AmpachPre

[fain]

Originally Posted by angiest

Everything seems to be working so far, except for one little thing.

My non-saved playlists from prior to 1.8.6 still show up. I can swipe them away and delete them, but they keep coming back. And if I select them the spinner comes up and never goes away, I wind up having to toss the card away.

I have looked into the options. I believe the easiest way would be to downgrade to 1.8.3 and delete the playlists there. I have not tested this method yet, I will very soon. You can upgrade to the latest (1.8.9) due out here soon and re-save, but the database will be under the new name. Causing the playlist to be left on your usb partition.. Let me know what you think. I am also considering making a database rename function which i can stem a re-pare function for you, but that might take a few days to build and test.

[Saber Mage]

Pardon me if this has been asked before, but in the Vista How-To for Ampache setup, where did stable.tar.gz come from? There was no mention as to how you obtain stable.tar.gz, as far as I can see. You just suddenly started talking about this mysterious file! =P

Edit: Well, it looks like you were using that synonymously with the ampache-3.5.1.tar.gz file, I guess... Randomly switching names? o_O; I think I got it now though.


Editedit: New issue. Sorry xD;. On step 28, I've ensured that all passwords I supplied matched up and yet when I click "check for config" the errors remain present. Possible issues? Might I have the file name wrong? It save it as "ampache_cfg", then I added the .php and checked, then changed it to Ampache.cfg.php and checked, then made the A lowercase and checked -- neither of the errors are resolving. Hrnnn...

Holycrapedits: All is resolved. >_> Thanks anyways! xD

[fain]

Originally Posted by Saber Mage

Pardon me if this has been asked before, but in the Vista How-To for Ampache setup, where did stable.tar.gz come from? There was no mention as to how you obtain stable.tar.gz, as far as I can see. You just suddenly started talking about this mysterious file! =P

Edit: Well, it looks like you were using that synonymously with the ampache-3.5.1.tar.gz file, I guess... Randomly switching names? o_O; I think I got it now though.

ya back when I made that how to the name of the 3.5.1 archive was stable. I don't know what his naming scheme is now. The latest 3.5.3 should work just fine.

[Saber Mage]

Hey man, just read your entire change log, and it's now clear to me that you've done a ton of work on this, and continue to make improvements despite, uh, anything at all! Hahah. Thanks a bunch, I really appreciate it. Hard to believe Ampache Mobile showed up higher than yours when sorting by votes - Ampachpre definitely has a higher concentration of features. Keep it up!

[fain]

Originally Posted by Saber Mage

Hey man, just read your entire change log, and it's now clear to me that you've done a ton of work on this, and continue to make improvements despite, uh, anything at all! Hahah. Thanks a bunch, I really appreciate it. Hard to believe Ampache Mobile showed up higher than yours when sorting by votes - Ampachpre definitely has a higher concentration of features. Keep it up!

np thanks I have worked hard on this project. School is kinda kickin my ***** right now though.

[Saber Mage]

Hate to say it but, perhaps I spoke too soon. =P Just gave AmpachPre a try today, and it couldn't keep a connection with my Ampache server long enough to start streaming a song. Or maybe it just couldn't stream songs. Another issue I ran into was that, if you re-edit any of the fields in any of the accounts' settings, the account usually won't save anymore! The save button ceases to do anything, and if you swipe to go back, the changes that were made to the account are lost. Although I couldn't get a song to play, I was able to reach the part with the play and (>>), (<<), etc. buttons, and noticed that they're covering up some of the text on the bottom of the GUI.

The logging-in splash text can be moved up and down with your finger.

Ampache Mobile is able to start and keep a connection to my server with relative ease, and has yet to drop a connection. Streaming over EVDO was pretty choppy with it, but 'tis probably to be expected. I wonder if the API you used/are using isn't up-to-date with Ampache v. 3.5.4? Seems like it might be a likely issue. Really hope the bugs can be worked out eventually, but your education's more important, eh =P. Good luck!

[andred]

can someone post screen shots of the what the feilds should look like on ampache mobile or pre....cant seem to get it going.

[Maturin]

I was a longtime user of Ampache Mobile, but since bjgeiser hasn't had time to develop it lately I've been using AmpachePre instead. Both are awesome, but with some considerable usability issues.
Ampache Mobile is pretty, well organized and user friendly. I love the ability to shuffle all songs. However it does not pre-cache the next song, leading to sometimes large gaps while streaming an album. It also seems to not tolerate connection issues very well. I often end up with x-palm-connect and Palm Audio Service Failed errors. And I gotta admit, I kinda hate the icon.

AmpachePre is more stable and more usable. It reconnects when I lose connection. It caches the next song to be played, so theres less of a gap between songs. It gives me the option to download music from my server to my phone, which I've made use of for some ringtones. The UI does have some nice points; the ability to start the app and type directly in a search box is a great idea. However, I wish it was a universal search type thing, and would pull up all results without having to tell it to search Albums or Songs. Which brings me to my main issue with AmpachePre... It's great when you know exactly what you want to listen to. I usually don't, however. Browsing my music is nonintuitive, and it lacks an easy shuffle all button. There is an unlabeled ON/OFF switch however on the main screen that happens to turn on Albums of the Moment, and I can usually refresh that until I stumble upon something that I'd like to hear. And what are those buttons at the bottom again? Maybe I just need more practice, but I think one can argue that the UI definitely could use work. The tray notifications are very nice, however.

tl;dr
If I could have Ampache Mobile's UI with AmpachePre's functionality and stability, I would be one happy guy

[fain]

Originally Posted by Saber Mage

Hate to say it but, perhaps I spoke too soon. =P Just gave AmpachPre a try today, and it couldn't keep a connection with my Ampache server long enough to start streaming a song. Or maybe it just couldn't stream songs. Another issue I ran into was that, if you re-edit any of the fields in any of the accounts' settings, the account usually won't save anymore! The save button ceases to do anything, and if you swipe to go back, the changes that were made to the account are lost. Although I couldn't get a song to play, I was able to reach the part with the play and (>>), (<<), etc. buttons, and noticed that they're covering up some of the text on the bottom of the GUI.

The logging-in splash text can be moved up and down with your finger.

Ampache Mobile is able to start and keep a connection to my server with relative ease, and has yet to drop a connection. Streaming over EVDO was pretty choppy with it, but 'tis probably to be expected. I wonder if the API you used/are using isn't up-to-date with Ampache v. 3.5.4? Seems like it might be a likely issue. Really hope the bugs can be worked out eventually, but your education's more important, eh =P. Good luck!

I noticed a account edit/save bug a little while back and I fixed it. I am not sure if this is the same bug. Are you leaving the keep alive field empty? If so put a 0 in there and save it, see if that works.

As far as the connection issues go, I am not sure what could be causing this. Even the choppiness doesn't sound right. I stream over evdo all the time with out chops. 1x is a different story, are you transcoding? I also have not used 3.5.4 as i didn't know it had been released. I will check that out soon thanks.

The splash logo ****es me off. I set the no scroll perimeter but it still scrolls Some text does get covered up on the stream scene when there is a notification on the pre I am trying to figure out a better way to display it. Just curious, are you on the pixi?

Originally Posted by andred

can someone post screen shots of the what the feilds should look like on ampache mobile or pre....cant seem to get it going.

I tried my best to put examples in each field. I think the next update should be a little better at this. Are you getting any errors? Are you able to login via a pc?

Originally Posted by Maturin

I was a longtime user of Ampache Mobile, but since bjgeiser hasn't had time to develop it lately I've been using AmpachePre instead. Both are awesome, but with some considerable usability issues.
Ampache Mobile is pretty, well organized and user friendly. I love the ability to shuffle all songs. However it does not pre-cache the next song, leading to sometimes large gaps while streaming an album. It also seems to not tolerate connection issues very well. I often end up with x-palm-connect and Palm Audio Service Failed errors. And I gotta admit, I kinda hate the icon.

AmpachePre is more stable and more usable. It reconnects when I lose connection. It caches the next song to be played, so theres less of a gap between songs. It gives me the option to download music from my server to my phone, which I've made use of for some ringtones. The UI does have some nice points; the ability to start the app and type directly in a search box is a great idea. However, I wish it was a universal search type thing, and would pull up all results without having to tell it to search Albums or Songs. Which brings me to my main issue with AmpachePre... It's great when you know exactly what you want to listen to. I usually don't, however. Browsing my music is nonintuitive, and it lacks an easy shuffle all button. There is an unlabeled ON/OFF switch however on the main screen that happens to turn on Albums of the Moment, and I can usually refresh that until I stumble upon something that I'd like to hear. And what are those buttons at the bottom again? Maybe I just need more practice, but I think one can argue that the UI definitely could use work. The tray notifications are very nice, however.

tl;dr
If I could have Ampache Mobile's UI with AmpachePre's functionality and stability, I would be one happy guy

Thanks for the feed back. I agree the UI could use some work. I am not that great with CSS.

Universal search has crossed my mind a number of times and I hope to make this come true soon. I have needed it my self a few times. Just not sure how I would implement it yet. A all random play sounds good as well. I will continue to look into these things. My next feat is keeping the audio playing while browsing music. I might have another release before I get that working though.

[Saber Mage]

Originally Posted by fain

I noticed a account edit/save bug a little while back and I fixed it. I am not sure if this is the same bug. Are you leaving the keep alive field empty? If so put a 0 in there and save it, see if that works.

As far as the connection issues go, I am not sure what could be causing this. Even the choppiness doesn't sound right. I stream over evdo all the time with out chops. 1x is a different story, are you transcoding? I also have not used 3.5.4 as i didn't know it had been released. I will check that out soon thanks.

The splash logo ****es me off. I set the no scroll perimeter but it still scrolls Some text does get covered up on the stream scene when there is a notification on the pre I am trying to figure out a better way to display it. Just curious, are you on the pixi?

Ah, yes I did have the keep alive field empty. That fixed that bit. Thanks ^^. And I'm using the Pre, by the way.

Hmm yeah, still can't get it to stream music. The pause symbol always shows when I choose a song to begin playing, and tapping the button does nothing. More often than not I get the "MEDIA_ERR_DECODE" in this instance. I'm positive I was using EVDO, and now WiFi. Before I wasn't, but now I'm also on the local network of the host computer, and have the same issues. Transcoding is enabled, but not for mp3 files, which is the majority of my library. I would be willing to bet that this is all incompatibility issues with ver. 3.5.4; the Ampache gang seems to stress keeping things up-to-date much. Apparently it must be a cause of many mishaps.

[andred]

Originally Posted by fain

I tried my best to put examples in each field. I think the next update should be a little better at this. Are you getting any errors? Are you able to login via a pc?

I can log in via PC....its mainly entering the proper information into the ampachepre account section. i enter what i think is correct and comes up with errors. what do u enter in these fields to get it to work?

Account name:?
example,ampache-3.5.2:?
default EVDO address:?
connection port,default 80/443:?
streaming port:?
User ID: (got IT)
password: (got it)
just want an example from someone who has it working already as to what the entries(on the question marks above) should look like.

-Cheers

[fain]

Originally Posted by andred

I can log in via PC....its mainly entering the proper information into the ampachepre account section. i enter what i think is correct and comes up with errors. what do u enter in these fields to get it to work?

Account name:?
example,ampache-3.5.2:?
default EVDO address:?
connection port,default 80/443:?
streaming port:?
User ID: (got IT)
password: (got it)
just want an example from someone who has it working already as to what the entries(on the question marks above) should look like.

-Cheers

Account name:what ever you want here
example,ampache-3.5.2:? this is the directory where ampache is located.
default EVDO address:? this is your domain name or ip address.
connection port,default 80/443:? if you have a basic connection (port 80) you can leave this blank.
streaming port:? same as above if not using ssl

here's a example from my account settings:
Account name:
Wifi
Ampache Server Address:
192.168.1.2
Ampache Directory Root:
ampache-3.5.3
Connection Port
777 //I use a non standard http port, if you use port 80 or no port just leave it blank
Streaming port:
777
Ampache Username:
ampacheUser
Ampache Password:
********
Download Directory:
myDownloads
Keep Alive:
15

[fain]

Originally Posted by Saber Mage

Ah, yes I did have the keep alive field empty. That fixed that bit. Thanks ^^. And I'm using the Pre, by the way.

Hmm yeah, still can't get it to stream music. The pause symbol always shows when I choose a song to begin playing, and tapping the button does nothing. More often than not I get the "MEDIA_ERR_DECODE" in this instance. I'm positive I was using EVDO, and now WiFi. Before I wasn't, but now I'm also on the local network of the host computer, and have the same issues. Transcoding is enabled, but not for mp3 files, which is the majority of my library. I would be willing to bet that this is all incompatibility issues with ver. 3.5.4; the Ampache gang seems to stress keeping things up-to-date much. Apparently it must be a cause of many mishaps.

I have found the culprit!! Seems they have changed one little letter in the mp3 url, go figure. I can fix it but in order for me to do that every one who uses AmpachPre will need to update to Ampache 3.5.4. So the next release will require a upgrade to ampache 3.5.4. Until then sit tight on 3.5.3.

edit: I see why Vollmerk changed the url now. I am going to try and make it so if this happens again, only saved playlists will be effected. I might be able to save you from having to upgrade Ampache this way as well

[andred]

Originally Posted by fain

Account name:what ever you want here
example,ampache-3.5.2:? this is the directory where ampache is located.
default EVDO address:? this is your domain name or ip address.
connection port,default 80/443:? if you have a basic connection (port 80) you can leave this blank.
streaming port:? same as above if not using ssl

here's a example from my account settings:
Account name:
Wifi
Ampache Server Address:
192.168.1.2
Ampache Directory Root:
ampache-3.5.3
Connection Port
777 //I use a non standard http port, if you use port 80 or no port just leave it blank
Streaming port:
777
Ampache Username:
ampacheUser
Ampache Password:
********
Download Directory:
myDownloads
Keep Alive:
15

Thanks,

Still getting errors.....followed everything in the instruction guide....great idea for an app but setting it up has taken waaayy to long.

Thanks again

[fain]

Originally Posted by andred

Thanks,

Still getting errors.....followed everything in the instruction guide....great idea for an app but setting it up has taken waaayy to long.

Thanks again

What error are you getting?
Also what are your settings? Feel free to pm me if you don't want to post them here.

[Maturin]

Originally Posted by fain

Thanks for the feed back. I agree the UI could use some work. I am not that great with CSS.

Universal search has crossed my mind a number of times and I hope to make this come true soon. I have needed it my self a few times. Just not sure how I would implement it yet. A all random play sounds good as well. I will continue to look into these things. My next feat is keeping the audio playing while browsing music. I might have another release before I get that working though.

Thanks for the response, fain. I didn't mean to be harsh or anything, I know you've put a lot of time and work into this.
After giving it some thought, if you do implement Universal Search, I don't think it should eliminate the options so search by song or album. I like being able to search for "rain" in the songs search, and come up with a big list of rainy day songs to play through. However, it ought to be a default search all. Results could be displayed with an icon to denote whether the result is a song, album or artist.

[fain]

Originally Posted by Maturin

Thanks for the response, fain. I didn't mean to be harsh or anything, I know you've put a lot of time and work into this.
After giving it some thought, if you do implement Universal Search, I don't think it should eliminate the options so search by song or album. I like being able to search for "rain" in the songs search, and come up with a big list of rainy day songs to play through. However, it ought to be a default search all. Results could be displayed with an icon to denote whether the result is a song, album or artist.

Talls good, I enjoy good constructive feedback I will most definitely leave the categories and "all" as the default.

[Saber Mage]

Originally Posted by fain

I have found the culprit!! Seems they have changed one little letter in the mp3 url, go figure. I can fix it but in order for me to do that every one who uses AmpachPre will need to update to Ampache 3.5.4. So the next release will require a upgrade to ampache 3.5.4. Until then sit tight on 3.5.3.

edit: I see why Vollmerk changed the url now. I am going to try and make it so if this happens again, only saved playlists will be effected. I might be able to save you from having to upgrade Ampache this way as well

Fine with me! I'm already using 3.5.4, after all. 8D Sounds good, thanks for the help. Looking forward to trying it out for real with the next release!


@andred: Yeah, I'll admit that setting up an Ampache server takes a lot of effort and strive, not to mention some general knowledge regarding networking. This app definitely isn't for everyone (or rather, the action of setting up a personal Ampache server isn't). But if a user knew of some other Ampache server up on the web, they could certainly use this app to access it away from their computer.

I'm just glad fain wrote the basic guide to setting it up that he did - otherwise I would've had almost no idea where to start! I've never used Apache before, nor hosted my own web server, but xampp makes the process relatively simple and pain-free. Gotta wonder if your ISP's gonna crack a whip at you for crazy bandwidth usage eventually though, heheh.


Ah and, for anyone who so desires, the Ampache server I set up, "Vibeshack," can be visited here. Registrations are open to the public. Vibeshack is my entire music library, and I might add my friends' libraries as separate catalogs later on. My musical tastes are pretty diverse, but you won't find much rap or country on there, if any at all. Mostly indie, electronica, some metal/hardcore, and VGM/VGM remixes too.

[angiest]

Originally Posted by fain

I have found the culprit!! Seems they have changed one little letter in the mp3 url, go figure. I can fix it but in order for me to do that every one who uses AmpachPre will need to update to Ampache 3.5.4. So the next release will require a upgrade to ampache 3.5.4. Until then sit tight on 3.5.3.

edit: I see why Vollmerk changed the url now. I am going to try and make it so if this happens again, only saved playlists will be effected. I might be able to save you from having to upgrade Ampache this way as well

So are you saying don't upgrade to 3.5.4 until the next version of Ampachpre comes out?

[Maturin]

Originally Posted by fain

Talls good, I enjoy good constructive feedback I will most definitely leave the categories and "all" as the default.

Ok, how about some more then And let me know if any of these functions can be duplicated in AmpachePre currently, and I just don't know about them.

When you search for an artist that has multiple albums, how about some kind of button at the top of the list that allows you to play all the songs from all the albums?

In the full album list, how about the ability to sort? Sorting Albums by Artist Name would help usability for me so much.

I know you said you weren't very good with CSS, but if there were some way to make the entries (Albums, Artists, Songs) a little slimmer, I think that would make better use of screen space available.

How about a cancel button when Searching? A back gesture from there logs back out to the connections list.

And a question for everyone: How are you using the bookmarks function? Do you find it useful?

Thanks