New Compact Player Layout

[Steven]

this is a really quick mockup of what i mean - with zune like fonts i think this could look really good (it would optionally have the standard windows border around it)



one other possibility would be to have a click link that replaces the left side (album picture and lyrics) with a library browser
With this sort of layout it would be easy to have a background texture as well

[VX]

The mockup looks quite clean and promising. However, when it comes to background textures, I'd like to have an option to use it with Main Player view as well. That'd be useful for Track Details or Now Playing list when in the middle pane.

[9cupsoftea]

With a library browser I'd certainly take a skinnable (textured) version of the compact player. The only reason I don't use musicbee right now in compact mode is because it takes far too long for me find an album by simply using the now playing list.  

I'd still like picture themes over the main player too, but if that's not possible this is still an great feature in my opinion.

[SimonBRT]

This mockup is really promising.  Being able to switch between artwork/lyrics and a library browser sounds like a great idea.

[redwing]

How does this look as compared with Steven's mockup above?

[link removed]

Of course, this is not a mockup but an embedded TM view I just created.
The point I want to make is that it's already almost possible with the current functionality.

What's needed is

1. ability to hide location bar and Playing Track panel's tabs.

2. ability to display player scroll in this mode.

then it's done.

[Alexis]

I personally appreciate your efforts, but would like to see where you land in the end.

So far, I believe I have a different expectation for what Steven proposed.

[Steven]

@alexis, can you do a mockup? I still havent started to this so still open to ideas about how it could be done.
My current thinking is along the lines of Zune without the library navigation part - just the now playing list and associated lyrics, artwork, wavebar/ visualiser etc

[Alexis]

@alexis, can you do a mockup? I still havent started to this so still open to ideas about how it could be done.
My current thinking is along the lines of Zune without the library navigation part - just the now playing list and associated lyrics, artwork, wavebar/ visualiser etc

This an idea of what I was thinking you may be doing.. where it has wings  that can be expanded/collapsed (They are expanded in your mockup) .







Please disregard the obvious signs of a novice.  This is much the result of cut and paste.
The song title and the progressbar could actually be combined
The player controls row could be a whole lot thinner.
I am anticipating the Transparency aspect  to remain functional.  
The black labels on the side.. you click on those and the relevant feature would expand out or pop up if desired.
The spectrum analyzer could overlap the bottom of the artist image or something like that.  If an artist has no image, there could be some sort of visualization in its place or just a default image.

[Alexis]

That is about what I was thinking..  dunno how practical any of this would be... or if they make sense

[Steven]

i haven't done what was requested but i think it looks quite good. It allows a wavebar and visualiser (like the "Playing Track" panel), and the fields in the now playing list can be configured.
I'm going to add an optional lyrics component which will display where the now playing list is and the now playing list would show just a few upcoming tracks (so you dont have 2 separate scrollbars). Also for the next iteration i might look at allowing the now playing list show as a pop-out. I make a link available later today

[Steven]

here is a link if you want to try it out as it is now:
http://www.mediafire.com/?064acf9ef0k8bz7

to enable the compact player with this layout, set "custom layout" in Layout(2)/ compact player preferences

[redwing]

Great work! I really appreciate you opened unlimited possibilities for customization. Some observations about the beta.

- <#> field is not available for Now Playing list.
- Did you intend to allow using either embedded or full TM views for this? Then, right-click on left panel under compact player mode opens up wrong configuration pane, and it doesn't work.
- Would be nice if the width of Now Playing list on the right can be adjustable, including completely collapsing it just like the current compact player.
- Sound graph does not pick up skin-specified colors.

[Alexis]

Below is what I get with your current configuration and the custom layout I had for the nowplaying panel.  Really looks very good I think. (oops, cannot tell who is singing  )

[Steven]

- i have improved the picture cropping for different layouts
- you can now configure the right panel to show the now playing list and/or lyrics or neither
- you can now resize the right panel by dragging the mouse when it shows as a vertical splitter (keep in mind you change/resize the fields in the now playing list from the configuration dialog)

i havent had much time to test so i expect there will be some bugs

http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_1/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip

edit:
re-uploaded to fix the lyrics not updating

[SimonBRT]

this is awesome so far!  really interested to see how this develops...  the default layout is already looking great.