Removing dead Winamp online stuff

[ChiggyChiggy]

Now that the Gracenote integration is dead, pretty much all of the online stuff in Winamp is a ghost town, from the Now Playing to the Playlist generator etc...

I wanna remove them all since theyre of no use, but i have mo idea what plugin controls what or if i remove something will it affect something non-online, help?

[Koopa]

Gracenote only affects the auto tagger, the cd lookup and the playlist generator.

The rest of the online stuff is server side controlled.

So if you want to get rid of dead components, you can uninstall:

ml_plg.dll (Playlist Generator)
ml_autotag.dll (Winamp Auto Tagger)

The CD plugin is still required for CD playback, only the Gracenote lookup won't work. If you don't plan to play audio cds, you can remove in_cdda.dll/ml_disc.dll as well.

[DJ Egg]

You can find a detailed list of all native plugins in these threads

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=364300

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?threadid=199851#list

Note that you can manually remove Online Services (i.e. Channels listed under the Online Services node) by right-clicking them and selecting "Remove".

Some of them are still working, e.g. SHOUTcast Radio (currently undergoing work with an update due soon), LyricsMeaning, MetroLyrics, etc.

You can also manually add or edit any of said Online Services

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=375338

If you want to completely remove the Online Services node, then close Winamp and move ml_online.dll out of the %ProgramFiles%\Winamp\Plugins folder.

Now Playing = ml_nowplaying.dll
Though I think NowPlaying is also meant to be getting a makeover soon...

Podcasts = ml_wire.dll
Though note that you can manually select any Podcast service to use via:
Winamp > Prefs > Media Library > Podcasts > Podcast Directory Service

I've currently got mine set to http://www.allpodcasts.com/Directory/Music
Though I'm still looking out for something that's updated more regularly (and also without any annoying ads or other banners etc).

Gracenote can be disabled by going to:
Winamp > Prefs > Plugins > Input > in_cdda > Config
and unchecking "Use MusicID"

Then, with Winamp closed, you can delete/rename/move these files:
Winamp\System\gracenote.w5s
Winamp\Plugins\Gracenote\*.*

Though ideally, CDDBControlWinamp.dll, CDDBUIWinamp.dll & CddbMusicIDWinamp.dll should be properly unregistered first via the Admin Command Prompt...

Start > Programs > Accessories > System > Command Prompt (Right-click > Run As Administrator)
regsvr32 /u %ProgramFiles%\Winamp\Plugins\Gracenote\CDDBControlWinamp.dll
Enter
Repeat as above for CDDBUIWinamp.dll & CddbMusicIDWinamp.dll
Close Command Prompt.

Playlist Generator = ml_plg.dll
AutoTag = ml_autotag.dll

And I think that's all of them.

We'll be replacing all of those features/services for the next release.
But we've still got a hell of a lot of work to do before we can get said next (awesome) version of Winamp released...


[EDIT]

Koopa beat me to it

[MrSinatra]

Egg,

wouldn't it make sense to put out an interim release with a working mp3 dll and the gracenote / aol stuff etc removed? just something to bridge the last release to what I am sure will be a new awesome radionomy release? (meaning bug fixes and deletions, but not new features?) I do worry that a lot of people who don't come to the forums will really be put off by the last release, and write winamp off as buggy and unusable.

[ChiggyChiggy]

What difference does deleting the Gracenote plugin folder do than unregistering them first btw?

Egg,

wouldn't it make sense to put out an interim release with a working mp3 dll and the gracenote / aol stuff etc removed? just something to bridge the last release to what I am sure will be a new awesome radionomy release? (meaning bug fixes and deletions, but not new features?) I do worry that a lot of people who don't come to the forums will really be put off by the last release, and write winamp off as buggy and unusable.

True sadly >.< Its hard to recommend the very latest version when you say you have to go get stuff and remove stuff in it cuz its sorta broken, esp the mp3 bug since itll affect anyone and everyone at one point and few people would visit a forum to know about it..

[thunderhayes]

This is what happens when you're dealing with a Zombie Llama...

[DJ Egg]

Egg,

wouldn't it make sense to put out an interim release with a working mp3 dll and the gracenote / aol stuff etc removed? just something to bridge the last release to what I am sure will be a new awesome radionomy release? (meaning bug fixes and deletions, but not new features?) I do worry that a lot of people who don't come to the forums will really be put off by the last release, and write winamp off as buggy and unusable.

Yes, it would make sense in an ideal world.
However, we aren't even licensed to use the Fraunhofer mp3 & aac codecs any more.
Everything licensed by/to AOL (Gracenote, Sonic, Fraunhofer, etc) needs replacing before there can be an official new patch or release.
It's a big job and it's going to take some time. Sorry.
We *will* be back - bigger, better & freer than ever before :-)

[MrSinatra]

Yes, it would make sense in an ideal world.
However, we aren't even licensed to use the Fraunhofer mp3 & aac codecs any more.
Everything licensed by/to AOL (Gracenote, Sonic, Fraunhofer, etc) needs replacing before there can be an official new patch or release.
It's a big job and it's going to take some time. Sorry.
We *will* be back - bigger, better & freer than ever before :-)

I understand and I'm not trying to be a PITA; but couldn't u just use free, open source solutions for mp3 and aac? or is that not how it works? I'm all for stripping out gracenote and sonic and just leaving it out and not replaced until a new release. I'm just talking about an interim, bridge maint release to help protect winamps image until the new one is ready.

I know with EAC, it comes with FLAC encoding for example, but if you want mp3 encoding u gotta DL Lame separately. also not ideal, but even that kind of paradigm might be better than what we have now, esp if the wait goes another 6 months or more, b/c the longer it is, the worse its going to make the image issue.

too bad radionomy couldn't negotiate some bridge coverage time to cover the gap in their deal.

[DJ Egg]

The general idea IS to use open source solutions...
However, it's not just a simple case of replacing x with y,
it's a big job to strip out all the old code and replace it with the new code.
The mp3 decoder, for example, is an integral part of Winamp.
And yes, we may well have to tell people to download lame_enc separately (on clean installs).

We also can't really just strip out Sonic without providing a working alternative ripping+burning solution.
Again, it's another big job.

Gracenote to Musicbrainz etc is also a fairly big job.
But when it's done, we'll have a working CDDB + AutoTag feature, a better playlist generator (and one that doesn't crash), and also an album art retrieval service again (Gracenote prevented us from using any other service).

We're working on all the above and more (with, currently, an even smaller team than before), so the current codebase isn't in a state where we can release anything.

When will it be ready? When it's ready!

We didn't know the exact date when the Gracenote license would expire.
We were kind of hoping it was valid until 2015, but obviously not :-(

All we can do is apologize profusely and hopfully promise to get something out as soon as humanly possible.
Sorry again.

[MrSinatra]

I just want to make it absolutely clear that I do understand all that and I'm not complaining, my comments are meant to protect winamp. I patiently await whatever is next, np!

I am sure the new version will rock. I guess all I was trying to say is why not put out a "stripped" yet not replaced maint bug fixed version, until the new big neon light ver is ready?

but if u all don't think it wise to do so, np. I just wanted to know the score and float the idea.

as always, thx for the response. btw, I'd love your response to my thread here:

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=377717

[DJ Egg]

What difference does deleting the Gracenote plugin folder do than unregistering them first btw?

Unregistering them first will keep the Windows Registry clean by removing the relevant CDDB keys & strings.

When you uninstall Winamp, it automatically unregisters those Gracenote DLLs (using the same command line method).
However, if those DLLs aren't present, then it won't be able to unregister them.

Other than that, I guess there'd be no real harm just deleting the folder...

[DJ Egg]

I just want to make it absolutely clear that I do understand all that and I'm not complaining, my comments are meant to protect winamp. I patiently await whatever is next, np!

I am sure the new version will rock. I guess all I was trying to say is why not put out a "stripped" yet not replaced maint bug fixed version, until the new big neon light ver is ready?

but if u all don't think it wise to do so, np. I just wanted to know the score and float the idea.

as always, thx for the response.

Yeah, no worries. I know that you know that I know you understand :-)
Believe me, I wish we could put out a patch release right now. But we can't.
We aren't even supposed to be providing any direct download links for 5.666 either,
because it still contains code licensed to & by AOL.
We need to strip out ALL that stuff and replace it before we can provide anything new (patch or release).

btw, I'd love your response to my thread here:

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=377717

Yes. I agree about the need to be able to edit the TCMP etc flag
(Is a compilation = checked = 1)
Not sure how to implement it properly though, but will read that thread when I've got a spare half hour / life ;-)

[Koopa]

Egg,

wouldn't it make sense to put out an interim release with a working mp3 dll and the gracenote / aol stuff etc removed? just something to bridge the last release to what I am sure will be a new awesome radionomy release? (meaning bug fixes and deletions, but not new features?) I do worry that a lot of people who don't come to the forums will really be put off by the last release, and write winamp off as buggy and unusable.

Sounds more easy than it is.

All of the burning/ripping support in the library is based on the Sonic engine and i guess removing Sonic from ml_disc is the same like coding a new plugin. Same for in_cdda, the whole digital extraction code is using Sonic.

So shipping a version without digital audio extraction, CD ripping or even MP3 playback is no choice.

Ripping/burning, digital audio extraction and MP3 encoding/decoding is just working fine in the last AOL release. The only stuff which won't work is the online stuff.

[DrO]

the points of issue in Winamp currently are the parts that have to be effectively re-written from scratch and is part of the plan for the end of the year release schedule being aimed for (as detailed elsewhere).

a patch installer would be ideal, but as Egg and Koopa have detailed, it's just not possible and the bits that can be provided aren't the parts that are at issue and so would not be helpful in the main part to provide updated versions of.

and it's known that it's not ideal to not be able to put out fixed parts, but this is just what would have happened if Winamp hadn't been sold - at least there's the case that there will be a fixed / new version provided. and it's known that not being able to provide updates is hurting things, but time is the biggest hinderence in getting things done (as i'm behind on getting builds to the internal beta group at the moment due to spending additional time researching replacement solutions for things that need to be replaced or included as part of the new feature set).


so currently, what is currently broken in Winamp (which is mainly online related aspects as well as Gracenote powered features) should be about as bad as it's going to get (assuming i do my job correctly).

[MrSinatra]

sounds good!