Author Topic: Dot Field for managing multiple tracks (and some other features wishlist)  (Read 24870 times)

HHM

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Hi,
I'm a MusicBee fan for ca 6 months. It's my very first post here. Cheers to all!

Here's my wishlist:
1. Dot fields:
My suggestion for MusicBee new feature is a "dot field" as an option in both main and playlist view.
Let me explain how it works.

The idea comes from Aimp program (which I used before MusicBee) and this is one of the features I miss. Dot is for checking/unchecking particular tracks in playlist/main window:

See how it looks like in Aimp:
http://i39.tinypic.com/124tppg.png

On deafault all tracks are "checked" (green dots in my snapshot), unchecking makes the dot grey (but even nicer option would be if the dot gets the color of the background so that it gets "invisible")

What is it for?
One function is for skipping unchecked tracks - program doesn't play unchecked positions.
BUT more important is that with this feature you can easily manage (delete/copy/send etc) multiple tracks. And the coolest thing is that you can do that both with checked or unchecked tracks (it depends on you - you can uncheck all tracks that you want to delete BUT you can aldo send unchecked tracks to fav. folder etc.)

Of course you can do that with rating (f.e. deleting all tracks marked with one star), but it is much more difficult.
You can also use CTRL-click for multiple files, you must do that anytime you want to do sth with those tracks and Dots are permanent (till you un/check them again)

The commands come from context menu of right mouse click OR - and this is the second feature I'd suggest - from those [+/-/square/misc] fields below playlist window (see the pic).


2. [+/-/square/misc] buttons:
this is used and useful in Winamp, Aimp and loads of other programs. Handy menus for [adding/deleting/sorting/other-commands] files in playlist.


3. Assigning more Hotkeys:
I'd love if there was an option for assigning Hotkeys for much more options (or - ideally- for any command you can do in MB)
F.e. one of the commands I do most often in moving files into organised folder. Unfortunatelly I must do that from the context menu (and it's hidden in 3rd or 4th window so it needs patience). It would be nice to have a personal Hotkey for that.


4. Move/Copy to an (organised) folder:
This one is very personal. As I wrote before - I use these commands very often, but they are hidden. To do that I need to:
- click right button for context menu
- choose "send to"
- choose "folder (move)" or "folder (copy)"
- choose between sending to folder and sending to organised folder.
And it takes time:)

My idea is to make context menu (re)arrangeable. In my example, as what I often do is moving files to organised folder, I'd love to have this option "move files to organised folder" in context menu just after clicking right mouse button.

With these features MB will get perfect!
Anyways, thanks for creating a fantastic and the best musicplayer!
Last Edit: March 12, 2012, 11:33:45 AM by HHM

richardap1

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My idea is to make context menu (re)arrangeable. In my example, as what I often do is moving files to organised folder, I'd love to have this option "move files to organised folder" in context menu just after clicking right mouse button.



Jriver Media Centre has similar feature where the last one or two recently used commands are at the top of the context menu, followed by a separator line before the main part of the menu.
+1 for this part as it useful, but perhaps could cause confusion with novice users as an option would be there one minute and be replaced the next

Steven

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for skipping songs, just right click on the one(s) you want to skip in the now playing list/ Skip and a symbol will display to indicate the song will be skipped

HHM

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Thx. But notice that skipping is only one and less important (for me) of DOTS functions. So actually with this feature you can replace some more:)
Last Edit: March 08, 2012, 07:01:24 PM by HHM

HHM

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Jriver Media Centre has similar feature where the last one or two recently used commands are at the top of the context menu, followed by a separator line before the main part of the menu.
+1 for this part as it useful, but perhaps could cause confusion with novice users as an option would be there one minute and be replaced the next

This sounds like a good solution - maybe could be done as an option to chose froma main preferences (not to confuse those novice users:))


And just right now another idea came to me - to have an option of more than one organised folder. Is this possible?

beehive

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Here's my wishlist:
1. Dot fields:
What is it for?
One function is for skipping unchecked tracks - program doesn't play unchecked positions.
BUT more important is that with this feature you can easily manage (delete/copy/send etc) multiple tracks. And the coolest thing is that you can do that both with checked or unchecked tracks (it depends on you - you can uncheck all tracks that you want to delete BUT you can aldo send unchecked tracks to fav. folder etc.)

I personally find that wish 1, will be very usefull

HHM

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it could be just an option for additional column in library/playlist view - so one could use it only if they need it

Steven

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i had a play around with AIMP last night looking at the dot feature - seems the same as iTunes checkboxes.
Its straight forward enough how it skips songs not ticked, but using it i cant see how it excludes unticked tracks from commands
eg. if i want to remove a set of tracks from a playlist, by default all are ticked. Lets say i untick a couple of tracks. Using a right click context menu or the - button in AIMP, it still removes all selected items whether they are ticked or not. So i dont understand how ticking/ unticking makes a difference

HHM

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More options are  in the menu of under-the-playlist-window-buttons. In Aimp's default skin at the bottom you got "+"," -", "small tiles", "sth strange" & "maginfying glass" buttons. When you click, f.i., this minus button, you got "removal" option to deal with unticked tracks.

Now, as  I see, I might have gone too far with saying that all operations can be done with both ticked/unticked tracks. It was only my projection:) But maybe this could be implemented in context menu?


ps. I never used iTunes and don't know how checkboxes option works there.


beehive

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I think the dots will be great if I was listening to an album and I only wanted to delete songs I dont like, or if I was tagging and I only wanted to tag certain songs without worrying about using the ctrl. function which is easily lost if you select outside the selection by accident.

Steven

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you can already right click on a track in the Now Playing list/ Skip track
but having a tickbox for that function has been asked before so i will add it as an optional column at some point in the near future

however i dont feeel comfortable about how it would work from a user interface perspective when editing tags or applying any other context menu command.
How does musicbee know if your intention is to apply the command to the selected item, or the ticked items? One way i can see it working is you have additional separate commands that look at the ticked items rather than the selected items and doing that adds more clutter to the context menus which i want to avoid.
Another might be if you hold the Alt key down when clicking a context menu command it uses the ticked items but then thats not easily discoverable as functionality
Last Edit: March 13, 2012, 02:07:17 PM by Steven

HHM

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additional separate commands seem to be better solution than messing around with the context menu but i think it's best to leave it to your intuition:)
Last Edit: March 13, 2012, 05:24:54 PM by HHM

beehive

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One way i can see it working is you have additional separate commands that look at the ticked items rather than the selected items and doing that adds more clutter to the context menus which i want to avoid.
Another might be if you hold the Alt key down when clicking a context menu command it uses the ticked items but then thats not easily discoverable as functionality
Makes Sense. Like HHM said "i think it's the best to leave it to your intuition:)".