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[Steve]

There are new Plugins available for both NomadII (v3.0.5) and Nomad Jukebox(v. 3.0.6).  If any problems are reportable please first verify that you have these versions as well as whatever version of MJ is released next (something higher than 8.0.189)

Thanks for your help.

Steve

[Doof]

MJ 8.0.193
Plugin 3.0.5

No normalization - No conversion : Overall Progress Indicator dissapears after transferring around 21MB (as reported by MJ) of data and never reappears. Transferring less than 20MB of files works properly. I can't say for sure the exact number it disappears at, as I kind of had to guess by adding up the values of all of the files it completely transferred without losing the progress bar, and then guestimating how much of the file it uploaded before the progress bar did dissapear (because it would dissapear part way through a file) I did this several times with several different groups of files and the progress bar always dissapeared after approximately 21MB. In case it's a percentage of total memory thing, I'm using a 64MB card in my Nomad.

Normalization - No Conversion : Overall Progress Indicator resets itself after every file is transferred. Says it's converting to 128kbps WMA even though conversion options are disabled. Encoding options for general MJ operation is set to APE, conversion settings for Nomad previously set to WMA 64kbps, but that option was disabled for this test. It shows MP3 for all files in the queue, but afterwards, checking the actual list of files on the Nomad reveals that they are 64kbps WMA even though MJ reported it was encoding at 128 kbps AND even though it wasn't supposed to be converting at all.

No Normalization - Conversion to WMA 64kbps : For some reason, it now says that conversion is not applicable on every file, and then just proceeds to upload as if I had never asked it to convert first. At this point I restarted MJ thinking there must be some weirdness going on, but it did the same thing after restarting MJ. The starting format doesn't appear to make any difference. In fact, if I start with APE's and tell MJ to convert to WMA before transfer, it refuses to convert and then sends the APE file to the Nomad even though that format is not supported. If I clear the the convert box, then it tells me I can't transfer APE's to the Nomad as they are unsupported.

Normalization - Conversion to WMA 64kbps : Converts, Normalizes and transfers as you'd expect, but the Overall Progress Indicator resets after every file.

And on top of this, MJ crashes often during various operations.

[Clark]

i have the latest versions installed and wanted to report a couple of issues...when viewing the contents of the nomad, MJ is not displaying the correct info...for example, when i select Devices/Nomad Jukebox/Artists/John Coltrane the right pane will display 51 entries of the same song (in this case it lists "Waiting for You" 51 times)...there should be only 17 songs listed under John Coltrane and "Waiting for You" is not a Coltrane song...another issue is when i am Uploading songs to the Nomad and attempt to rip CD's i get "out of memory", "duplicate file" messages...MJ then crashes.

i hope this helps
Clark

[Doof]

My Nomad II actually locked up on me twice last night. I can't tell if this is due to the plugin or not, or if the lockup was caused by a problem that I had with the plugin (both lockups were discovered right after a severe problem with MJ and the nomad plugin) or if the lockups caused the problems I was having. I suspect the former, because I didn't have any of these problems with earlier versions of the nomad plugin.

[Steve]

Clark,

Thanks for the report. Sorry about the errors. Please get Plug-in 3.0.7 for NOMAD Jukebox and then get the next build of MJ which should be posted in the next half hour for a possible solution.

Doof,

I was finally able to duplicate your Conversion\Normalization issues.  Items 1,3 and 4 are hopefully resolved. Item two (Normalization - No Conversion) is addressed in the following way. In order to Normalize a file we must decode the file first. After the Normalization we then must reencode the file to something.  I changed the interface so that there is no longer a way to have Normalization checked without the Encoding check being activated to hopefully make intuitive the connection between the two.  The lock ups are a mystery.  Please try the new stuff and we can take it from there tomorrow.

Steve

[Doof]

Well, no Nomad lockups this time around... but...

Normalization & Conversion - Resets Write Progress Bar after every song.

I can't make heads or tails over what order files are converted. They're uploaded in the order specified in whatever playlist I dragged to the device, but they aren't being displayed that way in Content View.

If I try to view files on the Nomad I get "Invalid item adding (programmer error)" It's the same message I get when I try to switch to mini-me. I think this may be Matt's fault.

At this point, I have to stop testing as I can't even erase the files that are on it to continue.

But this screenshot should give you an idea of what I'm seeing. You can see both the strange discrepancy in the order they're being uploaded in as opposed to the order they're being displayed in, and you can see by the fact that, although several files have been uploaded, the Write Progress Bar is back at the beginning.

[Steve]

Doof,

- Normalization & Conversion - Resets Write Progress Bar after every song.


Did you see the "Write Progress" bar reset each time or is it possible "Write Progress" is proceeding very slowly? If it resets each time, do you see this behavior if you transfer a small number(3 or 4) of files?


- I can't make heads or tails over what order files are converted. They're uploaded in the order specified in whatever playlist I dragged to the device, but they aren't being displayed that way in Content View.

The Content View for Handhelds functions the same as any other view in MJ and is controlled by whatever sort order you have selected or click on in the headers of the columns.  Some users have requested that the files upload in the order they are dragged onto the tree and that is the order of the uploads you are seeing. For viewing, you can order the files however you want, but the track order for upload is decided during upload.

If I try to view files on the Nomad I get "Invalid item adding (programmer error)" It's the same message I get when I try to switch to mini-me. I think this may be Matt's fault.

- This one is baffling.  I think at some point you mentioned you are running with a 64MB card. Do you have a 32MB card to test with. I have tried to test here with our 64MB card but my Nomad will not format my card with either our program or Creatives. If you can test this it would be a big help.

At this point, I have to stop testing as I can't even erase the files that are on it to continue.

- Try formatting the card (LeftTree Right Click) and see if this helps.

[Doof]

The Write Progress Bar is definitely resetting itself after every song. It shows like 3 or 4 of those blocks (in my screenshot) and then when the current file is done, they all dissapear and it starts all over.

Can I drag files around in the Queue before uploading to change the order? I haven't tried this. If I do, what happens to the display? I think it would be more intuitive to display the files in the upload order rather than by the standard sort order. It should be the same as burning a CD, shouldn't it?

The programmer error messages are happening whenever I try to switch to mini-me as well, so I think it's just some general "MJ's broke" thing. But I can't format the card or anything through MJ. As soon as I click the Nomad device (either left or right) I get those programmer error messages. I do know that I've done this before with a 64MB card, in MJ8. But I'll do some more testing with this when I get home (if there's a new build tonight that fixes the programmer error messages ).

[Steve]

Some things changed late in the day yesterday that caused the "Programmer error" message you were seeing. These are fixed and will be all better in the next version.  

I will try to implement something for your queue dragging suggestion.  

The "Write Progress" bar issue is starting to annoy me.  I got a 64mb card and have tested on 2000,XP and 98 and cannot duplicate this.  I have tried many files or just a few and the car works great.  I will keep looking. I made a small change to the Plug-in but maybe it will help. Look for it later.

Thanks.
Steve

[Doof]

Thanks.

If I'm the only person having this problem with the progress bar, then it's no big deal. It's getting the job done, and that's what really counts. But if it's not just me, it might be more important to get it fixed so other people don't complain. Image is everything and all that.

[Doof]

Hey Steve, I think I've got something.

The progress bar reset only seems to happen when transferring WMA's. If I transfer MP3's it's fine. For the ultimate test, I tried uploading 3 MP3's and 3 WMA's. The progress bar worked fine for the 3 MP3's. And then it transferred the WMA's. For each WMA, the progress bar would move forward, and then when the upload for that WMA was done, the progress bar would jump back only as far as it just moved forward. So it doesn't appear to be an actual reset. It's just subtracting from the progress bar what it just added. Only for WMA's. Weird. I hope that's enough information to kill this bug once and for all.

There is another weird bug that I just found though. The Queue only shows a few fields (Name, Path, etc). If I right click on the column headers and choose one of the hidden fields, like Artist, all of the fields I normally have in Media Library appear at the very right-hand side. If I then try to move one of the columns to where I want it, weird things happen. See below.



A refresh corrects this, but it also rehides all of the extra fields, including the one I specifically asked for.

A couple of other minor bugs. While doing a large conversion/transfer, the Nomad powered down and MJ gave me a Transfer Error message box. I kind of screwed up and just hit OK before reconnecting the Nomad so I'm not sure if it would have reattempted the transfer after it was connected and on, but if not, it should. I remember this was implemented in 7.2. If it does, great. Also, when I saw that it wasn't going to finish, I clicked Cancel on the transfer, but it wouldn't actually cancel. I finally had to kill MJ through task manager, and when I did, MJ crashed. A strange series of events that led to a bug?

Also, when converting files before download, whether WMA or MP3, MJ doesn't appear to be filling in the tag data. It's not a huge deal, but the songs display so much nicer on the Nomad when the tags are filled in. I just confirmed that it is not filling in the tag properly by importing all of the converted files from the Temp folder into MJ. None of them have the tags filled in.

Which brings me to my next and final bug. The plugin isn't cleaning up its mess after its done. The temp folder still contains every file I converted while testing this plugin from the very beginning. This got me thinking. Is the plugin not calling the standard MJ conversion function?

Oh, and I can format my 64MB cards just fine.

[Steve]

Doof,

Thanks for your detailed information, this is a huge help.  I will work on these later today and let you know.

Steve

[Steve]

Doof,

I think I got everything you listed except for the loss of tag info during conversion. I need to test it more to be sure, but look for version 3.0.7 to fix the rest.  I will get the tag conversion issue on Monday. The files that remain in Temp are most likely left over from times when the uploads crashed MJ. Delete them all and test with the Temp directory open and you should see the files get created and then removed.

Again, thanks for the detailed information. It saves a lot of guessing on my part.

Have a good weekend.

[Steve]

Doof,

The next version of MJ should fix the loss of tag issue.

[Doof]

So close...

When uploading WMA's one out of every 4 or so will cause the write progress bar to jump back the amount that it just went forward. It's really weird. I couldn't quite make out if there was a pattern or not, and unfortunately, I only had time for one test.

But when it was all finished, the Write Progress Bar was about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way to the end.

Other than that, everything else is looking good. Tags are filled, and you were right, the Temp folder is being emptied.

What's the status on the file dragging/ordering?

[Steve]

Doof,

I will post a new Plug-in for Nomad II later (v3.0.8)which I hope will fix the progress bar for wma for you.

In regards to the dragging/ordering, I remember you wanted the ability to reorder files in the "upload view" before sending to the Device. By design, the files will transfer to the Device in the order in which they are dropped on the Device.  If a Device supports the reorder of tracks, we will support the reorder of tracks once they are on the Device.  The problem with supporting the reorder before you send the files, is it forces us into the need to handle reordering virtual (in queue) files with files that exist on the player. This gets messy and is a substantial difference between sending files to a CD or a Handheld Device. CD's never deal with the mixing of virtual and actual files.

I would recommend creating a Playlist, getting the tracks in order and then drag or send the files to the Device to get the order right.

Your feedback on this is appreciated.  There are a few other options available, but without going into the details, we are thinking the above recommendation is the best solution.

Steve

[Doof]

Ah, I hadn't considered that for some reason.

Would it be possible to just display the files in the order they are in on the player (or in the queue) instead of the same sort order specified for Media Library?

File ordering isn't all that important, but I just had a thought. If you wanted to do it, maybe you could display the files already on the player first, in a different color, to indicate that they were locked in place. And then only allow files within the queue to be reordered. But like I said, it's really not all that important. I typically do arrange things in a playlist first anyway. That way I can always repeat that transfer at some later date if I want.

[Steve]

Doof,

Something like you suggest is possible.  We kicked a similar idea around and thought that it would confuse more people than it would help.  If it appears to be an issue for a lot of people we will look to implement something. I will also keep trying to come up with a solution that is both not confusing and accomplishes what you want.

As always, thanks for your input.

[Steve]

Doof,

Regarding v 3.0.8, it is finished, but never got posted yesterday. I have asked again. Look for it this morning. Thanks.

Steve

[Doof]

Hey, Steve... about this plugin...

Perfect.

The only right now I'd like to see changed is to have the files displayed in the order they are (or will be) on the Nomad. But you knew that.

Good job.

[Doof]

Except for this..

"There is another weird bug that I just found though. The Queue only shows a few fields (Name, Path, etc). If I right click on the column headers and choose one of the hidden fields, like Artist, all of the fields I normally have in Media Library appear at the very right-hand side. A refresh corrects this, but it also rehides all of the extra fields, including the one I specifically asked for."

Not a showstopper by any stretch of the imagination.

[Steve]

Doof,

Sorry to ask, but do you have the latest MJ version?

[Steve]

Doof,

I was asking about the version because there was a problem with the columns that should be resolved in the current build. Using this build, I cannot duplicate the problem.  If you still see the bug you report, could you try removing skins to see if that helps?

PS I am about to take off until Monday so if anything needs changing, I will look at it then.

Thanks.

Steve

[Doof]

I'm using MJ 8.0.199 under XP, so no skins.

The column dragging bug isn't there anymore, but if you right click on the column header and choose Artist, and then scroll all the way to the right, you should see what I mean.

[Steve]

Doof,

On XP when I add "Artist" or any other field, they show up on the right side with my original columns intact. I will keep trying to duplicate it, but for now everything looks OK.

Steve