Author Topic: Theater Mode suggestions  (Read 24242 times)

oracio

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Wow Steven, Thanks a lot!

Now I have some work to do building the Theater Mode theme of my dreams  ;)

oracio

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Hi Steven,

I thought about suggesting another feature that would really be great, and I think others will enjoy it as well -
To be able to edit MP3 Tags (Comments, Custom tags, etc.) in Theater Mode by double clicking a Field element.
For example while listening to a song, I would like to edit the comments of it, and just by double tapping on it, it will change to active (editable) and then I can add my new comment.
I don't know if this feature is easy to be implemented so it will behave like you have done in MB (I think you call this feature "direct editing"), so a solution I thought about is that a small popup window with a text box will open when you double click on a Field element, where you can enter the new comment and hit a "Done" button and the comment will be updated in the Theater Mode Theme, just like how the "Now Playing Assistant" works. Of course this feature will be optional by a property tag.

And last thing, I'm from Israel and Hebrew is a right-to-left language. I know that there is an "Align" property which I can change to "Right", but the punctuation marks stay on the wrong side. Is it possible to add a "RTL" support?
I know you support RTL when editing text inside MB, but when the editing is done, and the field becomes passive again, the punctuation marks jump to the wrong side. (for example, the dot in the end of the sentence jumps to the start).

Thanks again for your bee-utiful work!

Steven

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having tag editing in the theater mode panels is deviating too far away from what i had planned, but if enough people +1 it i will reconsider.
For the hebrew handling, i have put something in but i am not sure if it would work well enough. It looks at the first character and if its a hebrew letter it formats the entire text right-to-left.
http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_1/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip

Bee-liever

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-1 for editing in theater mode

for me, theater mode is the sit back and enjoy the music mode  :)
MusicBee and my library - Making bee-utiful music together

oracio

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Hi Steven and Bee-liever,

I understand where you coming from, I understand the concept and the vision behind Theater Mode.
While working on my own Theater Mode theme I realized the great potential of Theater Mode, which is beyond its initial concept -
That a user (myself) can create his own perfect GUI and UX (User Experience) music player right inside MB.
From my eyes this is huge - because we all know that as many people who uses a software, there are twice the opinions and different needs.
And if users can create their own GUI and UX, which Steven developed the canvas to do so - Theater Mode, and I know how happy I was to find that Theater Mode exists, there will be more and more users who will build their own perfect-glove-fitted-music-player of their dreams inside MB.
This is more then a skin, this is a white canvas for creativity, and as more freedom you give to other people to paint their music player, the more amazed we will all be from the results and from what people will share. you can see the first sign of it with the work of Greb - so much creativity.

Don't get me wrong, I think that with the new features Steven just added to Theater Mode, we are very close to have all the freedom needed for one to create his dream player.
And I think that to be able to edit tags (this is of course optionally to the theme designer's decision) it will really let me as a user and a creator to have it all inside Theater Mode, without the need to jump back and forth, while enjoying the theme I created.

I hope what I had in mind came out clearly.

Thanks,
oracio

P.S:
An issue I found while playing with Theater Mode is that the new "Icon" element's onClick event doesn't work with the OpenAutoHidePanel() function.
And for some reason I was not able to access the link you provided to download the latest MB v2.1 with the RTL fix, it seems like the site niblseed.com is down.
Last Edit: December 05, 2012, 12:17:28 PM by oracio

Roadrunner

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- support in the skin file to set the window to a fixed size (for grebs recent files)
Code
  <settings fixedWidth="300" fixedHeight="100" />
Thx for this! But the boring part is now, when I change back to a theater mode without fixed width or even leave theater mode back to the main player, they'll keep the mostly to small dimensions with the need of manually adjustments. Much better would be, if MB remembered the previous size when changing from main player or non-fixed-szie theater mode to a fixed one and restore it the way back.

Steven

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it should be keeping the size corrrectly if you are using the latest 2.1 version from the weekly updates topic. If you are then you will need to describe the steps you are taking

Roadrunner

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Thank you for the quick answer. I'm using 2.1.4720 (on Win XP), is there anything newer?

The steps are quite easy:
1. Open MB with the main player in normal size (large, but not full screen)
2. Select view theater mode for example "Book lovers - Book of Shadows by Chapters Only Index - FONT Im Fell" (version Dec 02)
=> Now MB resizes to the defined fixed one, which is fine
3. Select view main player
=> The size is still the one for Book lovers and to small for the main player

The same happens when switching between fixed and non fixed size theater modes. If you start in full screen mode then it changes back to full screen.

Greb

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A couple of things:

(1) I don't know if you read this first one. I just copypaste: "I  was checking it today and I can't get both pictures at the same time [artist and composer]. It gives me either the one from the composer or the one from the artist, but no way to get both of them..."

(2) Would be it possible to rescale the png icons with some 'width/height' property? Otherwise, using an png icon as a frame, it's needed to rescale for every resolution. Example of use, this screencap:



Alexis

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Hi Steven,

I really think it should be a great  default implementation to have 'close' on the tools that show up when one hovers  theatermode... this quicker non=-keyboard access I think is really necessary.

Additionally, I believe that 'close' should be changed to 'exit', or main or something that more indicates that one is not leaving the program,  but rather, just exiting theatermode.

Thank you for your great work as usual.
They are not lazy... just more efficient.

Steven

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A couple of things:

(1) I don't know if you read this first one. I just copypaste: "I  was checking it today and I can't get both pictures at the same time [artist and composer]. It gives me either the one from the composer or the one from the artist, but no way to get both of them..."

(2) Would be it possible to rescale the png icons with some 'width/height' property? Otherwise, using an png icon as a frame, it's needed to rescale for every resolution. Example of use, this screencap:
1 - i already replied somewhere about that but keep an eye on this topic:
http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=8102.0
artistType="Artist"
artistType="Composer"
artistType="ComposerPref" - this one tries composer first and if blank then uses the artist
artistType="ArtistPref"

2 - i cant see where you are using the icons
Last Edit: December 06, 2012, 07:31:57 PM by Steven

Steven

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Thank you for the quick answer. I'm using 2.1.4720 (on Win XP), is there anything newer?

The steps are quite easy:
1. Open MB with the main player in normal size (large, but not full screen)
2. Select view theater mode for example "Book lovers - Book of Shadows by Chapters Only Index - FONT Im Fell" (version Dec 02)
=> Now MB resizes to the defined fixed one, which is fine
3. Select view main player
=> The size is still the one for Book lovers and to small for the main player

The same happens when switching between fixed and non fixed size theater modes. If you start in full screen mode then it changes back to full screen.
i cant reproduce any incorrect behavior (i also tried on my XP machine) - there was a bug with earlier versions but if you are using 1.2.4720 then thats fine
edit:
i do recall now i was getting some strange windows behavior when developing this feature. I have made a change that might help in the next 2.1 update
Last Edit: December 06, 2012, 09:43:34 PM by Steven

Greb

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1 - i already replied somewhere about that but keep an eye on this topic:
http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=8102.0
artistType="Artist"
artistType="Composer"
artistType="ComposerPref" - this one tries composer first and if blank then uses the artist
artistType="ArtistPref"

I know. My post was answering that: it doesn't work well. If you write, for example:

<element type="ArtistPicture" artistType="Composer" xAnchor="Panel.Left" x="570" yAnchor="Panel.Top" y="385"   width="200" height="200" aspectRatio="zoomKeep" fillColor="235,0,0,0" fade="0.0" interval="20"></element>

<element type="ArtistPicture" artistType="Artist" xAnchor="Panel.Left" x="870" yAnchor="Panel.Top" y="385"   width="200" height="200" aspectRatio="zoomKeep" fillColor="235,0,0,0" fade="0.0" interval="20"></element>

Both of them give the same picture, the one is written first (in this case, the composer). If "<element type="ArtistPicture" artistType="Artist" ..." had been written first, it would be the artist who would appear in both pictures.

2 - i cant see where you are using the icons

The white frame is the icon. I used a PNG pic, that allows transparence, as a frame. Check it for yourself, this is the layout:

http://filebeam.com/1a2b1954b0d422c3522d05ddbee111ce

But it only works well when the screen resolution matchs the png frame resolution. This case, 1600x900.

Here two pics, with and without the frame png icon:



Last Edit: December 06, 2012, 08:44:56 PM by Greb

Steven

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i have changed it so sizing attributes are now respected (note that in the zip file you sent, the png file has a different filename so is not loaded)
http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_1/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip
Code
<element type="Icon" image="Images\Book Lovers - Frame 1600x900.png" x="1" y="1" widthDock="Panel" width="-2" heightDock="Panel" height="-2" ></element>
I cant easily solve loading 2 different artists at the same time and will leave that unaddressed

@Roadrunner, this version has the change that might solve the sizing issue for you

Last Edit: December 06, 2012, 10:38:12 PM by Steven

Roadrunner

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@Roadrunner, this version has the change that might solve the sizing issue for you
Indeed, works perfectly, thank you very much!