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[NaTeDoGG]

I made this track info plugin for JRiver Media Center 10. I originally just wanted a plugin that worked great in fullscreen mode as well as above the playlist in Playing Now. What I have will scale down to a very small size so it looks good in Playing Now but still shows full size in fullscreen. As I worked on it though I ended up improving and improving, eventually I came up with a way to automatically show images in a slide show!

It looks for an "art" directory (the actual directory name is configurable) in the artist or album directories for the current playing track. It finds all the bmp, jpg, jpeg, and gif files in those directories. It first shows the cover art for the current track, then it randomly chooses from the other art images and shows each once.

The time between images is [song length] / [number of art images]. So if you have 3 art images and one track image, it will show each one for a quarter of the song. If the time between images would be less than 5 seconds (this is configurable) then it just uses 5 seconds between images until the song is over.

I used some flash animation files from the neoTropic plugin, I hope this is ok!

Here a screenshot of it when it is fullscreen...



...and here is the exact same song in Playing Now...



One thing that is important though... this plugin uses javascript to create an ActiveX object to access the hard drive. The default Internet Explorer security settings prompt you before allowing a script to do this. To use this plugin you must change the security settings to not prompt you, else it will prompt you for every track change. The security setting for files on your local hard drive is actually hidden by default. To show it you have to change this registry key...

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zones\0\Flags

...to 47 as instructed here...

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=315933

...then you must open Internet Explorer, click Tools->Internet Options->Security, scroll to
the right, click My Computer, Custom Level, and then click "Enable" under this setting:

"Initialize and script ActiveX controls not marked as safe"

This will allow unsigned (and potentially unsafe) ActiveX controls to be run from your local
hard drive. Note this does actually lower the security of your computer. Shouldn't be a problem though. You shouldn't be using Internet Explorer for web browsing anyway. FireFox is a million times better AND safer.

Heres the plugin...

http://www.n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/jrmcTrackInfo.zip

[NaTeDoGG]

I couldn't help myself...

I updated the download... I added actual images for the stars, better handling for when there are no stars and no times-track-has-been-played, and made it so you can still read the track name and other info when the artist name takes up two lines and you have the plugin sized very small. 'night!

[jplumey]

This is pretty cool. What would be better (for me at least) would be to use images in the MC library that match the artist and/or artist/album combo for the music playing. This way I can keep my pictures where they belong and have the plugin play the images that correspond to the music that's playing. This works really cool for live concerts I've attended.

[nickharambee]

thanks for the plug in - this is exactly the feature that i have been looking for, with one small issue.  ideally i would like just the j-pegs showing in the centre of the screen, and no text - the images would be on a black background in full screen mode and in the upper half of the display in playing now (without black background).  this would effectively be the same as the 'cover art' plug-in, but would show all art instead of just the cover..

thanks

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

jplumey, where are your images currently? It is trivial to pull images from wherever you want.

nick_harambee, I'll put together a simpler version when I get a chance! The simpler version will be easier to adapt to other plugins to give them the same slideshow feature.

[nickharambee]

thanks,

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

New versions are below. SimpleSlideShow is what you wanted nick. I also made them both work with Media Server. The track location URL is transformed into a UNC path. For example, a URL like this...

m01p://192.168.0.2:80/D:\Media\Music\Rap\Big L\Lifestylez Ov Da Poor & Dangerous\

...gets transformed to this...

\\192.168.0.2\D$\Media\Music\Rap\Big L\Lifestylez Ov Da Poor & Dangerous\

Works great on my LAN!

http://n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/jrmcSlideShow.zip

[nickharambee]

thanks a lot NaTeDoGG,

you are getting close to what i am looking for!

there are three aspects to your simple slide show plug-in that i would like tweaked if possible:

(i) to have the background on the upper potion of the playing now page the same as the rest of the page, i.e. not black.  this would be the same as on the 'cover art' plug in.  i am using an opus skin and the colour here is a light blue/grey.....

(ii) in full screen mode can the image be adjusted to fit the screen, as in the cover art plug in?  at the moment it is about half size in the middle of the screen, but i would like to be able to view from a distance, so size matters!

(iii) when i click on a track from a new album, i.e. with new art, can the transition be instant rather than fade (fading between artwork for the same album is fine).

ok, thanks again for your efforts on my (and others') behalf.  i look forward to hearing from you

nick.

[AoXoMoXoA]

Great job NaTeDoGG!
Thank you.

Now, all we need is someone to make an image websearch plugin to automate the process of gathering the images and saving them to the correct locations.      Any volunteers?      


Actually, while playing with this plugin I think I had an awesome idea!     WOW, imagine that  
Can it be configured so that it does something like this:
IF folder 'Art' is not found within folder 'Album',
Look in folder 'Artist',
if it is not found there, then,
Look in folder 'DefaultArt'

This would allow for a default slideshow for albums or artist which do not (yet) contain image files.

good, eh?  

Now is this something (even) I can do, or something that needs to be programmed into it?

[NaTeDoGG]

Thanks guys!

We could easily show images off the web, only problem is finding a service that provides relevant images.

nick,

(i) Change the CSS style that looks like this...

Code: [Select]

BODY {
   margin: 0px;
   background-color: black;
   overflow: hidden;
}
...to look like this...

Code: [Select]

BODY {
   margin: 0px;
   background-color: #XXXXXX;
   overflow: hidden;
}
...where "XXXXXX" is a web color code. You can find the code for the web color you want using this color picker.

(ii) Currently it sizes the images only up to their actual size. If you want them scaled further then, in the resizeTrackImage function, on line 126, change the code that looks like this...

Code: [Select]

trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, Math.min(trackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14) );
...to look like this...

Code: [Select]

trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14 );
(iii) To get rid of the page to page fade, remove this line that is at the top of the file...

Code: [Select]

<meta http-equiv="Page-Enter" content="blendTrans(Duration=4.2)">

AoXoMoXoA, thats pretty easy to do. The code you want to look at is in the storeArtImages function. The code you care about normally looks like this...

Code: [Select]

storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, albumPath );
albumImageCount = artImages.length;

var artistPath = fileSystem.getParentFolderName( albumPath );
storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, artistPath );
To do what you want it would change to this...

Code: [Select]

storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, albumPath );
albumImageCount = artImages.length;

if ( artImages.length == 0 ) {
   var artistPath = fileSystem.getParentFolderName( albumPath );
   storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, artistPath );
}

if ( artImages.length == 0 ) {
   storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, "c:\\some folder\\default art folder\\" );
}
What that does is: stores the art in the "artist/album/art" folder, then if no art was found it stores the art in the "artist/art" folder, then if still no art was found it stores the art in the "c:\some folder\default art folder\art" folder.

[nickharambee]

thanks NaTeDoGG

not being an expert on these things i am not sure what file (CSS??) it is that i need to go to make the changes you suggest, and how i access it.

could you please advise,

thanks

nick,

[NaTeDoGG]

CSS means Cascading Style Sheet and is a way of customizing the look of HTML. You'll find the CSS snippet (as well as all the code that I mentioned) in the index.html file.

Use these links to install the plugins:

http://www.n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/slideshow.mjp
http://www.n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/simpleSlideshow.mjp

[nickharambee]

excellent, i am getting closer and closer.

but.....

there are a few issues that i would still like to resolve:

(i) the simple slideshow plug-in isn't switching between jpgs in my album folders. in fact it is only picking up jpgs called 'folder'.  if i change the name of a 'folder' jpg to something else, the slideshow plug in doesn't show anything.

(ii) the transitions between images isn't very smooth - on the playing now page sometimes it show just a small section of a jpg (enlarged) before settling down to the full jpg at the correct size, and at other times on both the playing now screen and in full screen mode, the transitions are a little juddery

(iii) is it possible to set the playing now page and the full screen page to have different background colours?  i like black as the background colour on the full screen page, but to have a colour that blends with the opus skin on the playing now page

just another thought - would it be possible to have a plug-in that picks up mutliple images of an artist/band from a seperate folder that could then be combined with cover art/art for a specific album.  i could then choose between either showing just the cover art, or artist images......

thanks,

nick

[nickharambee]

oh, just one more thought - is it possible to change the default image, if slideshow doesn't find any art (at the moment it is a media centre control image)?

thanks

nick.

[NaTeDoGG]

(i) Do you have your image files in "artist/art" and/or "artist/album/art" folders? The plugin scans the art directory at the beginning of each song. Does it work with the SlideShow but not with SimpleSlideShow?

(ii) If the fading is jerky its probably because your video card isn't up to it. To remove the fading between images remove this code...

Code: [Select]

trackImageTD.filters[ 0 ].apply();
...and also this code...

Code: [Select]

if ( !firstTime ) trackImageTD.filters[ 0 ].play();
(iii) To have a different color background for Now Playing versus fullscreen, change this...

Code: [Select]

function resizeTrackImage () {
   if ( trackImageHeight == null ) return;

   var minHeight = Math.min( minimumTrackImageHeight, trackImageHeight );
   trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, Math.min(trackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14) );
}

..to this...

Code: [Select]

function resizeTrackImage () {
   if ( trackImageHeight == null ) return;

   var minHeight = Math.min( minimumTrackImageHeight, trackImageHeight );
   trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, Math.min(trackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14) );

   if ( document.body.offsetHeight == screen.availHeight )
      document.body.style.backgroundColor = "blue";
   else
      document.body.style.backgroundColor = "red";
}

Substitute blue and red for your colors. In the example blue is being used for fullscreen.

Yep we can change the default image. I don't have MC in front of me so I don't know what filename the default image is using, but what you need to do is detect that the track image is actually the MC default image and show a different one instead. The code would look something like this...

Code: [Select]

window.onload = function () {
   var path = "TRACKINFO_INSERT_IMAGE";
   var fileName = path.substring( path.lastIndexOf("\\") );
   if ( fileName == "default.jpg" ) {
      trackImage.onload = setTrackImageHeight;
      trackImage.src = "c:\\stuff\\my_default.jpg";
   }
   storeArtImages;
}


would it be possible to have a plug-in that picks up mutliple images of an artist/band from a seperate folder that could then be combined with cover art/art for a specific album.  i could then choose between either showing just the cover art, or artist images.

Yep. How would you choose between cover art and artist images though? Through a setting in the script? We could make tabs or radio buttons or a small image in the corner of the screen that toggles, or something. We could even use cookies to save the setting per artist/album/track/whatever. Would take a little bit of work though and I won't have a lot of free time for a while.

[NaTeDoGG]

I updated the download with a new version. I basically rewrote everything. Its much simpler and works better. Scales down better, taking width into account, dropping elements that don't fit on the screen, etc. In theater mode it will show only the images. There are some things you can modify to your liking at the top of SlideShow.js. Set "maxSmallImageScaling" to something high (like 1000) if you want to scale smaller images all the way up to full screen. You can turn off fading of images, set a default image to show when theres no art, and some other things.

Whats really cool with the rewrite is that I broke out the slideshow functionality. This means you can modify ANY track info plugin to add the ability to show a slideshow. Just include the SlideShow.js file and specify the id of the image to change.

[nickharambee]

(i) Do you have your image files in "artist/art" and/or "artist/album/art" folders? The plugin scans the art directory at the beginning of each song. Does it work with the SlideShow but not with SimpleSlideShow?

no, my music is stored as artist/album and the art is saved in album folder, with the front cover saved as 'folder' and other art as (artist)1,(artist2), etc....at the moment the slideshow and the simple slideshow are only picking up the 'folder' jpgs, and if there is no jpg called 'folder' i just get the default MC image. i have tried storing the art in a folder called art within the album folder, but then i get a 'malicius script detected' message in MC.

(ii) If the fading is jerky its probably because your video card isn't up to it. To remove the fading between images remove this code...

the fading seems to be ok in the slideshow plug-in and i run slideshows on my laptop using other programs with no problems

(iii) To have a different color background for Now Playing versus fullscreen, change this...

Code:

function resizeTrackImage () {
  if ( trackImageHeight == null ) return;

  var minHeight = Math.min( minimumTrackImageHeight, trackImageHeight );
  trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, Math.min(trackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14) );
}
 
 


..to this...

Code:

function resizeTrackImage () {
  if ( trackImageHeight == null ) return;

  var minHeight = Math.min( minimumTrackImageHeight, trackImageHeight );
  trackImage.style.pixelHeight = Math.max( minHeight, Math.min(trackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 14) );

  if ( document.body.offsetHeight == screen.availHeight )
      document.body.style.backgroundColor = "blue";
  else
      document.body.style.backgroundColor = "red";
}
 
 
Substitute blue and red for your colors. In the example blue is being used for fullscreen.

when i set this up i get the second colour, in this example 'red' on both the playing now and the full screen pages.

Yep we can change the default image. I don't have MC in front of me so I don't know what filename the default image is using, but what you need to do is detect that the track image is actually the MC default image and show a different one instead. The code would look something like this...

Code:

window.onload = function () {
   var path = "TRACKINFO_INSERT_IMAGE";
   var fileName = path.substring( path.lastIndexOf("\\") );
   if ( fileName == "default.jpg" ) {
      trackImage.onload = setTrackImageHeight;
      trackImage.src = "c:\\stuff\\my_default.jpg";
   }
   storeArtImages;
}
 

 
are these changes that i have to make to MC10 and if so, which file do i have to open?

thanks,

nick.

[NaTeDoGG]

my music is stored as artist/album and the art is saved in album folder

Then set the SlideShow.artFolderName to empty quotes (""). All SlideShow.xxxxx config properties are at the top of SlideShow.js. You will need the latest version.

the fading seems to be ok in the slideshow plug-in and i run slideshows on my laptop using other programs with no problems

Try the latest version and see if you get any wierdness.

when i set this up i get the second colour, in this example 'red' on both the playing now and the full screen pages.

Set these properties to what they should be on your machine...

SlideShow.bgColor = "red";
SlideShow.fullScreenBgColor = "blue";
SlideShow.fullScreenWidth = 1280;
SlideShow.fullScreenHeight = 720;
 

are these changes that i have to make to MC10 and if so, which file do i have to open?

To set the default image set SlideShow.defaultTrackImage.

[nickharambee]

where is the link to the latest version?

thanks, nick.

[NaTeDoGG]

I updated the links with a new version:

http://www.n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/slideshow.mjp
http://www.n4te.com/dev/misc/jrmc/simpleSlideshow.mjp

You can now switch from art to visualization by middle clicking.

[NaTeDoGG]

AAAAAaaaalllright. I've been putting WAY too much work into this plugin. It now uses bilinear interpolation to scale the images. This results in a SUPER smooth image, even when a poor quality image is scaled over 3x its size! This is a great improvement! I think this plugin already had an advantage by working well both tiny and fullscreen. Now that you can see all your images fullscreen at high quality... there is no contest! I also have tweaked the crap out of the resizing/positioning logic and it is now EXACTLY how I envisioned. I vow to not do any more work on this thing for a long time! Its eaten a ton of my freetime. Use the MJPs I linked to in my last post to get the latest version (1.0.0).

Enjoy!

[nickharambee]

thanks NaTeDoGG,

i hope you don't mind a few more questions.  i have got the colours and the sizing fine on your latest version, but there are still some things to sort:

(i) i can see where to enter the location of the default art (for use if there is no image in an album folder), but have tried various ways of entering the file path instead of 'null', but i keep getting errors when i try to run the plug-in in MC.  can you tell me exactly how to enter the file path after 'SlideShow.defaultTrackImage ='......

(ii) when there are jpgs in an album folder, but none of them are called 'folder', the plug-in doesn't find any art, and i just get a small red cross in the centre of the screen - any ideas why?

(iii) the transitions between images for a given song are fine on the playing now page, but are still juddery in full screen mode (i can run other slide show software in full screen fine) - any suggestions?  also, when i first click on a track, or when MC switches from one track to another (i.e. at the start of every track) the first image (which always seems to be 'folder.jpg') comes up briefly as a magnification of part of the image, before jumping to the correctly sized image.  do you know why this might be?

(iv) i am interested in the formulas used to select the images.  like i said, if there is an image called 'folder' this always comes up first, and is on screen longer than the other images, which stay for a minimum of 35 seconds, but longer if there is time.  how is the time for the 'folder' image calculated?  and are the other images then selected randomly?

(v) before i was editing index.html and now i am editing SlideShow.js.  do i still need the index.html?

thanks for all your work,

nick.

[NaTeDoGG]

(i) Try this (note the quotes and double backslash):

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.defaultTrackImage = "C:\\someDirectory\\someImage.jpg";
(ii) Do you have this artFolderName set to ""? This will look in the current album folder for images. Like this:

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.artFolderName = "";
(iii) I made a new version (1.1.0). I removed the scrolling text and the dots because they slowed down even my AMD XP 3800+ with a Radeon 9800 Pro in fullscreen. The Flash animation apparently is extremely inefficient when several layers of transparency are stacked. The new version should be much smoother and fixes the image problem when a track loads.

(iv) It doesn't do anything special with any images. It simply starts with the track's image, then displays the next ones, shuffled. It looks in artist/album/xxx and artist/xxx for the art, where xxx is SlideShow.artFolderName.

(v) You still need index.html. I just moved the slideshow specific functionality to SlideShow.js so that it can be used for any plugin.

Try the new version (1.1.0) at the same links above and if you still have problems let me know. The new version was a large overhaul, even after I said I was going to stop working on this thing. I'm pretty sure it will do everything you need!

[NaTeDoGG]

Fixed a small bug where if an image was wider than it was tall it could possibly be sized such that the track info was pushed off the edge of the screen. Now the track info can never be pushed off screen.

I also made it show the artist's name (similiar to how it normally shows the album name) when it is sized really small (and there is room).

Updated the downloads to the latest version (1.1.5).

Now I'm serious damnit! No more working on these plugins!

[nickharambee]

ok, i downloaded and adapted the latest version and....

(i) Try this (note the quotes and double backslash):

Code:
SlideShow.defaultTrackImage = "C:\\someDirectory\\someImage.jpg";

ok, this worked, but i am getting a lot of weirdness, as it loads the image.  first i get a small image of the media centre controls, then i get a small enlarged section of the jpg i am specifying as default, and then it settles to the correct image at the correct size.

(ii) Do you have this artFolderName set to ""? This will look in the current album folder for images. Like this:

Code:
SlideShow.artFolderName = "";

yes, it is set up exactly like this, but only works if one of the images are called folder.  even if there is only one image in a given album folder, i still get a small red cross on the screen if it isn't called 'folder'.  if there is one image called 'folder', then all the other images will come through as well. this isn't a huge problem, as eventually i want to have one folder.jpg for each album folder, but ideally it would work whatever the name of jpg.
 

(iii) I made a new version (1.1.0). I removed the scrolling text and the dots because they slowed down even my AMD XP 3800+ with a Radeon 9800 Pro in fullscreen. The Flash animation apparently is extremely inefficient when several layers of transparency are stacked. The new version should be much smoother and fixes the image problem when a track loads.

i have only been using simple slideshow, so no text or dots, and i am still getting the same weirdness, even with the latest version, with a large image followed by the correct image, and juddering cross fades in fullscreen mode.

apart from this, all is fine.....

thanks,

nick  


 
 

[Johnny B]

Is the developmnet of this handy plugin still alive?
I miss an option to set manually for how long a picture would be visible...

[Johnny B]

Hmm - "no" seems to be the answer... 

[nickharambee]

this is a real shame.  it would seem to me that there are lots of possibilities with this plugin, and i'd love it if someone would develop it some more

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

Sorry for the delayed response.

To manually set how long a picture is displayed, I believe you can just modify SlideShow.js at the top, set "minImageDisplaySeconds" to what you like.

Download here:

SimpleSlideShow:
http://accessories.musicex.com/mediacenter/mc_data/plugins/735.mjp

SlideShow:
http://accessories.musicex.com/mediacenter/mc_data/plugins/734.mjp

[Johnny B]

>NaTeDoGG
I think you are wrong...

"The time between images is [song length] / [number of art images]. So if you have 3 art images and one track image, it will show each one for a quarter of the song. If the time between images would be less than 5 seconds (this is configurable) then it just uses 5 seconds between images until the song is over."

[NaTeDoGG]

Ahh, you are right. Well, look at this code, lines 80 through 85 in SlideShow.js for "Slide Show"...

Code: [Select]

var millseconds = SlideShow.minImageDisplaySeconds;
if ( SlideShow.trackDuration != null ) {
var minutesAndSeconds = SlideShow.trackDuration.split( ":" );
millseconds = ( parseInt(minutesAndSeconds[0]) * 60 + parseInt(minutesAndSeconds[1]) ) * 1000;
millseconds = Math.max( SlideShow.minImageDisplaySeconds * 1000, Math.ceil(millseconds / SlideShow.artImages.length) );
}
SlideShow.imageChangeInterval = millseconds;
This is the code that does what you quoted me saying. The important line is this...

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.imageChangeInterval = millseconds;
Change that to what you want for the number of milliseconds between images. For example...

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.imageChangeInterval = 45000;
This sets the images to change every 45 seconds.

[Johnny B]

>NaTeDoGG
Great - now it works the way I wanted. Thanks

[Johnny B]

One more question: is it possible to easily tweak this plugin? I would like to see "Artist" (above image) and "Trackname" (below image) when in fullscreen - using SimpleSlideShow. How can I do this?

[NaTeDoGG]

  LOL, one more question... 8 months later!?

The plugin is just HTML and JavaScript. You'll need some basic programming skills to modify the JavaScript.

To do what you want, first you'll need to make the image size a little smaller to make room for the artist and trackname. The current image size I believe takes up the entire height.

Next, you need to put the artist and trackname in the right place. I think you'll have to put them in a DIV, then position it where you need to with JavaScript.

[Johnny B]

Well I simply realized I would need this just now... 

Unfortunately I am not a programmer myself. Nevertheless (re)sizing image was not so difficult (inside the SlideShow.js file). But then there is the warning message "Don't edit below this unless you know what you are doing." - and I really would NOT know what I am doing... 
In other words I can make the room I need. But "puting  the artist and trackname in the right place" is beyond my skills...    (I don't know what the DIV is in the first place)
Please could you help me with this?

[nickharambee]

hi NaTeDoGG

i have been making adjustments to your latest version of simple slide show and have managed to remove all fades between images by setting "SlideShow.fadeImages" to null, but i am still getting a fade between images when a new album starts in playing now, or when i select a new album to play.  could you please let me know how i can remove this fade

thanks

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

Johnny B, in SlideShow.js on line 139 you will see this...

Code: [Select]

var maxHeight = Math.min( SlideShow.maxTrackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 4 );
Change that to this...

Code: [Select]

var maxHeight = Math.min( SlideShow.maxTrackImageHeight, document.body.offsetHeight - 50 );
This causes there to be more space at the top and bottom of the image. Next open index.html and change this...

Code: [Select]

<img src="TRACKINFO_INSERT_IMAGE" id="trackImage" valign="absmiddle">
...to this...

Code: [Select]

TRACKINFO_INSERT_ARTIST<br>
<img src="TRACKINFO_INSERT_IMAGE" id="trackImage" valign="absmiddle"><br>
TRACKINFO_INSERT_TITLE
That puts the artist text on top on the title on bottom. Finally, near the top of index.html you will find this...

Code: [Select]

body, td {
font-family: Arial;
font-size: 12px;
color:white;
}

Make that look like this (by adding the extra part)...

Code: [Select]

body, td {
font-family: Arial;
font-size: 12px;
color:white;
}
div {
text-align:center;
}
This should accomplish what you wanted.

nick_harambee, I believe you need to remove the following from index.html...

Code: [Select]

<meta http-equiv="Page-Exit" content="blendTrans(Duration=0.25)">
You may also try removing line 38 of index.html, which should be this...

Code: [Select]

filter: progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Fade( duration=0.25 );

[Johnny B]

>NaTeDoGG
WOW! Well this is what I needed! I only made some customization (enlarged the font and added empty lines between the image and the infos) and now it works exactly the way I need it! Thank you very much indeed! 

[nickharambee]

thanks NaTeDoGG

is it possible to use the simple slideshow on a client running MC?  all of the artwork has been uploaded to the client from the MC server, and i can get cover art in the 'cover art' display pane, but with simple slideshow i am just getting a white box with a red cross in it.  is there a change i can make to the code to get this working?

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

It should work using Media Server. From above...

The track location URL is transformed into a UNC path. For example, a URL like this...

m01p://192.168.0.2:80/D:\Media\Music\Rap\Big L\Lifestylez Ov Da Poor & Dangerous\

...gets transformed to this...

\\192.168.0.2\D$\Media\Music\Rap\Big L\Lifestylez Ov Da Poor & Dangerous\

If for some reason the URL to the art that your Media Server is using is different than the "m01p://media_server_ip/media_server_local_path" then it probably is not getting replaced with the proper UNC path. To see what is going on, find this in the JS file...

Code: [Select]

var albumPath = SlideShow.trackPath;
if ( albumPath.indexOf("://") != -1 ) {
// Translate network path to UNC path.
/[^:]*:\/\/([^:]*):\d\d\/([a-zA-Z]):\\(.*)/.test( albumPath );
albumPath = "\\\\" + RegExp.$1 + "\\" + RegExp.$2 + "$\\" + RegExp.$3;
}
And replace with this...

Code: [Select]

var albumPath = SlideShow.trackPath;
alert( "before: " + albumPath );
if ( albumPath.indexOf("://") != -1 ) {
// Translate network path to UNC path.
/[^:]*:\/\/([^:]*):\d\d\/([a-zA-Z]):\\(.*)/.test( albumPath );
albumPath = "\\\\" + RegExp.$1 + "\\" + RegExp.$2 + "$\\" + RegExp.$3;
}
alert( "after: " + albumPath );

Post what you are getting before and after.

[nickharambee]

i am just getting two boxes with the text 'before:' and 'after:' but no other text

nick

[nickharambee]

...and now i am not.

i updated to the latest flac encoder/decoder which means that i can now stream flac rather than converting on the fly to mp3, and now i am getting cover art in simple slide show, and paths after the before and after:

before: m01p://192.168.2.20:81/H:\[artist]\[album]

after:
\\192.168.2.20\H$\[artist]\[album]\

what i am not getting is any other artwork, only the folder.jpg.  is there another setting that i need to change?

thanks

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

folder.jpg is the default image that is shown. The program uses ActiveX to access the file system and looks for files with a specific extension. This is how it finds files other than the default. This could be failing if you don't have the permissions set correctly. Look in the readme.txt file for instructions. Try changing this...

Code: [Select]

var artFolder = fileSystem.getFolder( artFolderPath );
var files = new Enumerator( artFolder.Files );
while ( !files.atEnd() ) {
var file = files.item();

...to this and post what you get...

Code: [Select]

var artFolder = fileSystem.getFolder( artFolderPath );
alert("Looking in folder: " + artFolder);
var files = new Enumerator( artFolder.Files );
while ( !files.atEnd() ) {
var file = files.item();
alert("Inspecting file: " + file.path);


[nickharambee]

i still get the same - just the folder.jpg, and no alerts.

i have already enabled "Initialize and script ActiveX controls not marked as safe".

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

Wierd... you are getting the correct value when it says "Looking in folder"? Did it ever say "Inspecting file"? I think for some reason it is unable to get a listing of the files in that folder.

[nickharambee]

you are getting the correct value when it says "Looking in folder"?

not sure what you mean by this, and where exactly i should be looking.  like i said, i am not getting any alerts.

Did it ever say "Inspecting file"?

not sure where i should be looking for this

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

Did you add the code I posted 2 posts ago? If you did then find this...

Code: [Select]

var fileSystem = new ActiveXObject( "Scripting.FileSystemObject" );
SlideShow.storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, albumPath );

And change to this...

Code: [Select]

alert("Got to 1");
var fileSystem = new ActiveXObject( "Scripting.FileSystemObject" );
alert("Got to 2");
SlideShow.storeArtImageFolder( fileSystem, albumPath );
alert("Got to 3");

Also lets change the code I posted two posts ago. Change from this..

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.storeArtImageFolder = function ( fileSystem, folderPath ) {
var artFolderPath = fileSystem.buildPath( folderPath, SlideShow.artFolderName );
if ( !fileSystem.folderExists(artFolderPath) ) return;
var artFolder = fileSystem.getFolder( artFolderPath );
var files = new Enumerator( artFolder.Files );
while ( !files.atEnd() ) {
var file = files.item();

To this...

Code: [Select]

SlideShow.storeArtImageFolder = function ( fileSystem, folderPath ) {
alert("Got to storeArtImageFolder");
var artFolderPath = fileSystem.buildPath( folderPath, SlideShow.artFolderName );
alert("artFolderPath: " + artFolderPath);
alert("artFolderPath exists: " + fileSystem.folderExists(artFolderPath));
if ( !fileSystem.folderExists(artFolderPath) ) return;
var artFolder = fileSystem.getFolder( artFolderPath );
alert("Looking in folder: " + artFolder);
var files = new Enumerator( artFolder.Files );
while ( !files.atEnd() ) {
var file = files.item();
alert("Inspecting file: " + file.path);

I am guessing it thinks artFolderPath does not exist. If this is the case, try removing this line temporarily...

Code: [Select]

if ( !fileSystem.folderExists(artFolderPath) ) return;

[nickharambee]

yes, i did add the code. 

so next i made the first two changes to the script that you suggested and then i got several alerts in the following order:

Got to 1

Got to 2

Got to StoreArtImageFolder

ArtFolderPath:\\192.168.2.20\H$\[artist]\[album]

artFolderPath exists: false

Got to 3

Got to StoreArtImageFolder

ArtFolderPath:\\192.168.2.20\H$\[artist]\[album]

artFolderPath exists: false


then i deleted the additional line and now get similar alerts, but also an additional error message:

an error has occured on the script on this page:

line: 103
ch: 1
error: path not found
code:0
URL: file://C\Program Files\J River....Generated.Html

do you want to continue running scripts on this page?

there is no line 103 in the generated.html, and line 103 in the slideshow.js is:

alert("Looking in folder: " + artFolder);

i am off to bed now, but any further attempts to sort this out would be much appreciated

thanks

nick

[nickharambee]

hi NaTeDoGG

do you have any other ideas as to how to get simple slideshow working over the library server?

thanks for your help to date

nick

[NaTeDoGG]

Wird, I typed a reply, don't know why it never got posted.

You got "artFolderPath exists: false". This means it thinks "\\192.168.2.20\H$\[artist]\[album]" does not exist. That is the only clue we have. Can you verify it does exist? If it does, then I assume the reason it thinks it doesn't is because of some security settings. Make sure the H$ share is open to Everyone. There may be other security settings you need to open up, I'm not sure.