Shuffle On/Off display
#1
One thing I always find frustrating about using XBMC as my music center:

Checking shuffle status is rather cumbersome. I have a remote button mapped to toggle shuffle off and on but I have no easy way of knowing what the current status is.

I think it would be more consistent with standard music player performance for any changes to this staus to be graphically represented. (Ie shuffle on / off message popup).

Is there any way this could be built into XBMC?
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#2
kiboy6 Wrote:One thing I always find frustrating about using XBMC as my music center:

Checking shuffle status is rather cumbersome. I have a remote button mapped to toggle shuffle off and on but I have no easy way of knowing what the current status is.

I think it would be more consistent with standard music player performance for any changes to this staus to be graphically represented. (Ie shuffle on / off message popup).

Is there any way this could be built into XBMC?

It could easily be integrated. My strategy (probably wrong) is, When shuffle status is changed (when the GUI button is pressed, the internal representation is changed or a {"shuffle", on} msg is sent, by a remote button... I don't know this part) then a toast dialog notifies the user. Then, executable built-ins are created to allow shuffle to be enabled/disabled via an interface like json. A third json method could be added for a buildin, "show shuffle" that simply pops the toast dialog up with no further action.

Feature request it, be clear on the exact behavior you want, here & on trac. This feature is something that will probably be included.

Garrett
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#3
Thanks for the help.

Trac ticket created here : http://trac.xbmc.org/ticket/11902

Does it need a separate thread here for the feature request, or will this thread itself suffice?
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#4
The thread here's enough. Heads up. your trac ticket's forum link is missing a 6 ;-)
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#5
BTW here's my motivation for seconding this. I run xbmc on two TVs -- 1080p flatscreen is crisp enough to see the difference between the shuffle on/off icons. My 720p, however, is rear projection and while the picture is crisp in the middle, towards the edge of the screen it starts to get a bit blurry. Which conveniently happens to be the location of the shuffle button on Confluence and most other skins.

A toast dialog, even for toggling shuffle within the GUI itself, would be good for Confluence on old TVs as well as any skin with little distinction between shuffle on and shuffle off.

The same could be said about repeat one/all/none!
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#6
So kiboy, I got u covered, I'm working on a patch. I have one question, what's the command that your remote button is set to?
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#7
Thanks so much garbear....I agree it wouldn't hurt at all for repeat either Wink

I also agree that sometimes the random or shuffle status is hard to see on the "now playing screen". However the more fundamental problem for me is that during my normal usage, I never really come across that screen to begin with!

Anyway, great news that you're working on this. My remote button is, for now at least, set to a command through EventGhost's XBMC plugin. That command is called simply "XBMC: Random", but I'm afraid I have no idea of the inner workings of that command.
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#8
I finished the patch and got it working, github.com/garbear/xbmc/.../shuffle-repeat-notify. I'll get it reviewed & submitted over the next few days as per the other devs' free time.

Unfortunately, there is no way for XBMC to know the true source of the command, only the interface that it's generated from. It turns out Eventghost invokes the same interface as the skin (xbmc's built-ins), so if the Random function was changed to include notifications, it would affect the skin as well. I had the option of hacking another interface (Python or JSON-RPC) to always display notifications, but both can be called locally (Python, obviously, and JSON-RPC though python bindings), so that wouldn't work. The solution was to extend the command and make Eventghost use the extended command. This leaves the skin unaltered but requires a small modification in Eventghost.

You're using the XBMC2 plugin, right? Open C:\Program Files (x86)\EventGhost\plugins\XBMCRepeat\__init__.py and scroll down to lines 186 and 187. Make the following change,
Code:
("Random", "Random", "Random.", "PlayerControl(Random)"),
    ("Repeat", "Repeat", "Repeat.", "PlayerControl(Repeat)"),
Code:
("Random", "Random", "Random.", "PlayerControl(Random,Notify)"),
    ("Repeat", "Repeat", "Repeat.", "PlayerControl(Repeat,Notify)"),

You can make the change now because it won't break anything, XBMC ignores the second parameter. Keep on eye on the Git nightlies for when our patch is merged. When you upgrade, you'll start seeing the notifications. Maybe after this we can bug the XBMC2 plugin author to include our change.
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#9
Awesome...can't wait til the change is included in a nightly I can download.

I made the change in the EventGhost plugin (I actually just use the standard XBMC plugin, but made the same changes).

Thanks so much again - this will make a big difference!
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#10
Nightlies from 28 August will have this feature
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#11
That's awesome garbear...thank you very much indeed. Can't wait for the 28th August nightly so I can try it out Smile
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#12
OK, tried out the new nightly....and it's just perfect!

Thanks so much garbear Smile
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