ml_tree prototype

[shaneh]

Ive done up a quick tree view thing for the Media Library which is starting to look quite nice. Its purely ML based, so everything is loaded from the ML, which means building the tree requires indexing and consolidating every item into the final tree. Im quite surprised at how well it works though, and will make something out of it eventually.

The great thing is I can have this plugin group on other things as well, such as genres, artists, years etc. Its similar to how mexp does its grouping.

Obviously, this is just a prototype, and is quite buggy. It will eventually have a nice list view with full meta data support, drag,drop, "send to" and other context menu support, explorer context menus etc. I may even allow custom columns using ATF, kinda how the columns ui works in fb2k. But will see how much of a hit to performance that will be.

Once again, this is a prototype,ie. buggy. Dont bother with bug reports or feature requests or 'why wont this work?' nonsense.

Known bugs: Crashes if no results are found from the query, the other edit box does nothing, clicking on song items does nothing, crashes on exit sometimes, very buggy if you change views while it is searching, the scroll bar isnt skinned and occasionally loses ability to be clicked, shows one less item in the view than there should be/ etc

All these issues and more are easy enough to fix, and it will be done overtime.

[shaneh]

I am trying to resize both child windows in such a way that they maintain ratios. Currently I just use:

static ChildWndResizeItem resize_rlist[]={
{IDC_TREE1,0x0001}, // 0xLTRB
{IDC_LIST1,0x0011},
{IDC_EDIT1,0x0000},
{IDC_EDIT2,0x0010},
};

But the tree view stays the same size. If I edit the LR values of the tree view, it overlaps and does all sorts of weird stuff. Does anyone know hte magic for doing the resizing and keeping the ratios? Similar to how the "Arists" and "Albums" windows resize in the local media views.

[shaneh]

oblig screenshot.

[shaneh]

Also, does anyone know how to refine a query? I can just create one query and use "AND", however it doesnt seem possible to mix query types. (ie keyword and ? style syntax). I need this to do:

?filename begins "C:\path\" AND keyword_search

But Im not sure its possible. However, the view in the ML manages to do it, it can mix ? and keyword style when using the "Refine:" box.

[shaneh]

It now displays the items in a proper list view, with some better threading and meta data such as playcount and rating. The threading/performance still has a few tweaks that can be done.Obviously sorting needs to be implemented too.

Double-clicking on items will now enqueue them in winamp, its just some basic operation to verify that the item can actually be retrieved ok.

Some basic 'splitter' support for the window, still needs some tweaks.

[YtseJam]

Good stuff, looking forward for future version to try out!

[chris_d_smith]

Originally posted by shaneh
Also, does anyone know how to refine a query? I can just create one query and use "AND", however it doesnt seem possible to mix query types. (ie keyword and ? style syntax). I need this to do:

?filename begins "C:\path\" AND keyword_search

But Im not sure its possible. However, the view in the ML manages to do it, it can mix ? and keyword style when using the "Refine:" box.

It's probably possible to do properly somehow but i took a cop out approach in mlwww and just turned keyword searches into "HAS" searches internally :) eg:

?filename begins "C:\path\" AND keyword_search

becomes

?filename begins "C:\path\" AND ARTIST HAS "keyword" or ALBUM HAS "keyword" or TITLE HAS "keyword" or TRACKNO HAS "keyword" or GENRE HAS "keyword" or FILENAME HAS "keyword" or YEAR HAS "keyword" or COMMENT HAS "keyword"

Kinda embarrasingly dodgy but it works :)

[shaneh]

Yeah I thought about that too, its pretty sketchy, but I guess it is doing something similar internally when you do a keyword search anyway.

I dont think its possible, but is there a way to do a search such that:

?filename begins "C:\path\" AND has_no_extra_path

so it will return results in a specific path, but not sub directories. Something like NOTHAS "\" in the remaining bit. Unfortuantly, I doubt this is possible, and will probably resort to not implementing it, or manually filtering, which can be slow if there are a lot of files in the sub directories.

[DAVOR]

Hello guys.

I'm good in SQL, but I don't know if is this what You are looking for.

The SQL is language for 'comunicating' with databases.

So if I have a database named DB, in this database i have 1 table named TBL. This table is having 3 fields: Folder, Filename, Count.
Firsd two fields are strings and the last is number. the field type is important for building querys.

For retriving all from TBL.
SQL:
"SELECT * FROM TBL"

For retriving only specific fields:
"SELECT TBL.Filename, TBL.Folder FROM TBL"

To get only records that have folder 'c:\My Music':
(Here is important if You are having in Where string field then the searching string mus be in ''
"SELECT * FROM TBL WHERE TBL.FOLDER = 'C:\My Music'"

To get records that Folder field starts with 'C:\My' then:
"SELECT * FROM TBL WHERE TBL.Folder Like 'C:\My*'"
or
"SELECT * FROM TBL WHERE TBL.Folder Like 'C:\My%'"

Is this what You have looking.

[DAVOR]

Sorry but I have now seen that ML is not building Querys on a standard SQL type. :-(

[shaneh]

heh, thanks anyway davor. You could do the same with the ML querying, however the ML doesnt keep the path/folder and filename separate. It just stores the full filename with path. So you can't match on it separately. You need a way to match:

filename begins "C:\path\" AND has_no_\_after_"C:\path\"

which isnt really possible. I can quickly parse the results no problem, but it doesnt fit in with the modular design Im hoping for, and is slow, when querying the root for example, as it needs to return a lot of unnecessary results which then get pruned. The post-filtering code will be quick enough, its the actual search which takes the time due to having to copy heaps of meta data which then just gets discarded by the post-filter.

[chris_d_smith]

You could do it with some precalculating...

Find the subdirectories of the path using windows API then do:

filename begins "C:\path\" and !(filename has "subdir1") and !(filename has "subdir2") and ...

Should/Could still be faster than rescanning all the results afterwards?

Could be ridiculously slow too :)

[shaneh]

Yeah, I think that would be an order of magnatitude slower. Also, it is mainly the root that has this problem, as it rarely has many files in the directory itself, but has many subdirectories and files under it. Other directories are ok, as the number of sub directories is often much smaller so the search is faster. Trying to exclude every subdirectory wouldnt be possible like that, and would be much slower than just querying the in-memory database and pruning it afterwards. Although, I have already built the tree from the ML so wouldnt need to query the disk. But still, the query would be too large for the root.

The root search doesn't take *that* much longer than a search that only returns a few results, so I will probably just resort to post-processing the results.

[shaneh]

Nevermind that. Ive used a much better solution which is much faster when showing items. It also makes for much better search results when navigating.

Ive fixed up a bit of threading and changed the way it indexes to a more modular and sensible design. It now has a directory and artist view, I will expand on this in future versions. The great thing is I can group and filter etc fairly flexibly. I will probably make similar views to Mexp.

Its starting to take shape...

[chris_d_smith]

looks cool :up:.

Not sure if you want this kind of feedback yet but i got it to crash by changing the query in the top left box and pressing enter.

Would you be thinking of putting a playlist window down the bottom like in mexp?

[shaneh]

Yeah the tree building is quite buggy at the moment, both with the threading aspect and "finding the root" - which can be problematic when only a few items are returned etc. Theyre fairly minor issues I'll smooth out over time.

[shaneh]

Added an artist/album grouping view. Fixed some threading and root finding.

I will put future versions up on my web space.
http://www.myplugins*******ml_tree.zip

[shaneh]

Its now nicely skinned with a couple do-nothing buttons. I can start actually adding funcionality and fixing bugs now.

TODO:

context menus (list item/s and tree items):
-refine search using selected
-explorer
-enqueue,play etc
-send to
-move/delete
-view file info
-more
column customisation
sorting
view customisation
make buttons do something
refine filter?
config saving/loading/gui
drag/drop
few songs by artist consolidation into 'various artists'
locate item from playlist
'snap' away item list view
rating star mouse over column thing
more info in status bar
fix strange crash bug
fix strange scrollbar loses functionality bug

Available here: http://www.myplugins*******ml_tree.zip

http://www.myplugins*******ml_treescreen.png

[shaneh]

Updated with some basic context menu support. Enqueue will actually work for the list view, with the button and context menu. Clear button works.

Pre-lim support for "Send to:" functionality, the menu is there at least. Its a bit of an ordeal as it requires reverse engineering the code structures, though Ive worked out most of it already.

Fixed some threading issues, possibly fixed the scrollbar losing functionality issue?

Dummy context menus for list view headers.

[Gabes Dad]

Looks great so far. Kind of reminds me of Joonas's Dynamic Library, but within the Media Library - I'm all for that, less windows and more integration. Or even like crackity's quick tracks in functionality but sort of its brother anchored in the media library.

[Joonas]

Originally posted by Gabes Dad
Looks great so far. Kind of reminds me of Joonas's Dynamic Library, but within the Media Library - I'm all for that, less windows and more integration. Or even like crackity's quick tracks in functionality but sort of its brother anchored in the media library. ¨

It is alike but it's more along shaneh's liking :)
He likes ML, I don't, so it is better that he does this kind of plugin than I.

[shaneh]

Some huge improvements to the list view. Much faster and responsive. Allows sorting on the vaious headers.

Added more meta data columns.

"Send to" functionality works (this is a quite a big deal, if you realise what was requried to get it to work :). Added context menu to the tree view, with send to functionality too.

Shift-clicking a tree view item shows all child items rather than just direct children.

The tree view is still a bit buggy when being drawn.

/edit: updated with basic drag/drop support.

/edit: updated with enqueue and play support in both listview and tree. Honours ML default doubleclick actions.

[shaneh]

Made the rating a bit prettier, and shows the proper values. Will do some mouseover hot rating stuff later.

Some alternating colors for list view items, not great in all skins, like base skin. Will fix it soon.
general fixes. the context menu in the list view seems to not show up too reliably atm. (/edit: fixed issue)

http://www.myplugins*******ml_treerate.png

[Gabes Dad]

off the topic, but Shane - what skin are you using in those I screen shots? It is very clean - I like it.

[shaneh]

The opus skin, I had a Visual style using this theme before and it looked quite nice together.
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/5041772/


a few other nice simple skins.
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/16283197/ - modern bleh:P
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/5143321/
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/7449018/
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/8977109/

[shaneh]

Updated: Now does some currently playing song highlighting. A bit rough round the edges, but will get smoothed out later.

[shaneh]

Added some cool mouse over rating effect. Doesnt rate yet, but is simple enough to add in.

http://www.myplugins*******ml_treehot.png

[YtseJam]

Are you going to make this theme-friendly?

[shaneh]

in what way? IF you mean winamp skin, then yes. It mostly is already, I just need to use appropriate colours in some places.

If you mean win xp Visual Style theme, what are you referring to that should be themed?

/edit: updated ml_tree to fix some silly bugs, and add automatic deep view of returned results.

[shaneh]

Rating using star mouse over now affects items in the db.
+some performance improvements when mouse star hovering.

Column choosing and ordering etc code is there now, but not being used. I will make use of it when I do the config loading/saving.

[shaneh]

Nested the palylist in the window, inspired by the single gui skin. Note sure if I like this yet. Perhaps I can just have another ML plugin which nests the playlist and lets you drag drop.

Currently quite buggy with this feature, still prototype stuff as Ive said.

http://www.myplugins*******ml_treenested.png

[shaneh]

Ive taken out the playlist for now, as it was quite buggy and I didnt really like the interface. I prefer to just dock the playlist alongside the window, or make use of the "single GUI modern skin" which does a similar thing, but lets you see the playlist for all ml windows.

But I will see how it goes. A better solution would be to dock the playlist like this, but have it for all windows. Similar to how the single gui skin does it, but without relying on the freeform skin engine.

The old version is still available at:
http://www.myplugins*******ml_tree_pl.zip
Note its quite buggy, leaks, and doesnt work with modern skins.

On the plus side, Ive fixed some threading issues with the tree building. It should be heaps more stable now. The version without the playlist is actually becoming quite usable.

[DAVOR]

Hello Shaneh.
Again me with my question, will Your ml_tree be able to let other programers to see from other app whitch item is selected (filename).

[shaneh]

@DAVOR: It has makes use of the sendto_ system for ml plugins to extend functionality. A plugin which hooked proxied the sendto information to external applications would work the same way as it would in the normal ml view.

[shaneh]

It now lets you do some basic tree customization in that you can specify the grouping. ie, by artist/album, year/genre, artist/rating etc. In the root tree item, just choose the options then click 'set' then view the custom view item. Obviously this will let you create custom views and save them etc.

It also has orphan grouping capabilities, and can show total counts of sub items. Plus some general fixes.

[billyvnilly]

:up: you got praised in WA Unlimited (http://www.winampunlimited.com/) :) very nice plugin!

[shaneh]

@billyvnilly, cool.

Ive put in some folder icons etc which look ok. Ive also used images for the rating column instead of a font character. Its looks a little rough at the moment but I'll clear it up. For some reason I cannot get the alpha blending to work properly in the treeview or listview so the shadowed images look kind of crap at the moment.

Ive also added playcount, playcount range, weeks ago, days ago, played last and title to the grouping options. I will also probably add an order 3 grouping option as well. I dont think theres any need for more than 3 levels. The 'group orphans' option will also be able to be set on a per group level basis soon.

Added a "played last" column. Some improvements to tracking the currently played item. And probably just some small fixes here and there.

[jocacliff]

Sweet. The plugin I was looking for. I haven't had in issues with this plugin. Keep up the good work:up:

Is it possible to make it so you can edit the tag info via a right click like you can with the standard media library? That would be my only request.

[shaneh]

+Added an explorer context menu for the folders in directory views. This will also be available for individual items in the list, although Windows prevents this from being possible on items within different directories. What I might do is a quick check to see if all selected items are within the same folder before enabling the context menu. Otherwise, I will have to disable the recursive view of folders if I want it to behave like Explorer.

@jocacliff: Im not quite at the point of accepting feature requests. Though I am hoping to have that feature. In fact, it will allow editing things like playcount and rating and basically all the meta data rather than just the dialog used in the ML.

http://www.myplugins*******ml_treeexp.png

[WanderingKnight]

For some reason, the "artist" and "artist/album" grouped views both give me large "various" items, in the case of the artist/album view almost 3/4 of my total ML!

As well, the "directory view" doesn't show me the watched folder that is on my D: drive, only the folder on my C: drive

[Edited to add:]

OK, wait... for the "artist" grouping it's only the artists that only have a single track that are showing up under "various". That makes sense.

But many of the artists in the "album/artist" view "various" have multiple tracks.

[Edited AGAIN to add:]

OK... wait again. It seems to be something to do with the "group orphans" setting but I can't make the setting stick.

[billyvnilly]

xp pro, 5.08e

i can confirm "group orphans with fewer than:" does not properly save itself. very weird behavior.

if you click artist view, my orphan value defaults to 2
if you click artist/album, my orphan vaule defaults to 10
if you click custom view, orphan value stays

and group 1 and group 2 default when you click artist or artist/album



[edit]i am trying to open Dynamic Library, and i get a ml_tree.dll crash, offset:0001a95c

[shaneh]

@WanderingKnight:
@billyvnilly:

That is expected behaviour given that you cant actually customize the views yet. The 'set custom' hack is just a way to *temporarily* set the custom view to check it out. It gets reset to whatever you view whenever you change views. Its not finished yet.

Not sure about the crash, but if its there Im sure it will crop up again and I will catch it over time.

[WanderingKnight]

Ah, the perils of falling in love with alpha/beta software... you can never wait for it to be finished.

Awesome work so far, Shaneh. Can't wait for more!

[shaneh]

+added a dynamic tracking checkbox thing, which causes ml_tree to follow the currently playing item in winamp.

+added a <- locate current item button

+added a few APIs, unpublished atm.

+added ability to remove tree items from the results. You will be able to remove individual items too. Useful for pruning garbage from a search.

+basic view file info ability

+random button to shuffle the currently viewed results

+general fixes.

[shaneh]

+columns can be turned on and off. note that no settings are being saved atm. (this includes views, column widths, everything). This also means some improved column code internally which will help with saving settings later.

+Icons are now stored in ml_tree.bmp in the plugins directory. rgb(0x00,0x80,0x80) is the mask. Feel free to tidy them up a bit.

+Sorting is improved to a stable sort which preserves the old order if the new items are equal.

+General fixes.

[shaneh]

It now has an interesting feature in that it can import playlists into the current view. This includes the currently active playlist. Just hit the "v" button and click "import from current playlist". I also have some code for reading m3u files and importing them, but need to decide how its going to work, as it needs to fit seamlessly in with 'smart views', 'send to->current view/particular view' and importing current playlist, playlist from file, ml search results, etc etc..

Its more of a design issue than techinical issue atm.

[shaneh]

A few more internal optimisations and fixes.

You can locate the currently selected item in the playlist by left clicking the "<-" button.

A few more working context menu item things such as 'locate in tree', 'select all', 'select none'.

Added "enqueue and play", and "punch in/punch in and play" commands. I'll add a "punch in at selection" command too later.

A reminder that some things are just placeholders, and not everything is working or in its final state.

[Joonas]

Originally posted by shaneh
A few more internal optimisations and fixes.

You can locate the currently selected item in the playlist by left clicking the "<-" button.

A few more working context menu item things such as 'locate in tree', 'select all', 'select none'.

Added "enqueue and play", and "punch in/punch in and play" commands. I'll add a "punch in at selection" command too later.

A reminder that some things are just placeholders, and not everything is working or in its final state.

Looks pretty nice :)

[billyvnilly]

i love the "current playlist" very speedy progress shane.:up:

[shaneh]

Hey thanks guys, I still have a couple little things planned which will hopefully make it a great tool for narrowing down those tracks and creating 'smart' collections and playlists.

[Cianca]

very great plugin :up:

any chance to remove the playlist editor integration?

(useless with Single UI)

[shaneh]

Its not there, and hasnt been in several days.

[saivert]

Here's the code I created to skin these controls:
- Trackbar
- Checkbox
- Radiobutton
- Group box

Download ZIP and open ctrlskin.h for more info.

[shaneh]

thanks saivert, that should come in handy. Though Im not using the wa_dlg.h stuff, but using the exports provided by the ML. So I will have to do a bunch of hacking around to get it working. ie, get the colours from the exports rather than getpixel type calls.

There is also a bug with the skin listview call from the ML in that it doesnt handle custom ordering. It stops custom drawing the headers once it reaches the last item, even though the last "item" may not techincally be the last header.

[shaneh]

Ive added the ability to re-group individual nodes in the tree to user defined grouping orders. This involved a bit of work, but seems to have come up ok. It loads the settings from ml_tree_groups.ini, obviously this will be customised from the plugin later. The 'smart' view things on the side will define both their source (folder, playlist, ml query) and one of these grouping views.

[jocacliff]

keep up the good work. This has been the only time I have come to the winamp forums everyday. Just to see what improvements you have made. Great job

[saivert]

Can you atleast create a page for it at SourceForge so we can easily be notified when you make updates, maybe download the latest build via CVS??? Just a though...

[shaneh]

Its not OSS so I can't put it up at sourceforge, plus sourceforge is really quite crap these days for various reasons and am thinking of putting ActiveWinamp across to another site. Plus Im considering making this a non-free or at least shareware/donationware type plugin.

ML Tree is very early alpha/prototype. Its just for previewing and I dont really expect people to actually use it at the moment, and would caution them against it. Consider being able to have a preview of it at the moment a bonus. The other option is I dont make it available at all until its "done". I generally will post in this thread when I up a new build with significant changes.

What I might do later is set up a blog so people can subscribe via RSS. That way I can announce other stuff as well, and make it available through the site rather than the flakey winamp plugin site.

[saivert]

Hmm... I will be well prepared to test your builds, he he. Use strong caution.

Does 1 euro satisfy your needs? I might be able to fork up something...

[adskiski]

I'm loving it so far, super work Shane.

any chance of adding in some persistence of column customisation?

cheers
adski

[shaneh]

dont be daft lad, its in alpha.

[shaneh]

Have fixed up the individual node grouping a bit. You can now add custom node grouping views, its prelim at the moment, but works ok.

Added ability to define whether a view is 'trimmed' or not. show totals, and group orphans now works on individual nodes.

Different colour icons are used to distinguish between a node which represents a directory or 'virtual' folders. I could use different icons for nodes which represent artists, playcounts, albums etc, but I dont think its necessary.

[shaneh]

+column persistance (finally). there ya go.

edit: doh, that broke sort refreshing for some reason (?), will try fix it.

Yeah the new column ordering code has broken selecting items and refreshing the view. Its pretty broken atm.

[shaneh]

ok, the columns *should* be saved/restored ok now.

[saivert]

When are you going to implement the CtrlSkin.c/h ??

[shaneh]

@saivert: in good time :) little gui aesthetics arent really a high priority at the moment, Id rather work on the underlying core. I need to do a few tweaks to that code to merge it into my code as I already do a bit of subclassing and custom drawing about the place, and use the ml functions etc, so its not just a drop in and go process.

[saivert]

Well for me at least it was a drop in and go. I made the code so that you can call one funtion and it takes care of the rest. It uses Window Properties to keep note of the previous Window Proc of the windows it subclasses.

I have tested your plugin a couple of times now, but my Winamp seem to crash when the plugin is installed o I'm only having it installed for the session i'm testing it.
Good luck! Really think this is a nice one.

[shaneh]

It might work as it is. But that doesnt mean Im going to just chuck it in and hope for the best.

I want to avoid re-subclassing the windows when I already have them subclassed. Itd be better to merge the drawing into my existing wndproc. I just took a quick look and it seems to be doing the drawing on WM_PAINT, Id rather use NM_CUSTOMDRAW stuff when/if possible instead as Im already using that for some things.

Plus, it uses wa_dlg stuff which obtains the bmp and reads pixels etc, which I want to avoid cause I already have the ml to provide the necessary colours through its waget colour call.

plus, theres no point in adding extra unnecessary code until I am sure the rest is working first. If theres gonna be crashes it makes it easier to know where they are coming from if you do things one step at a time.


Thats too bad about the crashes for you. :(.. it seems to be running ok for me. Are you copying all the .ini files across into the plugins directory too? It would cause problems if you didnt. At what point does it crash? When u try display something or at winamp load? What structure is your ml in? (ie multiple drives/multiple root directories might cause issues). Heh, theres plenty of oppourtunity for bugs.. am looking forward to getting this thing rock stable and feature rich :)

[saivert]

I'm testing your plugins using a fresh install of Winamp 5.08e. I'm not even touching the ml_tree plugin at all (it's just installed that is), then I doubleclicked a song in the playlist to start playing it and then Winamp crashes and Windows displays a dialog asking me if I want to report it.

When ml_tree is uninstalled, I never get this. I'm going to look into it myself though. And YES I did extract all files from the ml_tree.zip into my Winamp\Plugins folder.

[shaneh]

Ah ok, playing the song is the key point there. Theres some sketchy code that does the current playing song tracking/current song highlighting feature. Its a bit dodge 'cause I handle quite a few different cases to try optimize it as much as possible to prevent searching the entire search results every time you play a song. Its something that needs looking into.

[ken1to]

I got this plugin a couple of min ago... it's great, a lot of potencial... really. Great work so far.

A few suggestions, i don't know if you plan to the customs views to group by genre, year, or rating... that would be great... (specialy for genre, 'cuz I'm the genre-mood-guy... maybe i'll be a punk-music day for me... or rock...;) or pop... so genre it something important to me, now i have to manualy create a smartview for every new genre that i add to the library)

I repeat, great work. :up: :up: :up: :up: :up:

(This and the ml_org, and i'll be the happiest guy in the world ) :D

[MTS]

Hello everybody from France
I tried your plug in
I though finding my favorite plug in. Sorry it's not exacty what i'm looking for. But it's a good job. Most user will be interested by this
The only think i wanted, it's the tree with the local media from ML and not based on the hard disk.
I'm trying to explain what i looking for, if you agree or if it's possible. no problem if not
ex:
local meda
+ genre
____-( rock
____-( pop
____-( ....)
- last played
+ year
____+( 2003
_________-( rock
_________-( pop
_________-( ....
____+( 2004
_________-( rock
_________-( pop
+ hit
____-( from 6 month
____-( from 1 year
....
--------------------------
When i create a new view in the ML i will have the choice of the folder parent. In my exemple when i create the "from 6 month" i note the folder parent is hit. The request is cascade.
The request for "hit" is rated with more than 3 stars
the request "from 6 month" are files updated since less 6 month.
The view hit/from 6 month are files with more 3 stars and less 6 months..
With the mouse i can move up and down the view like today. With this action the view can belong to another view.
When i move a mean view, the subsidiary move together and can belong to another subsidiary or mean
Like that i change the filter more easy.

I should have the way to develop the branch. Else with too branch the user will be affraid.

A lot of code certainly.

Thank to read me

[shaneh]

Your english is quite difficult to understand but Ill try.

At this time I have no plans on making multiple roots. To do something similar, you should create a 'smart view' which defines the particular view you want (its not currently possible to define those 'smart views'). I wont be doing this for performance reasons, and to keep it nice and simple with regards to only representing a file once in the tree. Such that locating a file wont be ambiguous because it is located in multiple locations.

I also would like to have people be able to 'develop' the branch. But am wondering how to do that. One way is to use something similar to what foo_playlist_tree does, where you can do stuff like:

%artist%|%album%|$if(rating>2,Good,Bad)

type of things. Where the | represents a branch in the tree. However TAGZ stuff would be a fair bit slower, but it would be worth trying it out. Currently the 'indexing' stage is quite quick and it is the ML search that is the bottleneck (and cannot be improved). Unfortuantly representing ranges such as "6 months ago", "1 year ago" etc, would be quite difficult like this, and for this case it is actually a lot more user friendly to just have a set of common pre-defined tree styles. Of course, the pre-defined styles could just be TAGZ presets written in an .ini file.

It doesn't help that the TAGZ/ATF support in Winamp is very lacking and not very powerful.

Another way is to let people extend the tree styles through plugins. This would mean having to write the extended styles in C/C++ etc, but it would be much faster and more powerful.

In anycase, there is a lot still to do on this plugin, and this kind of support is something I have in mind. It is just a matter of finding the time to do it. It is still in development, and by no means should be taken as any indication of what the final feature set will look like.

[MTS]

Hello sorry for my english. I'll to do better.
In french we say : He speaks like a spanish cow. I'm sorry if i'm one.
I'm already happy with your answer

I see in details and i'm thinking i could find what i'm looking for.

I want to give some information, bug or questions
about the file ml_tree_groups.ini
I notice the meaning of your variable. I'm not expecting answer to this point. See if you can hav a profit with.

Version tested build 98 april 8 2005
file ml_tree_groups.ini

[GroupViews] Label of the .ini Group
GroupViewCount=6 Number of view in ML
GroupViewDesc.0=Directory Name of the view n° 0 in ML
ViewType.0=0 type of view : 0 = based on the hard disk view
1 = 1 sub-directory like artist
2 = 2 sub-directory like artist/album
OrderA.0=1 A = the firsts sub_directories after the root
=1 = order by
=2 = order by artist
=3 = order by album
=4 = order by genre
=5 = order by year
=6 = order by rating
=7 = order by playcount
=8 = order by artist-album
=9 = order by playcount by step. the step are 0-5;6-9; 10-19;20-34;35-49 ....
=10 = order by lastplayed displayed by "date"
=11 = order by lastplayed displayed by "week ago"
=12 = order by lastplayed displayed by "day ago"
=13 = order by title
OrderB.0=1 B = the seconds sub_directories after the root
OrderC.0=1 C = the thirds sub_directories after the root
GroupCount.0=0 no explication
GroupVarious.0=0 no explication
ShowTotals.0=0 0 = don't display the number of files in this sub-directory
1 or not zero = display the number of files in this sub-directory

Trim.0=1 0= no explication
1= no explication
--------------------------------------
bug to fix or to develop:
bug in ml_tree.group.ini

- the number of GroupView is 6. I can see only 5 groupview. Changing the GroupViewCount=6 with 3 don't make different . I see only Directory, Artist, Artist/album, Custom view and Current Playlist. It miss 3 view
- If i put 4 (bad value OK) to test in ViewTypeDesc.%n, i have pb with the view 0 directory, 1 artist and 2 Artist/Album. But the view 4,5 and 6 aren't modified because they aren't displayed.
- if the name of group view is defined by GroupviewDesc.%n . When i change the name , nothing is modified.


Question:

- Will be there a way to put additional filter ? ex : rating > 2 . I hope you will have time.
- the functionality ctrl^e is a good thing to modify the song with no tag ( .wav; .mdi ...) Is it possible to access this function directly in ML_tree
- when i am playing music who are not in my library yet. I see the lines but they are empty. It's normal because there is no link with the library. You sould let like that or display "not in the library" by example.

Thank to read me.

[saivert]

If you want, you may post an update of you plug-in in my guestbook so I can have a look before you post it elsewhere. Will be nice to be one of the first who gets to try out a new version. I will be able to respond more quicker than most here as I spend a lot of time on the internet.

[Artist 3D]

Man, thank you! I've been using dynamic library which is pretty nice, but didn't like having one more window opened, and your plugin does it pretty well. Can't wait to see the full version when it comes.

One small thing though:

I like showing the files orginized by artist, yet by album, yet by track number. hope i explained myself well. And the plugin doesn't allow me to do it. I mean, I can click the raws in the right order to achieve it with a list that is already shown, but when i passes to another folder, it orders by the last order only (ie. by artists only).

[shaneh]

@MTS: The ml_tree_groups.ini is for the node grouping options (when you right click a node, and choose 'node grouping'), not the custom smart views on the left. There is currently no way to customize that. Its still in development, theres a way to go with that. That file format will be changed quite a bit as well, its just something rough for now. It may be changed completely to support the ATF stuff I talked about earliar, but I cannot say at this point.

-I am not sure about the refining filters, Id like to do it but Im not sure exactly how to go about it design-wise. You can always add "AND rating>2" to your query, but this doesnt let you do things such as query on results that have been modified or pulled from the playlist etc. Like I said, the actual design hasnt been thought out fully yet.

-Yes I will put in meta tag editors etc eventually.

-As for items not in the library, you could enable the 'filename' column. Generally this plugin is for viewing items that *are* in your library, and Im not going to concentrate on adding that sort of support. It is mostly for navigating your already organised library of music. When items are added to your ML, generally they should be well tagged and declard 'fit' to be part of your library - this is the data that ML tree is designed to work with.


@Artist3D: That sort of multi-column sorting isn't easy to do. You will find almost all list views (including explorer eg) work like that. However, I can think of a way that I may be able to do it without any performance hit, so will experiment with that sometime in the future. But don't be surprised if it isn't supported.


@saivert: I dont have heaps of time to allocate to this project at the moment so there is no real need for frequent beta testing. When I do get time to put some effort into it, I will probably just maintain a stable and beta branch and have them up for download from my site.

[Drooling Dog]

Love what I'm seeing, but I'm confused. Is this based on directory/file names, or is it based on ID3 tags?

Thanks.

[MTS]

It"s based on ID3 tag
Shaned sayd to me:
...When items are added to your ML, generally they should be well tagged and declard 'fit' to be part of your library - this is the data that ML tree is designed to work with....

Then the ML-Tree it's only a new presentation of the library.
and a good presentation.

with right clic & change nod grouping you can change the order.You can see the tree can be based to genre, rating ...

MTS from france

[saivert]

Yeah. I was pretty optimistic when I proposed myself as a primary beta tester. I don't got heaps of time myself with school and everything.

But I look forward to the next version anyways.

[shaneh]

@Drooling Dog: It is based on the media library data. The media library caches all the meta data for files that have been added to it, including the filename itself. In order to arrange the data in a tree like strucutre, it parses this flat list of data, and groups the items accordingly.

Directory view needs to be done a little differently, as it needs to build up all the sub nodes for each sub directory, plus trim it back so only the first branch is shown as the root node etc.

@saivert: yes unfortuantly I havent had much time for this, but I certainly havent abandoned it and will continue to develop it as time permits.

[TheHealtyHippo]

I just wanted to say that this plugin made winamp complete for me, just simply looove it. thanks and keep up the good work :)

[saivert]

Now shaneh only needs to release it and see the money flow in via PayPal. Think of all the satisfied customers. Cred cred!

[jmbattle]

Absolutely wonderful!

As has already been suggested, this plugin offers precisely the ML functionality I have been waiting for for goodness knows how long - excellent work!

One or two (or three...) suggestions or wishes:

- Ability to rename 'Root' entry.
- Option to allow double-clicking on root/album/artist to automatically play those entries, rather than selecting then clicking the 'play' button.
- More intelligent sorting options in the tracklist; ideally Artist--->Date of album--->Track order.
- Make the 'Follow Now Playing' tickbox (in the botton right) savable.
- Truncate Artist names in the directory tree (user definable value) to prevent the horizontal scrollbar from automatically displaying. This will help with long arist/group names, such as 'Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band'.

Cheers, keep up the great work!
James

[shaneh]

-Renaming the 'Root' etc and features like that I am going to try steer clear of. If theres anything Ive learnt, its that users think they want lots of configuration, but in reality, the 'do the right thing by default without needing to configure it' is what people really want. With this plugin I am going to try keep trivial configuration things to a minimum, but still remain powerful. A challenge indeed.

-You can right click tree items and enqueue/play etc. Doubleclicking for the default action is easy enough, I just havent got around to doing it yet.

-You can sort like that by just clicking the columns in reverse order to what you want. Having anything more advanced would require yet more configuration. People will complain that they want to do it, I will add it, then people will complain that its too difficult to use. Anyway, I will get to that when I add in the custom 'smart view' stuff. Im tempted to implement it as tabs rather than tree items in the ML, such that it will keep your view as you switch, but we will see. It might use up too much memory like that.

-Due to the early stages of development, it doesnt make much sense to have it nice and user configurable, as its not yet clear exactly *what* will be available to configure and how. Im not going to waste time writing .ini loading and config screen stuff for features that could potentially change/ be removed etc. This includes basic stuff as 'item tracking', which I think is a bit broken in the latest build anyway.

-Truncating the artist would satisfy only one request. Then there is truncating the album, having different playcount ranges, last played ranges, track numbers at 3 digits, truncated titles etc etc etc etc etc etc etc....

The best solution would be ATF processing to create the tree branches. However, it would need to be done on *every* item. I havent tried it yet, it might work out ok, as the actual ML search is the main bottleneck, the indexing part seems quite fast.

--

Does anyone on a slower machine notice the indexing part to take a long time? (you will see 'indexing' displayed in the treeview when this is happening).

Anyway, Ive put a new build up. It doesn't add any new features, in fact I think it breaks some stuff with regards to finding the currently playing item. It has an "L" button now which switches to a details view and a list view, ut its currently broken de to Winamp's skinning functions not playing along. It also has a 'check for updates' button so you no longer have to guess. The web site also has a last changed timestamp to allieviate the problem.

Development on this plugin has slowed for a while, but it will definetely still be worked on. Theres a small possiblity it will get some "proper" development behind it at some stage, but its a bit early to say.

[jmbattle]

Great, thanks for your informative response! I fully understand your desire to keep things simple - both for the timebeing, and in the future.

Keep up the good work, cheers!
James

[jl0810]

shaneh - what a great plugin - I love the tree view and reminds me of a few of the other popular media libaries. I know it's stil in early preview mode - however even in the early stages it's a very useful tool - eagerly awaiting any grouping with "genre" as that is essentially how I've organized my music collection. Great work!

[shaneh]

If you right click a node and go to 'change node grouping->add node grouping..." you can make a order by genre node grouping category. Then you can right click and change the node grouping for the root node to give what you want.

The category will be saved, but the actual node grouping option wont be.

[Artist 3D]

Any news? (for some reason i got unsubsribed and saw a lot of messages were added, yet in the last 2 months almost nothing...) - not rashing though ;)

[saivert]

Obviously programming Winamp plug-ins take up a lot of time. ShaneH has plenty of other business to take care of as well. Give him the time. In the meantime, why don't you write some code yourself?

[Artist 3D]

Just was corious about the current picture, didn't even intended to rush, you don't have to be aggressive, man.

Anyway, I sincerely apologize if i sounded differently, I know how hard is to write a code.

[shaneh]

No I havent been able to do anything further on this plugin yet. My first priorty at the moment is getting a 2nd release of ActiveWinamp out, then hopefully do some more on ml_tree, although Im tempted to do an overdue complete overhaul of Toaster at some stage. Part of the delays of ml_tree are due to the buggy skinning support under the ML, it causes all sorts of problems. Plus there are some key design decisions which I havent had time to plan out.

[Artist 3D]

Thank you, shaneh.

[saivert]

I think the problems with skinning and so on is why Nullsoft decided to go with a icon-less tree-view for their Media Library plug-in. Most icons doesn't look good with customized backgrounds. And even worse with non solid backgrounds (eg: tiled background images or gradients). I did my best to make skinned checkboxes, but I did that by subclassing the checkboxes (the instance and not the window class itself which is called superclassing) and drawing a simple rectangle in the skin foreground color and rendering the "check" based on this. Radiobuttons is just a circle with a dot. I also managed to do trackbars by using the bitmap parts for the scrollbar and just rendering a very small scrollbar for the trackbar thumb and doing a simple line as the glider. I really want to make a real skinned tabcontrol as well, but the control I get through the tabcontrols native owner-draw of tabs is just not enough. Windows itself is drawing the outline of the tabs itself and I need to draw them as well. I thought about subclassing tabcontrols and drawing the entire tab part myself, but I'm worried about flickering.
For people who have downloaded Francis Gastellu's ColorEditor for Winamp5 (which really is a Winamp3 component loaded by gen_ff.dll and thus only available when using a modern skin) you know how good the controls go along with the current skin. A cross between modern skin UI rendering interface and the classic one would be nice but emulating classic skin using Modern UI would defeat classic skin's purpose which is to be alot faster than modern skins. I know asking for access to gen_ff.dll's internal structures is a lot to ask and that's why I don't ask for this at all. I will have to moderate myself a lot. I know in a CPU/memory requirements vs. features battle the CPU/memory requirements always win. You will not enjoy a feature if it is slow or fail to load.

[Artist 3D]

saivert, excuse me for my ignorent, i'm not a programer, i learned a bit here and there though. Anyway, a PNG has an alpha channel with 256 levels of transperency, doesn't it solve the problem or is it regarded as an heavey CPU/memory requirements and maybe even also unsupported by the classic skin?

[saivert]

I don't see what PNG has to do with this. PNG is just another image format that obviously has a lot of great features (truecolor, alpha channel and being open). But Microsoft finally took advantage of the spare 8 bits of the 32 bit color data they use in 24-bit bitmaps and used it for storing the alphachannel. That is great, but not too many image editing software supports this yet. Visual Styles used by Windows XP use 32bit bitmaps (BMP) with the last 8bits for alpha channel and only a few editors know of this last 8bits. The image format isn't the important factor here. Sure Modern skin or more properly the freeform skin engine (gen_ff.dll) use PNG as default, but also support loading of JPEG images. I don't think handling PNG is too memory consuming, neither CPU intensive. The process of doing Alpha blending has been improved over time and using MMX and SSE makes this less of a burden on the CPU. Hardware accelerating can also be used (GPU powered).

[Artist 3D]

Well, you're right, PNG was only an example for the technology, didn't mean that only PNG gives you the ability of alpha channel. Anyway, "not many image editing software support this yet??" Well, I'm working with photoshop, but i guess that GIMP and Paint Shop Pro support it and they're not expansive as photoshop. anyway, maybe this link will interest you: http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/pngaped.html

[saivert]

I was talking about 32-bit bitmaps (NOT PNG) with alpha channel which is very rare. Bitmaps has the BMP extention.

And enough of this off-topic shit. Add saivert@gmail.com to your MSN contacts list for more discussion. I really want to discuss this with you.

[g8keepr]

Hallo folks,

great plug-in. I haven't read all the replies, so I have a question that is probably already being answered: will I be able to create my own sub-nodes in the ml-tree (e.g. for playlists) and to move playliste between the sub-nodes?

Furthermore is it possible to create an import function for "foreign" playlists: it means that the plug-in would search the ML for the songs. The necessary information should be available from the m3u-File(%artist% - %title% - not the file information).

There could be a dialog where u could decide which mp3-file to use, if the song is found more than one time. I-Tunes there are symbols - which indidcate dead links in the playlists.

I think that would be a great plug-in, but I do not how to code it. Could that work in ml-Tree-Plug-in?

Have a good one.

Greetings

Sascha

[g8keepr]

Another remark: If u change the rating of a song or rate a song for the first time, it is not possible to delete the rating (means unrated).

To unrate the song by the context-menu "Rate items" is also not possible.

Would be great if one could delete the rating as well.

[shaneh]

@g8keepr: There is currently no support for playlist nodes. You can drag files from ml_tree to the ml playlists however.

I dont think I will add support for creating nodes like that, as it goes against the current design where you search and ml_tree 'tree-a-fies' your results. If you want to 'tree-a-fy' a playlist, you can create a playlist in the ml as normal (using send-to/dragging to the playlist etc) and then load it into ml_tree. The custom 'views' will let you specify a source - this could be a ml query, current playlist, playlist file, directory, or whatever. You can already load in the current playlist into ml_tree by clicking the 'v' button (you will see a selection, this is effectively the 'source', currently not fully implemented, but will allow all sorts of things one day).

As for the rating 'bug', it is simply a matter of finding time to implement the rating context menu.

[MTS]

Hello Shaneh
I sent you a light wish to rate the file. I know you are busy. Don't worry
the richt-clic,rate items doesn't show the actual rate. can you add the rate allready chosen.
however i can see the rate in the columns rating and make my choice.

MTS

[shaneh]

Ive finally released a bit on an update to this plugin, with the addition of filtering support.

It is different to the standard ML query filter thing - it is an actual re-implentation of the query parsing engine as used by the ML, but over the ML tree items.

What this means is you can apply refine filters to the current view without having to re-query the ML (it can also run in a seperate thread too, rather than locking up the gui). It also means you can apply filters to imported lists, for example the current playlist.

To give an example - click the "V" button, and select impot current playlist. Then in the filter box, type something like:

(lastplay > [3 weeks ago]) and (rating > 2)

or whatever, and it will filter the list. It defaults to the query style syntax at the moment, and there is no general keyword search, but I will probably add that. It also only applies to the directory style view, but thats easy enough to change.

Its still under heavy development, although I have very little spare time. While I welcome feedback, I do not have time to respond to every query.

[MTS]

Hello
sorry but your link
http://www.myplugins*******ml_tree.zip
is not updated. The file is the same than 4 month ago.

I'm enjoying to use your new filter.

MTS

[shaneh]

Thanks MTS, Ive fixed it now.

[shaneh]

Updated to support keyword filtering and to filter other tree types. To use the "artist has x playcount < 3" style syntax, precede the query with a ?, just as in the ML.

[Ichier]

great plugin, the views that were missing in ml, keep up the good work!
although i might stress your nerves, a feature-request:
cause i use the randomizer decide whats playing, but sometimes juse the extended jump to file to queue some traks it'll be great to enhance your plugin of jtf-functionality, wich is only available via the jump to file box or a right-click-menu in the playlist-editor. I guess there must be a way to get the rightclickitems out of the playlist into ml in general as well as into your treeplugin. pressing Q to enque selected item as in the playlist-editor was great, too!
btw. i'm not shure if you wrote, planing this, but the possibillity to move (or delete) files on the hd (with automatically re-indexing the ml) is hardly missing in the ml as well, and your interface is kinda predestined for that
so far, thanx for your good plugins (using toaster for some time :)!
:up:

[D&B]

Just wanted to say I just found this and love it - keep up the good work.

[D&B]

Didn't read the whole thread, so sorry if that has been mentioned.

If I use the divider to resize the columns, when I restart winamp they are not remembered. Is this a bug in ml_tree or a bug in the ml itself?

Originally posted by shaneh
...Part of the delays of ml_tree are due to the buggy skinning support under the ML, it causes all sorts of problems.God, that is why I left winamp a while ago (only to come back because it still does what I want best). Is anyone even working on winamp anymore, or is it completely left to stagnate into mediocrity?

[Ikarus7]

what about real trees in the library pane for the playlists ? is there any development ?

[Luzz]

I have a problem. I can't view this plug-in! Look:

http://img354.imageshack.us/img354/6060/asd9zx.jpg


Version of winamp: last!
I take ml_tree here (http://www.myplugins*******ml_tree.php)

[billyvnilly]

Thats because the plugin is still in development, and NOT finished...........

[Luzz]

Why some people here can use and view ml-tree?

[MTS]

You can see ml_tree in the library.
In the option ctrp^p, plugin , now no configuration is usable.
You can access by right clic in your library.
there is some configuration in this pane.

MTS

[Luzz]

Originally posted by MTS
You can see ml_tree in the library.
In the option ctrp^p, plugin , now no configuration is usable.
You can access by right clic in your library.
there is some configuration in this pane.

MTS

In the media library?

http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/4863/madai9fk.jpg


I can't view nothing...

[MTS]

@luzz
I see you can use the plug in

the entry grouped view and below is the plug in ML_tree

some function are not usable for the moment even they are in a menu.
here is my view
http://maistouse.free.fr/winamp/photo/ml_tree.PNG


MTS

[Luzz]

Originally posted by MTS
@luzz
I see you can use the plug in

the entry grouped view and below is the plug in ML_tree

some function are not usable for the moment even they are in a menu.
here is my view
[Image] (http://maistouse.free.fr/winamp/photo/ml_tree.PNG)


MTS


Thanks a lot!!! :D

[SwVictor]

Hi!
I realize this is maybe not the absolute right thread, but I couldn't find any better. Would it be possible to insert a BPM row into ML/ML-tree? I have most of my mp3:s bpm:ed and i really would like to sort after BPM as well... Any thoughts on how to accomplish this?

Cheers!
/SweVictor

[llew]

Hi shaneh,

I stumpled over ml_tree yesterday coincidentally and I am
so happy I found it. This is the Winamp Plugin I've been searching for so long time.

Directory View, Easy Rating (viewing and modifiying ratings), the find file in Directory Feature, the file-view (like itunes, much better than ml), Fast Indexing through ml-cache....

It replaced the Directory View Plugin right away for me.

Thanks for the great work and I hope you'll find the time to maintain this great plugin in the future (and release a final version).

[riezebosch]

Two things:
a) It seems not to be possible to start a complete album by double-clicking on it.
b) Richt-click->play on an album seems to start the album in reversed order.

Finally Winamp with the advantage of the MediaPlayer Library :)

[cheenius]

You probably already figured out that if you just set your default sort to be backwards then it adds the songs in the right order...
There's many bugs already reported, or at least so says the help window.

[riezebosch]

But where to modify the default sort?
Maybe it's a good idea to group the known bugs together, in the openingpost for instance?

[bobmoss]

How do you get ml_tree to add tracks in the correct (non-reversed) order when you right click on a folder and select play? The previous poster mentioned changing the default sort order but I can't see anywhere to change it.
Thanks.

[shaneh]

I've done a small update to this plugin to fix some compat issues. I'd like to do a lot more, but one thing at a time.

Namely Ive fixed:
- Ratings and playcounts etc not being shown for latest versions of winamp.
- Locate current selected fixed for latest versions of winamp
- Rate items context menu now functions
- Locate/Tracking of current playing/selected items fixed

[Koogle]

shaneh when are you going to get back onto this plugin.. its like the best one out there..dynamic library just doesn't appeal to me when I can use this one and already have my entire media library available+plus its built in.. just sucks that you can't customize it much.

would be great if you could start polishing it up some more :)

ps. is there any quick way i can change the alternating row colours?

[chocka]

May be a stupid question, but I just downloaded ml_tree.zip.
And when look to the content of this zip file: 1x bmp, 1x dll and 2x ini files. I ask what to do to install this plug-in into winamp???

I tried read all of this topic to find out, but nowhere I can find How to install???

I think this plug-in is the answer to my question for which I wanted to start a topic:

How to change the view of ML like explorer.

If this plug-in donnot match my question. Please, let me know. So I can start a topic to get to know what I need to get the view of ML like explorer.

[Artist 3D]

Originally posted by chocka
May be a stupid question... but I ask what to do to install this plug-in into winamp???

Just copy the files to your winamp's plugins folder, usually is: c:\program files\winamp\plugins

[Koogle]

yes its very much what you're looking for..

unfortunately its development seems as dead as a dodo like a lot of good things that get made for winamp they often never get finished and left abandoned... however the alternative to ML_tree is Dynamic Library.. maybe worth a try..

[/\NDROID]

This is great replace for classic Media Library.
But I got a suggestion for you. When you move some tracks in Artist or Artist/Album view to another "folder" (artist/album), it would be great to change ID3 tags of these tracks and class them properly in ML.
Thanks

[Koogle]

I think this plugin is now abandonware unfortunatly.. such a shame

[DrO]

you can't expect constant/instant updates with any plugins since it all comes down to the devs of the plugins to find/have the time to be able to work on them. also 5 months is a relatively short time to start claiming things as abandonware (personally i've a few plugins which have had a few minor internal updates but nothing major and that's from a few years after the last public release). until shane makes comment regarding this plugin i'd say it's not abandoned and is just waiting for time to appear to be able to work on it again. patience is the key word here (however frustrating that it maybe)

-daz

[peba0706]

hey, I found two bugs!!

when i use this plugin, playlist disappears.
Why? But when i click somwhere else, it appears again.
Funny, isnt it? :)

http://img168.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=75795_Clipboard01_122_522lo.jpg
http://img171.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=75796_Clipboard02_122_491lo.jpg

[shaneh]

I still use this plugin myself, its my primary interface to the ML. I find and enqueue every song I play from it, and send songs to my ipod from it. Which is pretty much all I need it for.

So I wouldn't say its abandoned, it just meets my immediate needs so I havent bothered to put the effort in to update it.

It has a fairly complex code base, and is written mostly in straight C but really should be re-written in C++. I am reluctant to commit much more effort to it in its current form because:

a. The ML is undergoing a change to unicode in Winamp, yet ML_tree is all multibyte based.

b. I would be increasing the complexity of the code, increasing the need for a re-design/re-write, and at the same time increasing the amount of code that needs to be re-written/re-designed. Its a bit of a stalemate condition.

As I use it myself, it should at least remain usable. I do like this plugin, so its something I will keep on my todo list. If and when I ever get a large amount of free time to dedicate to this, I will probably re-write it (mind you I say that about everything).

I would like to see what the ML does with the unicode transition too. Already there are a few changes, such as with adding 'composer' etc, and a a few bugs fixed. With that, my existing ml_tree code base, and my growing experience with decent code design it should be a little more desirable to design / re-code / maintain.

The biggest problem is time, or lack there-of.

[shaneh]

@peba0706:: you are using an old skool version that had a hack to dock the playlist. I dropped this feature in the later builds. Its kinda cool, but kinda useless and buggy. Get the latest version from www.myplugins.info

[peba0706]

Thank you for the fast response!
Now its works fine with oldskool skin (i like it, i dont wanna change) The playlist still appears, and the whole thing is OK.
So, thanks for your work, once again!

cheers

[sublime78]

Let me start out by thanking you for ML Tree, it is a very helpful tool. One question for you; is it possible to apply node ordering on a specific directory and have that setting retained between the opening and closing of Winamp?

[shaneh]

No unfortuantly not, but I am working on a re-write of ml tree which is going to be quite different, it may support that. Hopefully it will eventually be something a bit similar to

http://wiki.bowron.us/index.php/Foobar2000:Playlist_Tree

Although probably not as full featured, one thing at a time. Ive got some of the basics going, but it still needs a lot of design work.

[Koogle]

how is the developtment going on this new ml_tree re-write.. Didn't think anything was wrong with the last ml_tree, just needed some polishing up.. but oh well I am still waiting to see an update on propably one of the btter ml replacements :)

[Pinjekotte]

Yes, ML_TREE really is.. the win...
we need a remake with all the bloat!
ML_TREE goes 2008!

[Koogle]

shaneh damnit..where are you???.. ml_tree now doesn't even seem to be even usable from a straight fresh winamp 5.54 install and the plugin files from your site.. what to do