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Author Topic: MC20 and classical music  (Read 17127 times)

High-End

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MC20 and classical music
« on: October 12, 2014, 04:46:12 am »

hello

40% of my library is classcal music.
I found no way to show different tags for different genre at my remote APP ( EOS, Gizmo)
example:
beside the standard tags:
%genre%
%album%
%title%

I use specific classic genre tags:
%Chorus%
%conductor%
%composer%
%orchestra%
%soloists%

For all other genre (pop, jazz,...) I use instead of the above
%artist%

I am looking for a way to show within my EOS App at genre " Classic" different tags as in genre "pop".
Where could I setup these genre specific switching?
If it is not available today, is this a new feature you could implement within MC20?
that would be very kind ;-)

regards
H-E
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AndyU

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #1 on: October 12, 2014, 07:17:18 am »

Tools > Options > Media Network > Advanced  .. Customize view for Gizmo & Webgizmo  > Add  > Library Item    

and fiddle away to your hearts content. Any set of tags, any order .. superb. You'll probably want the "Set rules for file Display" wizard to help you constrain the selection. For example, only Genre = Classical.

You might find it easier to get a view working in the main MC window, then using Add > Add Library item from Standard View instead of the Add > Library Item.
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High-End

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #2 on: October 12, 2014, 10:19:01 am »

Oh, I forgot to say I would like to see these genre specifig tags at the playing now screen within EOS/GIZMO.

Regards
H-E
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #3 on: October 13, 2014, 01:47:02 am »

Tools > Options > Media Network > Advanced  .. Customize view for Gizmo & Webgizmo  > Add  > Library Item    

and fiddle away to your hearts content.

Yes, but there is still no way to select which fields are visible on the terminal (either the Android tablet with Gizmo app, either the screen of the DLNA renderer).

This theme comes here back on a regular basis. Basically, what classical music lovers need is :
- Track name, of course
- Composer name (either 'Composer' tag, either ComposerSort').
- Track number
Why not to  add a way to customize what is displayed in the DLNA player, like the display of the regular "playing now" view ?

Another thing: the album titles displayed in the Gizmo app are too short: sometimes we need to view the full album title to distinguish two albums:
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 1
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 2.

Some other DLNA apps have the ability to switch between a "thumbnails" view to a "details" one. Why not Gizmo ?


BTW, the Webremote view (seen through a browser) is more customizable (even if you need to be a little techy to do it), but Composer and Track number are not in the list of fields that you can add.

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AndyU

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #4 on: October 13, 2014, 03:21:54 am »

Yes, but there is still no way to select which fields are visible on the terminal (either the Android tablet with Gizmo app, either the screen of the DLNA renderer).

This theme comes here back on a regular basis. Basically, what classical music lovers need is :
- Track name, of course
- Composer name (either 'Composer' tag, either ComposerSort').
- Track number
Why not to  add a way to customize what is displayed in the DLNA player, like the display of the regular "playing now" view ?

Another thing: the album titles displayed in the Gizmo app are too short: sometimes we need to view the full album title to distinguish two albums:
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 1
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 2.

Some other DLNA apps have the ability to switch between a "thumbnails" view to a "details" one. Why not Gizmo ?


BTW, the Webremote view (seen through a browser) is more customizable (even if you need to be a little techy to do it), but Composer and Track number are not in the list of fields that you can add.


Pretty sure Gizmo will use and display whatever fields you specify in the steps I outlined above - just downloaded it to check. So I use an expression based on ComposerSort to give me ComposerSurname - and then have a view for classical by ComposerSurname by Work x Album. These fields all seem to show up in Gizmo. Nothing stopping you making composite or derived fields to suit your own views. The possibilities are endless with MC, unlike most DLNA servers. I would agree that Gizmo doesn't show long track names, but the artwork is often sufficient to disambiguate.

But I have to say I'm not a Gizmo expert. I use JRemote (which uses the same custom views as Gizmo). I can see every tag in full detail and edit them if I wish! And see really long track names. And search. And ...
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #5 on: October 13, 2014, 04:59:32 am »

As you may or may not know, JRemote is in the process of being ported over to an android version; when will this be available -- I have no idea :) But what everyone has asked for is available on IOS already, just have to be patient .. haven't used Gizmo in awhile so not sure about flipping from album view to list views, but most of can be done for classical music as Andy has suggested already. Not sure if this will be ported to Gizmo or to a separate app either.

just for info so off topic a bit -- I have a custom field called "Work" which helps a great deal for classical music for long titles and linking the track names being reserved for movements, or arias etc. There are a lot of posts and links on how people set up their classical libraries which you could help you set up your libraries that also address screen real estate problems for tablets indirectly ... have to search for these though don't have the links handy.
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #6 on: October 13, 2014, 06:47:40 am »

Thanks. So I will try to be patient. A little.

Concerning tagging and display, the issue is not about tagging: I have been able to tag my collection (and organize my views) in a way that, although maybe not perfect, fully satisfies me. The issue is that I have absolutely no control on what is displayed in the "Playing now" view of Gizmo, apart putting info myself in the track name.

I have tried maybe 30 or 40 (!) Upnp Android Apps this weekend, and BubbleSoft is the only one that proposes to add track number and composer in the display. Sadly, it does not synchronize very well with the server and the player.

@AndyU: the cover art is often enough to disambiguate, but not always. For instance, I have a big dozen of Chopin CDs, all with similar cover arts, and with the cover art title not readable: this is precisely the case where I would like to have the full album title...
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High-End

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #7 on: October 13, 2014, 07:15:51 am »


Another thing: the album titles displayed in the Gizmo app are too short: sometimes we need to view the full album title to distinguish two albums:
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 1
Beethoven, blablala sonatas, by Wilhelm bablabal, VOL 2.

Some other DLNA apps have the ability to switch between a "thumbnails" view to a "details" one. Why not Gizmo ?
Try using EOS.
It is much better than gizmo!
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #8 on: October 13, 2014, 08:35:56 am »

@AndyU: the cover art is often enough to disambiguate, but not always. For instance, I have a big dozen of Chopin CDs, all with similar cover arts, and with the cover art title not readable: this is precisely the case where I would like to have the full album title...
are you sure you have made the views in the area of the options as Andy indicated? They are totally separate from the standard views you have created (see 1st screenshot)

If you do not want to create new views just for Gizmo, you can import the Standard Views as shown in the 2nd screenshot below. I'd be surprised you can not see track numbers etc. if the views are setup correctly.

Also, are you referring to the number of characters visible on the screen at the same time or the actual content? -- As an example from my library, sorted on Composer through the view (I add the conductor in the Album Title as I often have numerous versions of the same work, sometimes with the same orchestras even:  Haydn: Symphonies Nos. 30, 53 & 69 [Harnoncourt] by Concentus Musicus Wien should not pose a problem?  :-\ You are right about needing the extra detail of course.

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krmasson

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #9 on: October 13, 2014, 09:44:51 am »

Yes, this is exactly what I did, and yes I built my Gizmo views from the regular ones (I am a lazzy guy), and I am perfectly happy w/ the way I navigate through my library from my tablet.

What I am not happy with is the "Playing now" display on the Android device:
What I want (sorry, would like) is:
--------------------------
[Cover Art]
1. Torelli, Trumpet concerto, Allegro
or
[Cover Art]
4. Cimarosa, Trumpet concerto, Allegro

-------------------------

whereas what I currently get is:
--------------------------
[Cover Art]
Trumpet concerto, Allegro
or
[Cover Art]
Trumpet concerto, Allegro
-------------------------
no way to know where I am.

And, concerning the navigation through the album thumbnails, what I would like is:
--------------------------------------------
[Cover Art 1]                         [Cover Art 2, very similar]
Beethoven, piano  sonatas   Beethoven, piano sonatas
vol 1 (1-8)                             vol.2 (9-15)
--------------------------------------------


whereas I currently have
--------------------------------------------
[Covert Art 1]                        [Cover Art 2, very similar]
Beethoven, piano  sonatas   Beethoven, piano sonatas
--------------------------------------------

no easy way to distnguish both albums.

But maybe I am not clear, I am more used to write computer English than music one :-)

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BillT

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #10 on: October 13, 2014, 10:03:22 am »

I think that you're right. Gizmo won't display custom fields in playing now.

I'm pretty sure that neither will Eos, JRemote or a web view. AIUI only a limited number of pre-defined fields are available in MCWS and that limits what can be displayed by any of these remotes.

This has been requested a few times, but I guess that the number of interested people is too small to bother with.
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High-End

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #11 on: October 13, 2014, 10:12:37 am »

krmasson, please open a new thread for your issue.
thanks!

back to the "playing now" screen.
Today, when I start playing (any genre) a song EOS/ Gizmo is showing
1st row: song name
2nd row: interpred and album name

what I would like to see in genre classical
1st row: song name
2nd row: composer
3rd. row: orchestra
4th. row: soloists
5th row: conduktor
6th. row: Chorus
the order should be configurable.
From my point of view row 1 + 2 is a must be (this should be configurable). the rest depends on the screen(sisze/ resolution) of the terminal/ tablet ...

for all the rest:
1st row: song name
2nd row: interpred and album name
is OK for my, but is should be configurable ;-)

I don't see a way in Tools > Options > Media Network > Advanced  .. Customize view for Gizmo & Webgizmo  > Add  > Library Item to config the " playing now" screen.

What I have is sorting rules for the music library within MC
composer
opra
concert
ectr....

I hope you understand now what I am looking for....

regards
H-E
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BillT

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #12 on: October 13, 2014, 11:13:29 am »

krmasson, please open a new thread for your issue.
thanks!

AFAICS krmasson's issue is exactly the same as yours (and mine). You cannot display anything other than certain fields in the remote players. It seems to be a built in limitation of JRiver.

You can use custom fields for navigation using the Gizmo/Webgizmo customisations, but you can't show them on the playing now screen.
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #13 on: October 13, 2014, 12:51:01 pm »

@High End - BillT is correct; I am sorry I was confusing Playing now with the Views.
 
I don't have anything that supports Androids apps so I can't check, but even in JRemote (the IOS app) the playing now screen is not configurable (although you have the ability to see everything you need to via an information button which gives you lots more than just the composer - all of the metadata, liner notes if you have them etc.).

Not sure if this is a limitation on the Media server side or the remote app side (probably the later). To the OP, I think you would be better off asking the developer for EOS directly in his thread in the Remote forum.

As for playing now, I can see asking for the possibility to replace composer with artist, but without removing the album cover, that would take up a lot of space - 6 lines. I can understand why you could need need this with a view, but for playing now wouldn't this only be useful if you are making random classical playlists? A workaround, for the composer would be to replace artist with composer. I mentioned what I do above (The album title includes the composer and conductor, the artist is the orchestra).

Sorry can't be more of a help  :)


@Mods -- think this post should be moved to the Remote thread, thanks
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High-End

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #14 on: October 13, 2014, 02:03:17 pm »


@Mods -- think this post should be moved to the Remote thread, thanks

why?
the MC has to deliver the data. My understanding is they don't today. thats the reason I ask here...

perhaps we find more customers who are interested in a configurabel " playing now" screen ;-)

regards
H-E
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #15 on: October 13, 2014, 02:26:38 pm »

why?
the MC has to deliver the data. My understanding is they don't today. thats the reason I ask here...

perhaps we find more customers who are interested in a configurabel " playing now" screen ;-)

regards
H-E
MC delivers the data (otherwise you could not have complex views on remotes).

- the app developers are not always in the employ of JRiver (the case of EOS and prior to this summer, JRemote too). They DO however know what can and cannot be done and if they are willing to do this (they are the ones looking for more customers for their remote apps).
- Gizmo is a base platform from JRiver and is now a google app; all questions pertaining to that goes in the Remote Forum (its really just a section of this forum of course  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=37.0 )
- also this can affect and maybe help people that use the Mac or Linux versions - more customers ;)
- and finally someone may have a solution that I have never heard about!! I only use JRemote! and who knows maybe its something simple (not the 6 lines just for classical aficionados though,  LOL),  The post will get lost in the sauce here -- the title doesn't even indicate that the problem is reconfiguring the "playing now screen" for remotes. In a way I can see why this could be interesting for Jazz collections too btw

 :P That's why  ;D ;D
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Scotto

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #16 on: October 13, 2014, 07:54:40 pm »

krmasson, please open a new thread for your issue.
thanks!

back to the "playing now" screen.
Today, when I start playing (any genre) a song EOS/ Gizmo is showing
1st row: song name
2nd row: interpred and album name

what I would like to see in genre classical
1st row: song name
2nd row: composer
3rd. row: orchestra
4th. row: soloists
5th row: conduktor
6th. row: Chorus
the order should be configurable.
From my point of view row 1 + 2 is a must be (this should be configurable). the rest depends on the screen(sisze/ resolution) of the terminal/ tablet ...

for all the rest:
1st row: song name
2nd row: interpred and album name
is OK for my, but is should be configurable ;-)

I don't see a way in Tools > Options > Media Network > Advanced  .. Customize view for Gizmo & Webgizmo  > Add  > Library Item to config the " playing now" screen.

What I have is sorting rules for the music library within MC
composer
opra
concert
ectr....

I hope you understand now what I am looking for....

regards
H-E

I too wish we could add custom fields to the playing now screen. Until then here is my work around:
Presently this is displayed:

[Name]
[Artist] ● [Album]

I leave the [Name] field alone, but since I don't use [Artist] and [Album] for my classical music I instead populate it with:

[Artist] <<<< [Composer] ● [Work]
[Album] <<<< [Conductor] ● [Performer]

So for example on the Playing Now screen this is showing right now:

Part One: Nr. 1: Vor Edens Tor im Morgenprangen
Schumann ● Das Paradies und die Peri ● Harnoncourt ● Röschmann ● Fink ● Strehl ● Gerhaher ● ...

Definitely not perfect, but easy to write a few expressions to aggregate and massage the data I want into temporary fields and copy those fields to [Artist] and [Album].

Advantages of this method: almost entirely automated, easy to setup, easy to reverse when a better solution comes along.

Scott
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AndyU

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #17 on: October 14, 2014, 02:24:45 am »

From my point of view, showing 6 lines of tags  would be excessive - (why not 7 .. or 8 ..) . in fact I hardly look at the playing now screen, since by the time a piece is playing I've picked it and I know what it is. On the occasions I want full details of the tags, or to edit them, then I can with JRemote. But I do think that, just as the main JRiver screen lets you define the "Thumbnail Text", the  DLNA views could usefully let you define the "Trackname Text".
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High-End

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Re: MC20 an classical music
« Reply #18 on: October 14, 2014, 02:27:58 am »

As said:
"From my point of view row 1 + 2 is a must be (this should be configurable). the rest depends on the screen(sisze/ resolution) of the terminal/ tablet ..."
Why not givn the customer to decide what he wants to have?

regards
H-E
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BillT

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #19 on: October 14, 2014, 03:16:32 am »

In an ideal world I would like to show composer, work, movement (a field that I don't have!) as a minimum with the possibility of performers, key and opus, but just to have the option of changing the default two fields to any available field (including custom fields) would be a great improvement.

AFAICS JRemote doesn't let you see all the fields, just a small selection.

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AndyU

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #20 on: October 14, 2014, 04:23:46 am »

..
AFAICS JRemote doesn't let you see all the fields, just a small selection.


Actually, JRemote lets you see every tag you have (you just press the "i" button). Not only that, you can search based on any of those tags and edit them if you wish.
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #21 on: October 14, 2014, 04:41:57 am »

In an ideal world I would like to show composer, work, movement (a field that I don't have!) as a minimum with the possibility of performers, key and opus, but just to have the option of changing the default two fields to any available field (including custom fields) would be a great improvement.

we are of course still talking about the playing now area? for others who might be confused by this, like I was, of course you can add movement, key, opus as fields  - but out of curiosity if work, movement, opus, are in separate fields what do you need the (track) name field for?

Quote
AFAICS JRemote doesn't let you see all the fields, just a small selection.
I'm confused here, which version do you have?

I can see all metadata with values; this is a tremendous feature (tags are even editable). It would almost be nicer to not see everything?!



edit : oops Andy beat me to it :)
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BillT

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #22 on: October 14, 2014, 05:20:05 am »

Yes, I'm talking about Playing Now.

I don't need the track name field, although for pop music the standard view is OK, so the name field can be used.

The trouble with putting all the info in one field is, (a) the field usually becomes much too long and (b) there isn't any standard way of doing it for classical music, as there is so much variation in naming and description.

Well, I'm no JRemote expert, but when I look at the tag listing with the (i) button all I get is an incomplete list of tags which are, apparently, a random selection in a random order. Maybe there's some setting in JRiver that controls this, but it doesn't seem to correspond to any of the views that I've set up, as far as I can see. As a random list containing mostly pointless tags like bit-rate it is actually pretty useless to me.

Edit. I think it might be showing only populated fields, which would explain some of the randomness.
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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #23 on: October 14, 2014, 06:17:34 am »

Edit. I think it might be showing only populated fields, which would explain some of the randomness.

Hey Bill

Yes thats what it is doing; so if you create a field called work opus etc. it will show up. It would be nice to be able to order this information or exclude some of it, but maybe that could be doable.
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AndyU

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #24 on: October 14, 2014, 09:06:44 am »

I haven't come across any other remote app + server pair that gives you anything like the power and flexibility of JRemote + MC; with most everything else what you get is what you have to put up with.

But if it's that important to see a lot of information why not just buy something like an Asus Transformer Book and use it as a remote running full fat J River Media Center.  Cheaper than an iPad too! And if the Asus thing is too expensive, you could just hang on a bit for sub $100 windows 8 tablets like this Toshiba Encore Mini.
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BillT

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #25 on: October 14, 2014, 12:29:01 pm »

Yes, I agree, of course. The great database is the reason that I've used JRiver for 11 years. It's especially valuable for classical music, but it would be even better if you could easily display items from the database on a small, simple player.

A lot of information isn't needed, just customisable information.

I have a Surface Pro with JRiver on it, but it's too heavy, has too poor battery life (and the pixels are too small for my eyes now!) to be useful.

An Android phone, tablet or Joggler is fine as a remote, but it would be even better if the Playing Now view was customisable. Considering all the esoteric things that have been developed in JRiver I can't believe that it would be very difficult to implement.

Actually, for me, WebGizmo would do fine, but AFAICS it has the same limitations as Gizmo.
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High-End

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #26 on: October 14, 2014, 12:42:10 pm »

...Considering all the esoteric things that have been developed in JRiver I can't believe that it would be very difficult to implement.

+1
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Soul_Rvr911

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #27 on: October 14, 2014, 02:04:14 pm »

The problem with customizable views in a mobile app is that the framework for allowing such a feature needs to be built by the developer of the application. As far as I'm aware, this functionality is not provided by any mobile platform. Giving the user full control of the positioning and quantity of fields on any given screen is not a trivial task, and is in fact in opposition with the most ubiquitous way of designing applications in Android, which is to use static XML that defines the layout of a screen.

Screen real estate is already at a premium on most mobile devices, and app developers have to find a balance that is both a) functional for the majority of users - in the case we're discussing here, that means showing the information that is most relevant, and b) visually appealing, making good use of the limited space. The JRiver database can contain a virtually limitless amount of information, in a similarly boundless number of custom fields. An app developer cannot reasonably account for all of these custom fields. However, as some have pointed out, the File Info page in eos - and the same page in JRemote - do provide a way to view all of the fields that are populated for a particular item in the library server's database.

That being said, Classical music seems to be a very popular genre of music around here, so surely something can be done to accommodate. I don't want to start adding conditions based upon specific genres, since this would be based on a string comparison that would fail if, as a simple example, the word "Classical" was translated to another language. I can add additional row(s) to the header on eos' Playing Now page, which would show more of the information that's specific to Classical music. These rows would be hidden if the tags were not populated. The obvious tradeoff here is that the size of the cover art will shrink as a result.

My biggest concern with this approach is that all of the information required to populate these additional fields will have to be retrieved from a different MWCS call. It would be nice if JRiver could update the /Playback/Info service to include this additional information. The stretch goal would be an implementation that allowed you, the user, to configure when this extra data was returned, so that if the "Composer" tag was populated in a pop music track it wouldn't be included, and therefore wouldn't show up on the Playing Now page (since you likely don't care about the Composer in this case).
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BillT

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #28 on: October 14, 2014, 02:59:07 pm »

Actually, what I initially envisioned was simply the ability to nominate which fields were displayed in the area currently used by Artist/Album/Track name, so I would display Composer,Work and another field to be decided, probably movement; no doubt others would choose different fields.

Of course it would be even better if the displayed fields could be changed depending on some value as you suggest, so pop music used the standard layout and the displayed fields changed with other music types. And even better the ability to display more information if using a device with a bigger screen, but I do appreciate the difficulties of designing something that fits all displays.

When Webgizmo was introduced I thought that it could be configured to do this, which would have solved the problem for me, as a web page would have been adequate, but I could not work out a way of doing it. May be my totally inadequate computer skills, but I rather got the impression that JRiver wouldn't send the information that I wanted to display.
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #29 on: October 14, 2014, 04:49:57 pm »

Webgizmo is a little more configurable, by tweaking the html/css template files on the server (more or less documented, needs some CSS knowledge, but documented and feasible).

Alas, there are only some predefined fields that you can get displayed on the PlayingNow page, and "Composer" is not part of them :-(. Nor track number.

I was nevertheless able to expand the room used by the thumbnails titles: they are now displayed on 3 lines on my computer, instead of a single one, and I can usually read the whole album title.
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Soul_Rvr911

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #30 on: October 14, 2014, 08:03:19 pm »

iirc, the fields that can be displayed on WebGizmo's Playing Now are limited to the fields that are available in the /Playback/Info service. As I mentioned, it would be nice if MCWS would return these additional fields, or at least cater them to the media type. For example, when playing a TV episode, there is no metadata about the season, episode, or even series that the video is from.
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #31 on: October 17, 2014, 07:19:02 am »

Hello there.

FYI, I have tried the BubbleSoft remote UPnp Android app. Worked fine with MC20 (which was not really the case with MC17).
(MC20 being both the server and the renderer, SP/DIF linked to my Uniti player).

Very pleasant and intuitive ergonomy, AND, AND... the ability to display the composer name in the playing now view, AND, AND... the ability to display the track number of every file.

These were precisely the both fields I missed in Gizmo.

Displaying current playing track, and gapless playback, work fine with MC20 default settings.

Full version costs about 3 €, but is definitely worth it.
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AndyU

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #32 on: October 17, 2014, 01:55:07 pm »

Hello there.

FYI, I have tried the BubbleSoft remote UPnp Android app. Worked fine with MC20 (which was not really the case with MC17).
(MC20 being both the server and the renderer, SP/DIF linked to my Uniti player).

Very pleasant and intuitive ergonomy, AND, AND... the ability to display the composer name in the playing now view, AND, AND... the ability to display the track number of every file.

These were precisely the both fields I missed in Gizmo.

Displaying current playing track, and gapless playback, work fine with MC20 default settings.

Full version costs about 3 €, but is definitely worth it.

Sounds good.  What are you running MC20 on? Any reason you are using s/pdif into your Uniti rather than streaming to it wirelessly?
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #33 on: October 17, 2014, 02:52:59 pm »

I run MC20 on a Asus miniPC, silent enough, using my TV as display, located in my living room, that I use only for playing music or video.

I use a cable because I could afford it (both devices are separated by only 3 meters, and the cable is actually hidden), and I supposed (be it wrong or true), that the quality would be better that through a wireless link.

Another reason, when I set up the installation, is that I can play music from the PC to the player, even if I have no network (my router is not always on, and I do not very like the idea of so much radio waves around me). I can still access my NAS, using some Windows configuration magics.

That said:
- in practice, my wifi network is always on when I listen to music
- sometimes, I choose music through the NAIM, browsing MC as DLNA server. In that case, it uses the wifi, and I have been unable to hear any difference in quality.

As a result, the next time I move all the stuff, and now that I have a correct wireless remote, maybe I would satisfy myself with a wireless link.
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ratbagp

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #34 on: November 25, 2014, 12:42:27 pm »

Here is a suggestion for fixing the 'playing now' screen for those who need 'composer' as well.

Instead of displaying just the 'Name' field, display a calculated data field such as

Remote_Name = ifelse(!isempty([Composer]), [Composer] -)[Name]

If the composer field is populated it delivers something like 'Beethoven - Fur Elise'

If the composer field is not populated, it just delivers 'Fur Elise'

Of course, the Remote_Name field could be user reconfigured to display what ever the user wanted.

The one problem I see is that there would be a compatibility problem between the old and new versions. I suspect many classical music lovers would be happy to pay a few bucks to upgrade and solve an annoying limitation.

ray
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #35 on: November 25, 2014, 02:35:57 pm »

This indeed works, but you can also simply configure the "Playing now" view, even w/o relying on custom user tag names.

The topic of the discussion was actually more about getting Gizmo displaying the composer, a still unsolved issue.

It appears that it is possible to force Gizmo to use a custom expression when displaying tracks (discussed in
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=93124.msg644545#msg644545 ), but Gizmo does not apply it at all places, and not in the "Playing Now" window...
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ratbagp

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #36 on: November 25, 2014, 05:25:41 pm »

Perhaps I have misunderstood you or you have misunderstood me. The 'Playing Now' screen is what I am referring to. I use a mix of Gizmo and WebRemote and I see for both of them that the HTML code is <div id="PlaybackInfo.Name">. I am suggesting that they change this to PlaybackInfo.Gizmo Display Name.

Of course this probably require users of older versions like myself (MC17) to upgrade or to create their own calculated field with that name.

And perhaps there is a problem referring to a calculated field within the HTML code.

ray
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #37 on: November 26, 2014, 01:13:09 am »

We misunderstood each other.
You were actually speaking about WebGizmo (the web interface, accessible through a browser), and I was speaking about the Android Gizmo app.

I am afraid your idea will not work, the fields accessible in PlaybakInfo are those explicitely exposed by the MC web engine, and they are in very limited number, and the Composer is not in the list. At least they were not the last time I tried and had a look on the wiki (July 2014).

And, even if you can somehow tweak the css used by webgizmo, they are not used/reflected by the Gizmo app, I have checked it yesterday again.

A solution could be to patch the code of the Gizmo Android app, but this is definitively behind the scope of my knowledge.
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rafverhoogen

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #38 on: March 24, 2015, 06:20:16 am »

I've been following a bit this discussion and i think you can achieve what you want using web gizmo and customizing this to your needs.  That would mean using html and java scripting to fetch the needed information.

I've created a now playing screen for my system, i use JRemote as remote, but on the imac that is JRiver server, i only display basic information which is different for classical music and not-classical music.  In the server itself i created some custom fields, that i pick up and compose in java script.

I will attach two screenshots of the now playing screen

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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #39 on: March 24, 2015, 07:24:15 am »

I have been more or less able to customize my view too (mostly by displaying the title on more lines in the thumbnails).

But you are interesting me: how do you get the name of the composer (here, Chostakovitch) : are you getting the "composer" tag, or is it part of the "work tag" ?

Regards
CM
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rafverhoogen

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #40 on: March 24, 2015, 09:59:55 am »

It is a bit tricky what i am doing, but it is a bit of a combination of both.  A few things are important.
1. if you use the standard mcws Info command you only get basic information back from the system.
2. if you use http://yourmachine:52199/mcws/v1/File/GetInfo?File=95477 you get all the tags that are filled back
3. the lines that you see are based on the condition that a song is grouped (Grouping tag, since i use genre for a detailed genre like Grouping is Classical and Genre is Symphony)

To give you an idea this is how the java script is done :
1. first the same function as in the default gizmo is adapted to intercept the rating and the file number (i am working on getting this more efficient, since these are the only two things i need from this)

function download_display_playing_information() {
    var xmlhttp = create_xmlhttp();
    xmlhttp.onreadystatechange = function() {
        if (xmlhttp.readyState == 4) {
            // load response 
            var xml = xmlhttp.responseXML;
            var root = xml.getElementsByTagName("Response");
            // see if response is valid
            if ((root != null) && (root.length == 1) && (xml.documentElement.getAttribute("Status") == "OK")) {
                // get all items
                var items = xml.getElementsByTagName("Item");
                if (items != null) {
            // new stuff
            nbr_items = items.length;
                    // loop items
                    for (var i = 0; i < items.length; i++) {
                        // parse values
                        var name = items.getAttribute("Name");
                        var value = items.childNodes[0].nodeValue;
                  if (name == "FileKey") {
                  filekey=value;
                  }
                  if (name == "Rating") {
                  star_rating=value;
                  }
                  // get corresponding element
                        var element = document.getElementById("PlaybackInfo." + name);
                        if (element != null) {
                            // update element
                            if ((element.src != null) && (element.src != "")) {
                                if (element.src != value)
                                    element.src = value; // image
                            }
                            else {
                                if (element.innerHTML != value)
                                    element.innerHTML = value; // text
                            }
                        }
                    }
                }
                xmlhttp = null;
         Load_Tag_info(filekey);   
         set_stars(star_rating)
            }
        }
    }

send_xmlhttp(xmlhttp, "MCWS/v1/Playback/Info?Zone=-1&Token=" + g_token, true);
}

2. the next script gets all the tags that are filled and constructs the lines to be shown in the html

function Load_Tag_info(filekey) {
 $.get( "MCWS/v1/File/GetInfo?File=" + filekey +"&Action=MPL", function( data ) {

  var xml = $.parseXML(data);
 
      // get all items
      var items = xml.getElementsByTagName("Field");

      if (items != null) {

         // loop items
         for (var i = 0; i < items.length; i++) {

            // parse values
            var name = items.getAttribute("Name");
            var value = items.childNodes[0].nodeValue;
            if (name == "Grouping") {grouping=value;}
            if (name == "Composer") {composer=value;}
            if (name == "Conductor") {conductor=value;}
            if (name == "Orchestra") {orchestra=value;}
            if (name == "Choir") {choir=value;}
            if (name == "cl_work") {works=value;}
            if (name == "cl_opus") {opus=value;}
            if (name == "cl_key") {key=value;}
            if (name == "Name") {title=value;}
            if (name == "Album") {album=value;}
            if (name == "Album Artist") {albumartist=value;}
            if (name == "Artist") {artist=value;}
            
            // get corresponding element

            var element = document.getElementById("Info." + name);

            if (element != null) {

               // update element
               if ((element.src != null) && (element.src != "")) {
                  if (element.src != value)
                     element.src = value; // image
               }
               else {
                  if (element.innerHTML != value)
                     element.innerHTML = value; // text
               }
            }
         }
      }

});

            if (grouping == "Classical")
               {
               document.getElementById('line1').innerHTML = "Movement : " + title;
               document.getElementById('line2').innerHTML = "Works : " + works + " - " + opus + " in " + key;
               document.getElementById('line3').innerHTML = "Conductor : " + conductor;
               document.getElementById('line4').innerHTML = "Orchestra : " + orchestra;
               document.getElementById('line5').innerHTML = "Choir : " + choir;
               }
               
            if (grouping != "Classical")
               {
               document.getElementById('line1').innerHTML = "Title : " + title;
               document.getElementById('line2').innerHTML = "Artist : " + artist;
               document.getElementById('line3').innerHTML = "Album : " + album;
               document.getElementById('line4').innerHTML = "Album artist : " + albumartist;
               document.getElementById('line5').innerHTML = "";
               }
               
            
}



I am sure that both functions can be made more efficient then they are now but it works for me

the discussion of leaving JRemote configurable, could be seen this way, this is my idea, maybe someone from JRiver picks it up and does something with it :

1. create a number of tags in the library that are user editable, called lineA,...lineN
2. these are the lines that are shown in the now playing screen of JRemote
3. standard install the tags lineA,...,lineN will be filled with Artist, Album, etc but the user can change the expression in the tag to whatever the need might be !!!!

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Arindelle

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #41 on: March 24, 2015, 10:11:25 am »

wow looks impressive ... great job
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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #42 on: March 25, 2015, 07:28:19 am »

Waoooh...
 
Just so sad to discover it at the time when JRemote becomes available on Android...

I had been able to tweak the css, but hadn't realized (nor thought or searched, actually) that Gizmo itself was written in Javascript.

I suppose that:
- code snippet 1 runs on the server, and more or less replaces an existing function?
- code snippet 2 is embedded in the web page built by the server, and is executed on the client?

Correct?

CM
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rafverhoogen

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #43 on: March 26, 2015, 04:22:58 am »

Remember i use jremote to control the server and only display a now playing screen during playback
i'm now working on a full replacement for webgizmo
in the meanwhile i optimized the code a bit of both the html and the java script

as for the javascript this is completely running on the client (so no server side implementation) but i do not have any performance issues, since it only loads one song at a time.

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krmasson

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Re: MC20 and classical music
« Reply #44 on: March 26, 2015, 01:15:05 pm »

Thanks
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