Virtual Tags, Skinning and Highlight

[xJohnny95]

I want to start by thanking Steven for this wonderful software and the community. Even though I had never posted anything here before, this forum helped me solve a lot of issues and also improve my settings and library, so thank you guys! 🧡

Now, let's begin the questions. I have a few of them.



As marked in red: Is there any way to remove the play/pause button? (the one that is in the expended panel — I think that's how it's called.) by checking a box inside of MB or by tweaking it in the skin's.xml?

As marked in yellow: The ban button in the bottom player is red-peachy colored, but in the right panel, it's red. How can I make it match? ❌

As marked in purple: I use an icon as a highlight for the tracks that are marked as explicit; although it shows perfectly in the right panel, it's really difficult to see in the expended panel when the album artwork color is bright, since I use the 'auto-pick panel color'. Is there any way to get around this or use a character instead of an icon since they auto-adapt based on the background's brightness? ❌
Wishlist post

As marked in blue: Now this is the tricky one. I use the $Contains() function for my 'Parental Adivisory' tag, so when the tag contains '1', it gives me a 'T' value. The issue is that it only shows me the result based on the first track of the album. I want to know if it is possible to display a result based on the entire album (using MB or a plugin) just like 'Album Tracks Count' works.  (I really want to keep it as a 'Virtual tag' since I don't want to create a new tag only for the album parental rating.) ✅
¯

So this is it. I hope you guys can help me with this and that I didn't break any rules by posting every question in one post. I just didn't want to flood the forum. 😅

[hiccup]

As marked in blue: Now this is the tricky one. I use the $Contains() function for my 'Parental Adivisory' tag, so when the tag contains '1', it gives me a 'T' value. The issue is that it only shows me the result based on the first track of the album. I want to know if it is possible to display a result based on the entire album (using MB or a plugin) just like 'Album Tracks Count' works.  (I really want to keep it as a 'Virtual tag' since I don't want to create a new tag only for the album parental rating.)

Welcome to the forum xJohnny95

Assuming your custom tag for 'explicit' is <Explicit>

     • Create a virtual tag: 
            - label:
              Explicit album
            - formula:
              $If($Sum(<Explicit>,<Album>)>0,Explicit,)

     • Then as a highlighting rule for your Albums view use 'Explicit album' has a value. 

note:
This will only work if you populate the Explicit tag with a number (such as '1'). Using a letter (such as 'Y') won't work for this.

[xJohnny95]

Assuming your custom tag for 'explicit' is <Explicit>,

    • Create a virtual tag:
    - label:
Explicit album
    - formula:
$If($Sum(<Explicit>,<Album>)>0,Explicit,)

    • Then as a highlighting rule for your Albums view use 'Explicit album' has a value.  

OK, so this worked exactly how I needed it! I read the whole virtual tag post and couldn't understand how $Sum() worked, lol. Now that I know how to get it to work, It will help me a lot with other statistics tags, thank you!!

[hiccup]

OK, so this worked exactly how I needed it! I read the whole virtual tag post and couldn't understand how $Sum() worked, lol. Now that I know how to get it to work, It will help me a lot with other statistics tags, thank you!!

Glad to help someone from the country that gave us some of the greatest music ever.
You may find this useful in case you want to learn more about functions for virtual tags.

b.t.w.
I'll post a Tips&Tricks topic on this highlighting in a short while.
I'm guessing more users will find this useful.

[xJohnny95]

Glad to help someone from the country that gave us some of the greatest music ever.

Wow, that's a huge compliment. Thank you! Now I'm really curious to know what your references are and who your Brazilian favorites are.

You may find this useful in case you want to learn more about functions for virtual tags.

So... this was the topic I was reading earlier yesterday, lol. Reading it now, it makes a lot of sense (now that I know how it works).

I'll post a Tips&Tricks topic on this highlighting in a short while. // I'm guessing more users will find this useful.

That's great! I'm looking forward to it! Can't wait to cross out everything from my question list. 😅

[hiccup]

Wow, that's a huge compliment. Thank you! Now I'm really curious to know what your references are and who your Brazilian favorites are.

Elis, Nana, Chico, Maria, Dorival, Simone, Ivan, João, Antônio.
All giants.

(am I taking liberties by calling them by their first names? ;-)

That's great! I'm looking forward to it! Can't wait to cross out everything from my question list. 😅

Done, it's here.
But the link that I gave you earlier (this one) will be more helpful in getting insights in the workings of functions for virtual tags.
 

[xJohnny95]

(am I taking liberties by calling them by their first names? ;-)

Nah, it's OK; we Brazilians tend to call them by their first name too (even the ones that have like 10 other people with the same name, lol). TBH, I'm not a big fan of MPB; it's not that I dislike it, but I don't listen to it on a daily basis. But I LOVE Elis; she was a force to be reckoned with.
(I'd like to recommend you listen to the 'new MPB' scene artists like Saudade's 'Bem Vindo, Amanhecer' album; it's really good.)

Done, it's here.

That's a really good tutorial; it will for sure help me with some issues, but do you know if there is a workaround for the issue I highlighted in purple? Is there a way to make the icon adapt like the rest of the characters?

[hiccup]

TBH, I'm not a big fan of MPB; it's not that I dislike it, but I don't listen to it on a daily basis. But I LOVE Elis; she was a force to be reckoned with.
(I'd like to recommend you listen to the 'new MPB' scene artists like Saudade's 'Bem Vindo, Amanhecer' album; it's really good.)

I've always wondered what the actual Brazilian people consider to be MPB exactly.
For non-Brazilians like me it's probably mostly some vague melting pot that is often misused.
But that is probably a topic for another (beyond MusicBee) board.
Since I care about Brazilian music a lot, I think I will start one this weekend, and explain to you why you are completely wrong about not caring that much about the other artists that I mentioned. Each and everyone of them should have statues in your country ;-)
And I will there ask for your help to explain the things that I don't understand ;-)

do you know if there is a workaround for the issue I highlighted in purple? Is there a way to make the icon adapt like the rest of the characters?

I'll take a look at that tomorrow, but maybe another user already has some idea's?

[phred]

As marked in purple: I use an icon as a highlight for the tracks that are marked as explicit; although it shows perfectly in the right panel, it's really difficult to see in the expended panel when the album artwork color is bright, since I use the 'auto-pick panel color'. Is there any way to get around this or use a character instead of an icon since they auto-adapt based on the background's brightness?

If the icon color doesn't work for some skins, then either find another icon that works with more backgrounds OR...
don't use an icon and chose a color that works best. I've pretty much settled on red, yellow, and green as the most visible with the skins I use. It will display as a vertical line in Track Details and Albums and Tracks views. And as a triangle in the upper-right corner of the album art in Album/Artwork views.

[hiccup]

About the highlighting in the Expanded Panel:

You could use a high contrast icon (black/white), but using a font character would be best since it will receive the same auto-colouring.
While you can't set a character in the highlighting rules, you can create a virtual tag for it, which would result in something like this:







the character used:

Code

🅴

[xJohnny95]

If the icon color doesn't work for some skins, then either find another icon that works with more backgrounds OR...
don't use an icon and chose a color that works best. I've pretty much settled on red, yellow, and green as the most visible with the skins I use. It will display as a vertical line in Track Details and Albums and Tracks views. And as a triangle in the upper-right corner of the album art in Album/Artwork views.

Keeping in mind that my issue is with Highlight in the Expended Panel View when auto-pick color panel is enabled (both base features of MB), changing my skin (or my icon) won't make a difference since the outcome would be the same.
Your examples are effective, but they don't apply to my issue, unfortunately.

About the highlighting in the Expanded Panel:

You could use a high contrast icon (black/white), but using a font character would be best since it will receive the same auto-colouring.
While you can't set a character in the highlighting rules, you can create a virtual tag for it, which would result in something like this:

I actually did use it like that for a while before trying to make the highlight icon function work with auto-color; it's a good workaround for sure. The problem is that, as a workaround, it's not perfect. Since title length is variable, the icon would never be in the same position.

I'm going to cross out this issue from this post and probably do a clear and presentable post on the wishlist thread about it.
Thank you guys.

I've always wondered what the actual Brazilian people consider to be MPB exactly.
For non-Brazilians like me it's probably mostly some vague melting pot that is often misused.
But that is probably a topic for another (beyond MusicBee) board.
Since I care about Brazilian music a lot, I think I will start one this weekend, and explain to you why you are completely wrong about not caring that much about the other artists that I mentioned. Each and everyone of them should have statues in your country ;-)
And I will there ask for your help to explain the things that I don't understand ;-)

(Hit me up so we can talk more about it; I'll be glad to help you. PS: You did choose these albums on purpose, didn't you? 😝)

[hiccup]

(Hit me up so we can talk more about it; I'll be glad to help you. PS: You did choose these albums on purpose, didn't you? 😝)

quem eu?  ;-)
https://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=39950.0

[Mayibongwe]

As marked in yellow: The ban button in the bottom player is red-peachy colored, but in the right panel, it's red. How can I make it match?

You would have to recompile the bitmapped skin with a (player panel) ban icon that matches the colour of its equivalent in the main panel (red).
The ban icon in the main panel has no override as yet (hasn't been requested before as far as I know).

[xJohnny95]

You would have to recompile the bitmapped skin with a (player panel) ban icon that matches the colour of its equivalent in the main panel (red).
The ban icon in the main panel has no override as yet (hasn't been requested before as far as I know).

So basically, I can change the icon on the player to match the sidebar icon, but not vice versa, right? I think I will let it be like that.

[Mayibongwe]

Precisely, and...you would need to have access to the source files in order to do that.
I don't think they were made public and it's been a while since I last saw the skin creator on the forum. So that'd be a long shot.