Any pmp_usb.dll developments please?
 

Hello chaps,

Just a quick note to enquire how work is progressing on the pmp_usb.dll Media Library plugin. As an owner of a slightly dated (but still great!) iAudio M3, I would dearly love to see improved integration/syncing with WinAMP's Media Library, as opposed to simply mounting the drive as a local folder.

I found a link to a wip pmp_usb.dll elsewhere on these forums, however it does not appear to be compatible with the newer WinAMP 5.22 API. And even then, testing using WinAMP 5.21, the plugin loaded, yet the iAudio did not appear in the portables list.

So, any news please? I was rather hoping it would be included with today's WinAMP 5.22 release...

Cheers,
James
x

Ok, attached is the latest beta of pmp_usb.

We have a new intern working here at winamp, and he is tasked with finishing this plugin, so hopefully we will have more on that soon.

[Edit > 30th Sep 2006]

Please do not use any versions of pmp_usb attached/linked to in this thread.
The latest version is included with the Winamp distribution
(currently pmp_usb v0.5 with Winamp 5.3, as of writing)

Lovely, thanks for the prompt response.

Is the UI configuration funcional yet? I gave this a quick try and - whilst the pmp_usb.dll plugin is now opened, my iAudio M3 is still not visible in the Media Library, now in the drop-down menu of the GUI.

http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/2972/pmpusb9pa.png

I would be interested to hear if any other users of USB mass storage device players have had greater success.

Well anyway, looking forward to further developments - wish your intern good luck! ;)

Cheers,
James
x

Ok, here is a new version which lets you manually connect drives (check the prefs).

Be careful not to connect your c drive or anything!

[edit: attachment removed, get latest winamp]

Great, thanks very much - just need to work out how to configure the plugin! ;)

It obviously requires a little bit more work (gpf caused upon closing WinAMP now), however any tips would be most welcome...

Cheers,
James
x

Will, you are a friggin ANGEL! :D I'm dancing and singing on the table at the moment!

Cheers,
Christopher

Christopher, glad to read of your joy, however I am not having a great deal of success with my iAudio M3. Any tips for configuring the plugin?

Cheers,
James
x

Does your iAudio M3 appear as a drive in My Computer? For pmp_usb to work, it must.

Hello Will, thank you once again for your reply.

Yes, the M3 functions as a mass storage device, and appears in My Computer. If you have a moment, please take a look at this screenshot:

http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/9...pusb4ue.th.png

Note the drive is visible in Windows Explorer as 'E:'
I have arranged the music in the format E:\!Artists!\[artist name]\[album name]\
Each album folder contains the named tracks (mostly tagged) and a playlist.m3u.

Upon running WinAMP, I open the ml_pmp_usb.dll plugin configuration, then use the 'Manual Detect' option to select E:\ then click 'Connect this drive'. After a few moments, the drive appears in the 'Portables' tree as 'USB Drive E:'.

Below this, there are many 'playlist.m3u' entries that I do not really need to see (they do not display anything in WinAMP, perhaps because I have renamed/removed ml_playlist.dll) and are largely unnecessary.

Clicking the 'USB Drive E:' entry, I can indeed view the music on the drive, however only .mp3 files appears to have been added (most of my music is self-ripped .ogg format). Moreover, the SmartView columns cannot be modified.

May I ask how the ml_pmp_usb.dll plugin ought to be configured in my case? Perhaps entering correct information into the three File name format/Playlist Directory/Supported Formats textfields will help?

Another point to note is that WinAMP causes a GPF whenever I close the player after configuring the ml_pmp_usb.dll plugin, preventing any settings from being saved, thus requiring the process to be repeated each time.

http://img437.imageshack.us/img437/7...pusbgpf3hd.png

Thanks again for your hard work chaps - I shall look forward to reading your response, and perhaps testing a new plugin.

Cheers,
James
x

EDIT: I note that performing the above process leaves a pmp_usb.ini file on the E:\ drive. Opening WinAMP once again and configuring the USB plugin, strangely only the playlist.m3u files are added. Closing WinAMP (okaying the gpf), deleting the pmp_usb.ini from E:\ and configuring the plugin once again, I find that the music is once again added correctly, albeit only .mp3 files.

First you need to modify the supported formats to read "mp3;wav;wma;ogg"
This will make it detect your ogg files.

As for the multitude of playlists, these all correspond to "playlist.m3u" files on your player.

If you need them but don't want to see them in winamp then click the icon by "USB Drive E:" and this will contract the list.

If you do not need these playlists, you can do a search for "playlist.m3u" on your device using windows explorer and delete them.

Thank you once again Will.

The three textfields mentioned cannot be edited until a device is selected (or in my case, manually 'connected'). If I try to add mp3;wav;wma;ogg to the supported formats, the pmp_usb.ini on E*\ is updated, however the ML does not add the extra files to reflect the changes.

Again, WinAMP will still cause a gpf when exiting, requiring the correct configuration to be defined each time.

Cheers,
James
x

Just a quick update to inform you lovely Nullsoft chaps that after installing the 5.23 beta release the gpf on closing WinAMP has gone. Good job; probably ml_local related?

Unfortunately, despite WinAMP successfully closing (and saving settings/ML updates), the ML forgets to mount my MP3 player automatically - perhaps this functionality has yet to be implemented?

Anyway, looking forward to any future updates with this useful plugin.

Cheers,
James
x

Hey, new intern at Nullsoft here! To keep you all updated, the update for pmp_usb is getting pretty close to being done.

The update should enhance its performance quite a bit (it mostly speeds everything up through caching of ID3 tags). It should also make the configuration screen a bit more user-friendly. There are still a few tweaks I am working on implementing in the plugin.

Thanks for your patience and support, and I look forward to getting the new version out to you as soon as possible!

Great, thank you for the update.

Please do not hesitate to attach beta versions for testing ahead of the final release.

Good luck with your internship also!

Cheers,
James
x

Hey! Thanks for the update. It's always good to hear from Winamp staff to hear when things are going well. I look forward to the update.

I have the same behavior with ogg files as jmbattle. Music Library shows the playlists on my iaudio u3 but none of the tracks. I did update the plug-in configuration to include the ogg extension.
No crashes though...
Look forward to a fully working plugin.
Peter

Problems with supported formats will be fixed in the next version.

The bug was that winamp would act like the last extension in the list of formats was not supported (for example - in "mp3;wav;wmv;ogg", ogg wouldnt be supported). For a temporary solution to last until I release a beta (which should be sometime this week), try adding a ";" onto the end of the list of formats. It should then look like "mp3;wav;wmv;ogg;". If this doesnt work, try it with a dummy format like "mp3;wav;wmv;ogg;dmy".

Again, this will be fixed in the beta release.

Ah, well spotted - WinAMP now lists all the files on my MP3 player. Thanks for the information.

One thing I have noticed using this plugin however, is that WinAMP will not remember to check the presence of my MP3 player at startup. I need to disconnect and reconnect the device in order for it to be picked up and visible from the portables menu in the ML.

Looking forward to the next beta!
Cheers,
James
x

Is this the same device that you were having to use the manual connect option? I'm still working on figuring out why devices are sometimes not auto-detected.

You say that it auto-detects when you connect it with winamp running? Just not off initialization? This might make a little more sense.

In this version of pmp_usb.dll, I remember that there was no way of keeping the old filename when moving files to the portable device -- it could only be some derivative of track number, title, or album. %filename% didn't mean anything to the plugin. Am I totally wrong about this or just missing something? Or can this be in the next version?

Sure thing, feature's added and will be out with the next release. ;)

Wow, thanks a lot! One more thing -- if you don't include it, that's fine -- but it was sort of annoying that when I deleted albums, the folders that held them were not deleted. I was left with a lot of empty folders. If there was some mechanism that deleted empty folders on the device, especially when Winamp and this plugin empties them, that'd be really awesome.

Thanks for your support so far, and I look forward to the new release. If you wanted us to test a beta, I'd be happy to give it a go.

You caught me just before I released v0.3... I'll see what I can do. It may have to be a setting that is off by default, though. Since pmp_usb detects some devices that people may not want winamp to touch, I wouldn't want to go crazy deleting all their folders.

I added an auto-delete folders option to the config screen. I have it on by default because it only deletes a folder when you delete a track in winamp and its the last track in the folder.

Changes since v0.2:
-Metadata caching through xml file
-Metadata for tracks now stored in memory
-Optimized playback of tracks (Winamp 5.25+)
-Improved configuration window (several GUI/functionality changes)
-Fixed handling of multiple devices in configuration window
-Fixed supported tracks edit box
-Media Library device view now longer shows unsupported track data
-Auto-delete empty folders option added to config

Let me know of any features you would like added or bugs you would like to see fixed.

[edit: attachment removed, get latest winamp]

You will not see this feature work until the next version of winamp.

Great stuff, thank you for the update chaps!

I am using v0.3 now, and things are working reasonably well. The XML tag caching is a good idea, although an option to save this data to the main ML would be a welcome addition - will the ML format be converted to XML in the near future to allow this?

Unfortunately, WinAMP still does not detect my USB device automatically when starting up if the MP3 player is already connected. However, if I physically disconnect the device, then reconnect it, the drive will eventually appear in the 'Portables' list - yet, this typically induces a 45+ second delay, during which time WinAMP hangs and will not respond to any mouse clicks. It surely cannot be scanning all the files again as these are now cached in the XML, yes?

Just to reaffirm, this device is an iAudio M3, HD player, connected using USB2.0. Normally, Windows recognises the device in just a few seconds once connected, so I am at a loss as to why it takes such a considerable length of time in WinAMP.

Well, thanks again for the updates - please do keep the betas coming!

Cheers,
James
x

Strange, now WinAMP dies whenever I attempt to connect the drive. Surely, something isn't right here...

Cheers,
James
x

Okay, one more. Well, WinAMP does not appear to die anymore, which is surely a good thing.

I opened WinAMP, watching the memory usage in taskmanager. Initially, the programme only uses approximately 6mb. However, upon disconnecting and reconnecting my MP3 player, the memory usage gradually increases over the course of approximately a minute to over 30mb. Once 30mb is reached (presumably reading the track metadata into the ML) the UI suddenly returns and is usable once again.

Furthermore, this memory is not freed when the ML is closed, leading me to believe that the data is held in memory. Yet, reopening the ML, and navigating to the USB device, there is a noticable delay of three seconds or so (as if the metadata is being reloaded). Is 30mb memory usage typical for caching the metadata of around 4000 tracks?

Slightly strange however is that I can no longer access E: (the mp3 player) in Windows Explorer - it would appear that WinAMP blocks access...?

My apologies for all the questions!
Cheers,
James
x

We're working on a new database back-end for the local media library. Hopefully when that is completed, the pmp_usb plugin could use that for faster metadata + less memory usage (it's nice when it's a win-win situation :)

p.s. good job guys :up:

As Benski mentioned, I plan on supporting this in the near future, once the new ML is complete. This should make things run much more smoothly.

I'm not sure yet as to why its not detecting your device on startup; the devices I have tried it with have all initialized correctly. I'll look into it today. If I cant figure it out, I'll see if I can have you run a diagnostic version of pmp_usb and it might tell me a little more about whats going with your device (if you wouldn't mind).

Winamp is not reading from ID3 if the cache is up to date. The reason for this long delay is probably because of the amount of songs that you have coupled with the fact that xml is not nearly as fast as the ML way of storing song data. Again, in the future, hopefully we can store track information locally in new ML database, which would make things much faster.

The reason winamp takes longer than windows is because windows does not initialize the tags before displaying the device. There may be a way to solve this by displaying the device, then loading the tags.

4000 tracks would have taken ~ 25mb (maybe a little bit more) in v0.3. Ive fixed this problem and you can expect memory usage to shrink to about 46% of what it was before. Track filenames were hogging wayyy too much memory.

Not sure why you are unable to access the device in windows explorer. When do you try to access it? Is it during a time when winamp is doing something with the device? I can access the device in windows explorer fine when it is open in winamp.

Thanks for all of the feedback. :)

Great, thanks for the responses chaps!

Well, now I back to WinAMP dying whenever the MP3 player is connected. So please, feel free to send a debug/diagnostic version whenever you get the chance.

Cheers,
James
x

like WinFS [sigh]! :D

adios!

It works fine for me, except it doesn't delete the empty folders that it creates. No bugs or problems other than that, though I suppose it could go a bit faster.

Good job! Thanks a lot.

Hm. It chokes sometimes. And it doesn't seem to have to do with what file is being transfered. It's just set as "Done" and the remaining "Waiting" tracks aren't transfered. Interesting bug, can't even remove tracks from the queue, or from the player (since the files are still being transfered).

I've got a regular SD/MMC memory card :)

Cheers,
Christopher

I assume the sqlite proposal is back on the cards. If so, WOO!

i read on this website http://www.sqlite.org/ it is look very promising, another media player using is XMMS2. WoW!

Winamp only deletes folders if you delete songs from the device in Winamp using "Remove from device". This is on purpose to prevent unwanted empty folders from being deleted. You also must have "remove empty folders" checked in the config.

If this still doesn't work - what version of windows and winamp are you running? These would help to know.

EDIT: Also, do you have any device permissions (restrictions) set for the device?

What version of winamp are you using with what device? Also, any other information you can give me with this about when this problem occurs would help a lot.

I deleted all of the files in a folder using Winamp's "remove from device" context menu option, and the folder remained on the portable device, empty. I have "remove empty folders" checked in config.

I'm running Winamp 5.24 with Windows XP, probably with the latest Service Pack, whichever that is (I don't know how to check). I also don't know how to view or change device permissions, perhaps someone could tell me. Also, the device I'm using is a Samsung YP-MT6X.

Thanks for your help!