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[wer]

It would be really nice if MC would not forcibly auto-expand Playing Now in the tree every time it starts up.  If the user manually collapses Playing Now, MC should leave it alone.

The reason is, when it is expanded, you see every time some network-aware device becomes available or goes away. Rows are added or removed from the tree. 

It can be really annoying to see things in your tree move every time someone turns a device on and off. Something can move up or down right before you try and click on it, a moving target.

If I collapse Playing Now, that's fine.  But the next time I run MC, it's expanded again.

If MC just remembered the user's choice, expanded or collapsed, everyone could be happy.  MC remembers if I expand or collapse some other leaf in the tree, but not Playing Now.

Pretty please?   

[Matt]

If you don't start in Playing Now, it will stay collapsed.  If you select Playing Now, it has to expand since it actually picks a child.

[wer]

I have my startup location set to Audio, and Playing Now does auto-expand.

If it's left closed when you close MC, then when you restart MC, it will appear to be closed, but only momentarily.  After a couple of seconds, it auto-expands.

And then once auto-expanded, it of course grows and shrinks every time something goes on or offline.

I've never started in Playing Now.

I can give you a video if you doubt me.

[RoderickGI]

I found an interesting difference when Media Server is running and when "Jump on Play (audio)" was not set to "Playing Now", versus other combinations of those settings.

On my Workstation, with the Startup settings as per the image, Playing Now doesn't expand when I start MC if I have Media Server running and "Jump on Play (audio)" was set to Display View or None, even when I start JRiver for Android with it loading the Workstation Library.

When Media Server wasn't running and "Jump on Play (audio)" was set to None or Display View, opening JRiver for Android caused Playing Now to be expanded.
When Media Server was running and "Jump on Play (audio)" was set to None or Display View, opening JRiver for Android did not cause Playing Now to be expanded. Even playing some tracks from JRiver for Android to the Workstation didn't expand Playing Now, even when MC jumped to Display View as per that setting.

Actually, maybe the jump setting isn't an issue. I just tested with the Media Server running and  "Jump on Play (audio)" was set to Playing Now, and Playing Now didn't expand until I played something from JRiver for Android.

I can understand why that happens (Media Server is managing Playing Now when it is running, rather than Media Center), but perhaps it explains why the two of you are seeing a difference.

I'll leave it to you guys to sort the ins and outs. 

[wer]

Thanks Rod, that could explain the difference.

But I doubt I would be contradicted in saying that something that shouldn't move suddenly moving as you're about to click on it is extremely annoying.   

So if MC could remember "collapsed is collapsed" in those additional cases, I'd be very grateful.

[wer]

So Matt, what do you think?   

[Matt]

I'm still working, but it will hopefully be fixed next build.

We were responding to the message that a zone was added or removed and expanding the tree.  Now I'm only going to do that if we've been running for over a minute.

There was also an issue that if a child was expanded but the parent collapsed, we would expand the child.  I won't do that anymore either.

Thanks for the bug / feature.  You pick!

[wer]

I'm still working, but it will hopefully be fixed next build.

We were responding to the message that a zone was added or removed and expanding the tree.  Now I'm only going to do that if we've been running for over a minute.

That will truly be wonderful when it's fixed. Truly wonderful.

What you said about "over a minute" is confusing though... Even if someone turns on a device 10 minutes later, it still shouldn't auto-expand Playing Now, right?  If it's collapsed, it should stay collapsed until the user manually clicks on it.

If Playing Now stays collapsed (until manually clicked) then the tree will not move every time a dynamic zone goes on or offline, and THAT'S the goal.  . Right?

[Matt]

Our thinking is that if a device arrives later, you would want to know about it.

[wer]

That thinking might be right for some people, but it's very wrong for others.

I would want to know about it, only IF I have Playing Now expanded.
If I don't, it should quietly wait in Playing Now until I go look for it.

Here's the problem:

People have lots of devices in their houses that do DLNA (TV, stereos, etc), and those devices are under the random control of kids, wives, husbands, timers, apps, etc. They can turn on and off at any time.  And the person may not even use DLNA from MC.

If Playing Now is Expanded when they turn on and off, then things move in the tree, sometimes right as you try and click on it.  Have you ever played whack-a-mole?  This is not fun.  It is fantastically irritating.

So if I'm working on MC in my den, then No I do not want to know every time someone turns on the TV in the basement.  I also don't want to know when then turn it back off 5 minutes later. And then 2 minutes after that when they turn on the one in their bedroom.

If I intentionally go to expand Playing Now and look for it, then I'll see it.  But I don't need the tree to move as a notification that this insignificant act has happened, and happened, and happened again.

This is not a fix/change that harms anybody:

If someone likes their tree moving all the time, they can leave Playing Now expanded, and they will get to continue to enjoy the current behavior, no problem.

But for those who don't like things to move right before they try and click it, they should be able to collapse Playing Now, and have it stay permanently collapsed until manually expanded, so that things don't go jumping around every time a device is powered on or off.  Everybody's happy.

Make sense?

[RoderickGI]

I agree with Will on this.

When I want to know if a Device has appeared in MC, I look. I don't like the auto expand. For a lot of people, I would bet they just expect the Device to be available.

A more appropriate response would be to auto expand if say a Zoneswitch rule tried to play to a non-existent Zone/Device, or some other function tried to access a missing Zone, such as MCWS or MCC commands.

[Moe]

I'm with Wer on this one as well.  Roderick pretty much sums up my feelings to a T.

[lepa]

I kinda agree with guys. If I have collapsed playing now I would like it to leave it that way. I can of course understand that you like to give some kind of indication as not everybody knows where to look. Not sure if those people know how to setup DLNA at first place though.
Don't know if tray tooltip (or something like that) about device registered would be good option.

[Matt]

I talked with Bob and we agree.

Next build:
Changed: The tree no longer expands to show when devices come and go.

[wer]

Thank you very much indeed!

[sdmarquart]

Can someone add a fix for this.

The one that says "correct" is how I want it to look. But it manually moves when I re-open JRiver like the other pic.

Suggestions?

Thanks,
Spence

[RoderickGI]

There is no practical difference between your two images sdmarquart.

The incorrect one is showing All Files, with the top one visible in the bottom Pane. There may be a sorting issue, but I can't tell.

The correct one is an identical view with one Album selected.

If you want help, start a new thread on your issue. Please do not tack your issue onto another thread as you have done here. It just muddies the water trying to follow replies. Maybe an Admin will split your question off to another thread for you, then clarify your issue.

[sdmarquart]

Hey sorry about that. I tried posting a new thread and it didn’t take for some reason.

My point is just above where my tracks are listed for the album the bar moves up and down every time I open the program.

It never did that before.

[sdmarquart]

Sorry to hijack the thread. I got it to work fine now.

Thanks.