current name, so their files, menus, and messages say Prest. The REAPER and Ableton Live guides use those names and list the ones later releases use. The stage screens still say Prest in places, for example Welcome to Prest.

Before you begin

You need:

1. A host running Prest Server:
   • REAPER with the plugin: REAPER install steps.
   • Ableton Live with the Control Surface: Ableton Live install steps.
   • Prest: Install Prest.
2. A network the band controls, such as its own router or a phone’s hotspot. Prest Server has no login: anyone who can reach it can control the show. See Network and security.
3. The host computer and every stage device on that network.
4. A show library: one folder on the host computer that holds the show’s projects (REAPER .rpp files, Live Sets .als, or Prest projects .prest), directly or in subfolders.

Systems

The REAPER plugin runs on macOS (Apple silicon and Intel), Windows x86_64, and Linux x86_64 (glibc 2.31 or later). The Ableton Live bridge runs on macOS and Windows. Prest has its own system requirements. For browsers, see Phones, tablets, and other computers.

Choose the host

• REAPER: each project in the show library is a song, or holds several songs marked with S\ markers.
• Ableton Live: each Live Set in the show library is a song, or holds several songs marked with S\ locators.
• Prest: Prest projects in the show library, with nothing else to install.

How it connects

1. The host opens projects, plays, and stops.
2. Prest Server runs beside it: inside REAPER as a plugin, next to Live through its Control Surface, or inside Prest.
3. Devices open http://prest.local/, or the host computer’s IP address, in a browser.

No internet connection or account is needed. The devices do need the local network: a page that loses the host waits and reconnects by itself, but it controls nothing until the host is back.

Next: Build a first show.