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[nuke2000]

Hi there

Just wondering whether you are considering any of the suggestions for improving on the accessibility and visibility of playing now in theatre view?

I have made some suggestions and although i like the look and feel of the obsidian skin, remote couch navigation issues have forced me to revert to the older traditional skins which resolves the majority of the navigation issues in obsidian.

I can't help but suggest that there is too much wasted screen real estate on the home screen which could be utilised to ensure we always have easy and visually appealing access to playing now. We could easily fit in a large playing now window that is selectable with a remote, perhaps with a choice of playing now or big screen when you select the window and hit enter. This choice when selecting now playing window could be extended to the small playing now window on other screens (as opposed to selecting now playing, navigating to big screen and selecting again). I think it would work well for the standard skins i am now using.

In my view obsidian needs something else (transparent now playing in the background perhaps (escape keypress removing the menu overlay)

Just my thoughts (for what they are worth) on improving you fantastic piece of software to make it the perfect HTPC front end 

[Matt]

Are you looking for what's playing as a display of a movie / visualization, or just the list of tracks?

The problem with mixing the playing video into the background is that there's no universal method that will work with all renderers and all visualizations.

[glynor]

Are you looking for what's playing as a display of a movie / visualization, or just the list of tracks?

I suspect that, like some others have before, he is just referring to the number of "clicks" it takes to access Playing Now from within Theater View (since it is buried under with a lot of other stuff in the secondary roller), not to any functionality of the Playing Now screen as it stands.  I could be reading it wrong, of course, but that's what it looks like to me.

I still think it goes back to many of the things I raised here: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=49579.msg340007#msg340007
And which were further discussed by others here: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=50134.msg342999#msg342999

And further on in both of those threads.

If navigation were linked to the always-visible secondary roller, you'd clear up a ton of real-estate on the top roller, which would allow it to serve a more purely toolbar-like roll, and allow for a quick jump to Playing Now.

[JimH]

I suspect that, like some others have before, he is just referring to the number of "clicks" it takes to access Playing Now from within Theater View (since it is buried under with a lot of other stuff in the secondary roller), not to any functionality of the Playing Now screen as it stands. 

Playing Now will be added to the top roller. 

Bear in mind that, though we listen to just about everything everyone says, _we_ have to solve the problem, and the problem is complex.  We have users who use touch screens to control MC, but others use a mouse or a keyboard or a remote control.  Everyone wants it to be simple enough for their family.

We think what we have works pretty well now for most people, and that may be as close as we get.

[glynor]

Bear in mind that, though we listen to just about everything everyone says, _we_ have to solve the problem, and the problem is complex.  We have users who use touch screens to control MC, but others use a mouse or a keyboard or a remote control.  Everyone wants it to be simple enough for their family.

We think what we have works pretty well now for most people, and that may be as close as we get.

I certainly understand that, and I'd agree.  I think you are very close to "just right".  Personally, I don't ever use Playing Now in Theater View mode, and what we have works fairly well as-is.  I do think there is some navigational clumsiness, and a certain lack of usable real estate on the top roller, which could possibly be cleared up (without adding complexity to either "roller" bar) by this:

Currently:
0. Arrow over to left side of screen (if in Thumbnail mode), this is variable and not needed in Lineup or List mode so not counted.
1. Press Left Arrow takes you to Top Roller
2. Left Arrow again takes you back one "tier" in the Breadcrumbs.
3. Down once takes you to the Breadcrubs Roller.
4. Down again takes you back to the File/Categories list.

Proposed:
0. Arrow over to left side of screen (if in Thumbnail mode).
1. Press Left Arrow takes you to Breadcrumbs roller.
2. Left Arrow again takes you back one "tier" in the Breadcrumbs.
3. Down arrow once takes you back to the File/Categories list.

Plus, this way you get these added bonuses:
1) ability to re-purpose the button in the top roller used for the back button for the stuff discussed above, allowing a "sticky" Play All button.
2) The ability to do this instead: In step 2 of the "proposed steps" above, you could hit Right-Arrow instead of Left-Arrow and have it quickly drill down through the View as if you are manually going to the Category list below and choosing "All".

I hardly ever go to Playing Now in Theater View (I generally use Display View if anything at all).  However, this could certainly be one of the "top" choices in the proposed new "Controls" button in the Top Roller, which would certainly make it a bit less buried and easier/faster to get to.

Obviously, I could be wrong and this could be just as confusing to a different set of people.  Maybe it won't work.  However, I think it might be worth thinking about, trying out, or discussing.  What I don't see is how any of these changes wouldn't work with all input types equally.  Keep in mind, the breadcrumbs would always be visible, so you could click on them directly with mouse/touchscreen input devices (just like the Windows Explorer breadcrumbs in Windows 7), and you could certainly put "back" under the "sticky menu" as well, for those odd mouse users who just need to click on a back button instead of the breadcrumbs.

[imugli]

USB-UIRT > Universal Remote > Programmed Button = 1 Click. 

[nuke2000]

OK, i understand transparency may be out and good to hear playing now will be added to the obsidian top roller. How about the suggestion of using wasted screen real estate on the home screens of all the skins. It just seems we have all that space doing nothing and it would be natural to have a large windowed version of big screen (whatever is playing) on the home screen, again selectable with remote, keyboard, whatever. Selecting the window bringing you instantly back to big screen.

I only raise these comments after attempting to get the family to use MC over VMC. They like it but often find themselves back on the home screen and get somewhat lost trying to view what they have queued or add to that queue. I find it frustrating having to take the remote off them to sort them out and equally they loose interest and moan at me to 'put the other one back on' (referring to VMC)

glynor is right in that i have no issues at all with the functionality of the playing now screen, just easy access to it and again the ability to get from playing now (or any other screen) into big screen via remote control. The natural thing to do when viewing the playing now screen is to select the window and hit enter on the remote to go big screen, but although you can do this with a mouse, you cannot select the window with a remote.

What do you guys think?

[)p(]

 The natural thing to do when viewing the playing now screen is to select the window and hit enter on the remote to go big screen, but although you can do this with a mouse, you cannot select the window with a remote.

What do you guys think?

I agree...highlight it and press enter. Not sure if you can get to the screen easy with just the cursor keys...i'll check this tonight.

peter

[raym]

I agree...highlight it and press enter. Not sure if you can get to the screen easy with just the cursor keys...i'll check this tonight.

peter

You can't at the moment but potentially, if the PIP window was simply part of normal list/thumbnail navigation, then you could arrow UP from the TOP roller to get to it. Arrow UP again to get back to the list or arrow DOWN to get to the roller again.

I think this could work well 

[park]

I agree with the top post in this thread about the use of the home screen. Playing Now is accessible on that screeen, but it isn't always visible. Why not have the Playing now button above the current horizontal scrolling list, on it's own and separate from all the views. Then, when hitting "up" from anywhere in that horizontal list you'd always be able to get to playing now with just 2 button presses.
As also suggested, you could also have a little preview of the current Playing now visualisation, or movie (when there is something playing) next to the playing now button so that people can see what is currently playing.

Also want to backup glynor. Breadcrumbs = navigation. Top Roller = top level info such as what view you're in, and a quick way to get to playing now/big screen. And by "=" I mean "Should =".

[raym]

Why not have the Playing now button above the current horizontal scrolling list, on it's own and separate from all the views. Then, when hitting "up" from anywhere in that horizontal list you'd always be able to get to playing now with just 2 button presses.
As also suggested, you could also have a little preview of the current Playing now visualisation, or movie (when there is something playing) next to the playing now button so that people can see what is currently playing.

Great ideas!

[nuke2000]

I agree with the top post in this thread about the use of the home screen. Playing Now is accessible on that screeen, but it isn't always visible. Why not have the Playing now button above the current horizontal scrolling list, on it's own and separate from all the views. Then, when hitting "up" from anywhere in that horizontal list you'd always be able to get to playing now with just 2 button presses.
As also suggested, you could also have a little preview of the current Playing now visualisation, or movie (when there is something playing) next to the playing now button so that people can see what is currently playing.

Also want to backup glynor. Breadcrumbs = navigation. Top Roller = top level info such as what view you're in, and a quick way to get to playing now/big screen. And by "=" I mean "Should =".

Glad someone else likes the idea park. If the horizontal list was shifted up (or down) a bit the playing now preview could actually be fairly large. If using a standard theatre view skin the vertical list on home screen could be shifted to the far left giving an even larger (watchable) playing now preview on the home screen. If nothing was playing it could just display the spinning cube wotsit or something else people may find useful or entertaining  There is a far, far more limited piece of software out there that gives you the idea but i'm not mentioning it cos MC is far superior in 99.8% of ways - HTPC enthusiasts will probably have tried it out at some point and know it anyway.

[MrHaugen]

A lot of good ideas here. I support them all
Glad to hear the Playing Now button can be found on the top roller soon!

[JimH]

Glad to hear the Playing Now button can be found on the top roller soon!

It's at the top of the board now.