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[kaiynne]

What is the current state of development regarding Gizmo? 
Where is the best place to discuss make suggestions? 
Could we get a dedicated forum for Gizmo?

Firstly let me say I love Gizmo, I use it more now than the actual UI in MC.  It is so much easier to just pick up the tablet and choose a track or playlist.  However as good as it is it still doesn't come close to the polish of the rest of the program.  Obviously its a much more recent addition to the stable so that is understandable.

Here are a few suggestions for features etc that I would love to see added in Gizmo 3 if possible.

1. An integrated volume slider in now playing.  It can be a little frustrating to have to go back to the commands menu and then tap 15 times on volume down to get the right volume for an album or track.  Yes I know thereis replay gain etc, but sometimes you just want to quickly turn the volume down.  This would make it much easier.

2. Playlist refesh, I may just be doing it wrong but there doesn;t seem to be an easy way to refresh a smart list.  I have multiple smart lists which pull say 20 tracks out of a certain set of albums, I usually like to take a glance across the playlist first and if I don't like it I will fresh it, there doesn;t seem to be a way to do this from Gizmo.

3.  Adjust the view schemes, long names get hidden and it seems somewhat random as to what part of the name will show.  If there was a way to either reduce the text size or force the entire name to show that would be helpful, or change the layout to fit larger names if desired.

4. Local caching of thumbnails on the tablet itself, I don't think this would take up a lot of space and it would make scrolling through large libraries a lot nicer as you wouldn't have to wait for the image to load and then scroll up only to have it dissapear again and reload.

There are probably a few more things I will think of but I honestly believe that a fully developed Gizmo will set MC even further apart from the competition.  It is easy to say it is one of my favourite features, but only because of all of the other stuff which is now just expected from MC, I think it just builds on an already amazing platform and extends it in ways that the standard windows interface can't compete with.

Thanks!

[jhermosillo]

I agree with all your suggestions, it will make Gizmo really good!

Regards,

[Castius]

I'd like to see caching of any content. So before I head out I can pull up a playlist and download all the content. That way if I lose connection it will keep playing. Like on an airplane.

[xplain]

A better Theater view remote control, would love to see a keyboard here, to type in search text
on Youtube, netflix ao.

I made a quick picture, to show what I would like,
please dont pay attention to design (as it isn't there),
just an ex.

Thomas

[JimH]

The hardware buttons on the device should change volume.

Thanks for your other thoughts.

[famu97]

I just noticed this. Sorry I posted my suggested in another thread.  You can delete if you see it:  Here are my essential feature add requests that will take Gizmo to the next level for sure. I've been using it since day 1 so trust me when I say these are needed:

I've been using Gizmo since it was first released and it's come a long way and it's great. I love it.  Doesn't mean it couldn't be better.  There are just a couple of things missing from Gizmo to make it the perfect Android Music Streaming App.

1. Cache frenquenly played songs - Add Feature that allows Gizmo to cache most recently played songs simular to how Google Play works.  Right now, every time I play the same song it re-streams the entire song from my htpc.  There's no intelligence there and that's extremely wasteful of bandwidth especially with my 2GB data cap limits.  I'd also like to see a setting added with this feature that allows the user to configure the size of the music caching.  Maybe have three options that allows the user to cache 20,30,40 most recently played songs or even allow the user to set how many MB's of storage the cached songs take up and if you add that setting you must allow the user to be able to purge cached songs if they are trying to free up storage.
2. Better Gizmo Bluetooth integration - make Gizmo comply with BT 2.1 A2DP specifications while in use.  Right now when I'm using Gizmo and I stream music via Bluetooth, Gizmo does not respond to the Bluetooth audio controls like to be able to skip fwd & backword to other songs.  If Gizmo is playing via BT and I click next track on the BT device, a second built-in music app then starts to play along with Gizmo at the same time.  Obviously there needs to be better BT integration with Android so that this doesn't happen.
3. Gizmo notification icon -  place a notification icon on top of Android Notification bar while playing or in use.  This is a subtle feature that takes an Android app to another level. Right now if I'm playing music using Gizmo and I go to another app, it's hard to navigate back to apps to bring up the Gizmo app to the front so that I can control the app again.   If this thing was more integrated with BT A2DP controls, this would not be as much of an issue.  Still while music is playing, there definitely needs to be a Gizmo notification icon on the icon bar.
4. Make Tablet friend/aware version of the Gizmo app.  When installed on an tablet I'd like to see the interface change slightly to accomodate the larger screen size.  Also make the navication icons larger and the thumbnail image size larger since it is a tablet screen.


Implement these four feature adds with associated settings and Gizmo will be on another planet it will be so tight

[Castius]

Yup that sums it up very well.

[drmimosa]

I would add to this list of suggestions the ability to rate songs from Gizmo (ratings work great in the JRemote app, which uses a touchscreen 5-star graphic and syncs changes to the server on the fly.)

famu97, I also use Bluetooth audio, some of these problems were solved when my phone got a firmware upgrade from froyo to gingerbread 2.3.4. I now use hardware commands forward, back, and pause succesfully with Gizmo, whereas before the update none of these buttons worked. Gizmo has to be open on top as the primary app, however, because if it isn't Google Listen or Google Play will pop up occasionally and unexpectedly from hardware commands.

+1 to notifications and local file caching. I've got a 5gb monthly cap and still come close to the limit when I do a lot of network streaming (JRiver, netflix, podcasts, etc.)

Gizmo is awesome, I use it every day. Thanks for starting this thread, I look forward to the next stage of Gizmo development and hope that some of these ideas are implemented!

[dexterdom]

The hardware buttons on the device should change volume.

Thanks for your other thoughts.

Jim,

I currently favor plugplayer (android) over gizmo simply because it has a beautiful volume slider on the now playing screen. The hardware volume controls on the Xoom leave a lot to be desired so the soft volume is a necessity for me. How about an optional setting in gizmo to enable  a soft volume slider, which can be turned off for those who don't need/want it?
Your thoughts?

[farmer1]

Option for setting an event when phone rings fx. mute, pause, fixed volume and also event for hangup fx. play, unmute.

[Castius]

+1 for thumbnail caching
+1 for caching.

[billg]

Ive been using Gizmo on my tablet as the player of choice but it could be a lot more fun to use as the tab has so much more real estate than the phone.

Top of the list is a volume control sitting beside the player controls on the playing now page. This is actually a real pain to have to tap 4 - 5 times and a slider is better than tapping repeatedly.

I'd also like
* MC-like screen instead of the blank icons for Artists, Album, etc. Like when you select All Artists. It'd be great to see the tracks listed beside albums.
* buttons on any screen to jump to Playing Now, Artists, Albums, Playlists, etc
* PLEASE add internet radio to MC and Gizmo (like Squeezebox)
* buttons to launch AMG, Amazon etc

Is there a timetable for Gizmo 3 or is it a just a dream of forum members like me?

[Mike48]

FYI: I've posted a list of requests -- including some repeated from posters here -- in a new thread.