Plugin to Permanently Display Title, Artist & Album separately?

[Artec123]

Hi

Please can you let me know if there is a plugin or something that
can display the currently playing Song title, artist & album info separately.
Particularly I am looking for...

- A small window that attaches to Winamp at the top-right or top-left (like DFX plugin)

- Displaying the current Title, Artist & Album
* Separately one below the other (e.g. 3 boxes stacked on one another)
* Non-scrolling
* Classic skin (White letter on Black would be preferred)

Thank you very much for your time.
Andy.

[Artec123]

Wow. Nothing available?

[Aminifu]

Hi Artec123,

There's lots of stuff for displaying song info. Search the plugins. Couple of links below to help you get started. Though they're not exactly what you asked for, i.e. 3 stacked boxes (Why do you want that when 1 box will do?).

http://nunzioweb.com/daz/gen_classicart/index.html

http://nunzioweb.com/daz/tiptop.html

[Artec123]

Hi Aminifu. Thank you very much for replying. I have tried to search
the plugins but have failed to locate any plugin that would meet my (simple?)
requirement. I had already gone through the 2 plugins you mentioned & just
as you say, they aren't of much help.

As to why I want something akin to 3 boxes is simple - to read the song info
at one glance without having to wait. I use classic skin. The single-box info tool
is awful & a time-waster especially with long song titles. You have to wait
for the title -artist to scroll (& you dont get any album info). Making the play list
window wider only makes Winamp look ugly.

3-box solution that is non-scrolling with adjustable boundaries is ideal cuz it keeps
all the relevant song info static throughout the duration of the song just like the
kbps kHz stereo boxes.

Please suggest some ways I can get this.
Thank you.

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by Artec123

The single-box info tool is awful & a time-waster especially with long song titles. You have to wait for the title -artist to scroll (& you dont get any album info). Making the play list window wider only makes Winamp look ugly.

I get what you're saying. I use an old plugin called 'Cover & Tag' v3.4.2. It uses the video window to display album art and information from selected tags. Since I only use WA for playing music, its perfect for me. You have to edit it's configuration file (gen_cover.ini) manually to get it to display more or less than what the default options allow. A text file named 'gen_cover.txt' is installed with the plugin that explains how to edit the configuration file (though not very clearly). I have it setup to display the album art on the left side of the video window and the title, artist, album, track number, year and genre tags on the right side of the video window, with no overlap of the art and tags data.

Info that will not fit on 1 line, due to text type and size and size of the video window, are wrapped around to the next line (no scrolling). There are options to have the album art be automatically re-sized or cropped to fit within the video window. Link below if you want to try it. Run the installer as an administrator.

http://www.angelfire.com/blog/richte...l/plugin5.html

[ujay]

Try switching to the Bento skin, this already has what you want in the form of the File Info window(top centre, settings button bottom right). You can widen this to accommodate long titles and remove the album art component for even more room.

Title
Album
Artist

are all shown fixed.

The 4th line scrolls whatever other components you have selected.

See how you get on with it, change to the Classic Winamp colour theme and you'll hardly notice the difference

UJ

[Artec123]

Aminifu, thanks buddy for a detailed reply. I will surely try it out.
I greatly appreciate you taking out time to respond :-)

Originally Posted by ujay

Try switching to the Bento skin, this already has what you want in the form of the File Info window(top centre, settings button bottom right). You can widen this to accommodate long titles and remove the album art component for even more room.
....
....
See how you get on with it, change to the Classic Winamp colour theme and you'll hardly notice the difference

This is EXACTLY what I needed. Wow! Thank you so much.
Everything is perfect or atleast workable, but please help me out with just one thing - The Playlist.
I would much prefer the playlist like the Winamp Classic. In there I can view/add/remove
several songs in one go. In Bento, this section is rather cramped.
Is there some way to increase its height like in the Winamp Classic skin?

Thanks for your reply :-)

[DrO]

there's a little button with an up-down arrow to the bottom-right of the playlist editor section which will make it expand down.

-daz

[Artec123]

Originally Posted by DrO

there's a little button with an up-down arrow to the bottom-right of the playlist editor section which will make it expand down.

-daz

Thanks DrO. That helped. However, the Media Library needs to be opened as well.
Now winamp literally takes most of the screen space!

I just wished the playlist panel could be separated & re-attached at the bottom
without the media library panel which I never use. I tried Bento Classified
but then with that skin I am back to square 1. The Bento info panel is now gone.

[DrO]

the bento skin is a SUI (single-window) type skin so it's always going to be like that. there's nothing stopping you trying to alter the skin. as an alternative might be a cPro skin (though i don't think that's going to be suitable either).

the bento classified skin is just a classic skin (v2.x type) which will have individual windows.


what exactly was wrong with the classic art plug-in? since that is meant to be close to the fileinfo pane in the bento skin but as a separate window - or am i completely missing what you're trying to achieve.

-daz

[Artec123]

Originally Posted by Aminifu

I get what you're saying. I use an old plugin called 'Cover & Tag' v3.4.2.
...
...
Info that will not fit on 1 line, due to text type and size and size of the video window, are wrapped around to the next line (no scrolling).
...
...

Aminifu, thanks for this solution & the link. It works & looks quite decent.
This way I dont have to change the skin!
Few questions though -

1. Is there a way to disable Album Art? (Doesn't matter much as it can be shrinked to
non-irritating levels )
2. Can we just cut off a long song title instead of it wrapping around to next line?
3. What should I change in gen_cover.ini to have the pic on right & info on the left?

Thanks for your time. :-)


(*EDIT*)

Originally Posted by DrO

what exactly was wrong with the classic art plug-in? since that is meant to be close to the fileinfo pane in the bento skin but as a separate window - or am i completely missing what you're trying to achieve.

DrO, I just tried out Cover & Tag as suggested by Aminifu.
Will you please take a look at the couple of queries I mentioned in this reply? Thank you.

[DrO]

right, so basically you just need an option to disable / hide the artwork if not present (instead of the dummy llama image) and just have it show the file info?

so with the attached mockup screenshot where the current handling (top) would become like the bottom with the option enabled (since it already clips the text instead of wrapping onto another line as seems to be other requirement).

-daz

[Artec123]

Originally Posted by DrO

right, so basically you just need an option to disable / hide the artwork if not present (instead of the dummy llama image) and just have it show the file info?

so with the attached mockup screenshot where the current handling (top) would become like the bottom with the option enabled (since it already clips the text instead of wrapping onto another line as seems to be other requirement).

-daz

* I would prefer an option to hide Artwork irrespective of whether it is present or absent. (Right now, when Artwork is absent, it shows nothing. I like that instead of llama)

* I want it like the top part of your mockup screenshot. (Attachment #1)

* My current setup looks like this (Attachment #2)

However, I would rather it displayed Tag info on the Right (Attachment #3)

Thank you.

[DrO]

not seeing any attachments on your post...

Originally Posted by Artec123

* I would prefer an option to hide Artwork irrespective of whether it is present or absent. (Right now, when Artwork is absent, it shows nothing. I like that instead of llama)

that's why i said disable or hide in my prior reply (obviously it'd be a bit strange to change the albumart plug-in to not show albumart but it seems like a reasonable change i would make to the plug-in when time allows).

-daz

[Artec123]

Oops! DrO, I did attach 3 images & then the post went for Mod-approval. Now I am
getting not a valid image error.

Pic-1 - The cutting of title as I would prefer.


Pic-2 My current setup. Tag-info Right justified


Pic-3 Preferred setup. Tag info Left-justified. Album art goes to Right


By the way, did you code this plugin? That's pretty awesome.
Please allow that left justification to be had.
And if possible few handles in the Gen_Cover.ini file to change font color
for at least the Title, Artist & album separately (Gray & White for sure & maybe others)
FontColorTitle
FontColorArtist
FontColorAlbum

Thank you.

[DrO]

i'm only responsible for maintaining the gen_classicart plug-in, cover&tag is someone elses though since they've not updated it in 4years, it's probably going to be quicker for me to find some time over the next month or so to change gen_classicart to at least allow for toggling the side the albumart appears on, if it's shown or if it's only shown if it's found. the custom colour aspect isn't something i want to add as i want it to keep in with the current Winamp skin.

-daz

[Artec123]

Oh alright. As I mentioned earlier, I don't mind the Album Art (as it is resizeable) & the font
colors were good but a superfluous requirement.

The really important one is the left-justification of the tag info (Pic-3) & trimming of
an overly long title (Pic-1). Will you please address these 2?

Thanks, DrO :-)

[DrO]

gen_classicart already does the ... handling so that's not something to worry about. it's just getting some time to put in handling for swapping the location around that's going to be fun.

-daz

[Artec123]

Originally Posted by DrO

gen_classicart already does the ... handling so that's not something to worry about. it's just getting some time to put in handling for swapping the location around that's going to be fun.

-daz

Wow! I wasn't aware this was your plugin site. I will get to it in a second.

Do I have to uninstall Cover & Tag v3.4.2 in order to try out Album Art Viewer v0.85?
If Album Art Viewer can somehow be tweaked to behave like Pic #3 above, I would be
more than happy

About the site - Playlist Undo v1.1 is an absolute lifesaver that I only recently installed.
I don't know how I went for so long without it (talk of the frustration when an entire
playlist disappeared due to a mis-click!). While I have your attention, can I ask you
to add a simple functionality to this utterly useful plugin.
Redo - Alt+R This counter-action to an Undo is very much needed

Thanks DrO :-)

[DrO]

Originally Posted by Artec123

Do I have to uninstall Cover & Tag v3.4.2 in order to try out Album Art Viewer v0.85?
If Album Art Viewer can somehow be tweaked to behave like Pic #3 above, I would be
more than happy

the 2 should co-exist ok though when i last briefly installed cover&tag, gen_classicart hadn't even been created.

Originally Posted by Artec123

While I have your attention, can I ask you to add a simple functionality to this utterly useful plugin. Redo - Alt+R This counter-action to an Undo is very much needed

it's been on the todo list for the plug-in since at least 2006, is a matter of finding the time since it may seem simple but it requires quite a number of internal changes to get it into how the plug-in works (since redo wasn't something i designed it to do from the start). one day i hope it will be in there....

-daz

[Artec123]

Where would you announce an update to Album Art Viewer plugin other than
the website itself?

Originally Posted by DrO

it's been on the todo list for the plug-in since at least 2006, is a matter of finding the time since it may seem simple but it requires quite a number of internal changes to get it into how the plug-in works (since redo wasn't something i designed it to do from the start). one day i hope it will be in there....

I fully appreciate the nitty-gritties that must be going in when actual coding changes are
to be made though it might seem simple from the outside :-)
My suggestion for the next (small) upgrade would be to have a single redo option.
I think that it should be easier to implement (using some sort of placeholder for the
list that was removed). You may extrapolate this to have 2 or 3 Redo's.
And when you delve fully into it you can then always re-code the Redo mechanism
to work across the whole queue in a more efficient way than this.

Your plugins are useful & awesome!
Thanks for kindly replying to my queries.

[DrO]

Originally Posted by Artec123

Where would you announce an update to Album Art Viewer plugin other than the website itself?

it'd be on the page or in the thread mentioned on the page or it'd appear in my plug-in update rss feed.

Originally Posted by Artec123

My suggestion for the next (small) upgrade would be to have a single redo option.

well it's going to be easier to do it as a complete feature since there is no redo handling in place anyway and just limiting it to 1 action as the same as it being limited to 50 actions. it'll happen eventually, i just cannot say when.

-daz

[Aminifu]

Hi Artec123,

Sorry for the delay in responding. There is a way to keep Cover & Tag from displaying the album art, I can PM you the info if you want. But, there is no way to switch the tag information to the left side of the window nor clip a long tag to prevent wrap-around. The text font, size and color can be changed, but it is not possible to have different colors for different tags. You could try to contact the author, but as DrO noted, he has not been active in quite awhile.

Anyway, DrO's plugin does most of what you want and he has agreed to add some of your feature requests when he can find the time.

[Artec123]

Hi Aminifu. Yeps please do PM me that info.
Thanks buddy.

[DrO]

well we're one step closer as i managed to find the most current copy of the source code which is newer than v0.85 (the fun of machine changes and 16 months since the last update) which makes things a bit easier to start on, now to re-read the source code to remember what went on...

[edit]
well things are on the start though not for what you want as i've finally tracked down a resource leak i noticed ~2months back but hadn't had a chance to look into and fix previously.

[edit2]
and a further update is i've now got the basis of the code in place for the album art to be right-aligned and also the means to auto-hide/hide the album art completely in either mode which i need to add in ui control for.

the main thing then is sorting out the artwork in details mode to not be locked at 100x100 but have it adjust to first showing all of the text and then filling the remaining space (in either orientation as per the attached screenshot which is taken from resizing the window so a 200x200 hard-coded test would work). though am now also wondering if (probably not for the next build) adding the means for the info to be shown above or below the artwork would be useful as well for others.

-daz

[Artec123]

DrO, this is fantastic When can we expect a beta release?

[Aminifu]

Hi,

I never tried DrO's Album Art Viewer since Cover & Tag was working for me. But it seems that Album Art Viewer does not display the title tag. Am I missing something and what tags are displayed if 'details view for the loaded item' is enabled? Also, is there a way to disable the rating info? I'm one of the few people who do not bother with ratings. I don't keep any song that would be low rated in my collection.

[DrO]

Originally Posted by Artec123

DrO, this is fantastic When can we expect a beta release?

when it's done... will most likely pm you a test build directly anyway before it goes out publically.

Originally Posted by Aminifu

But it seems that Album Art Viewer does not display the title tag. Am I missing something and what tags are displayed if 'details view for the loaded item' is enabled?

the aim of the plug-in is to show details about the album and not individual tracks, though i think it was raised as something in the plug-in's discussion thread (and is related to the next part of my reply).

Originally Posted by Aminifu

Also, is there a way to disable the rating info? I'm one of the few people who do not bother with ratings. I don't keep any song that would be low rated in my collection.

it currently does (in the following order):

• Artist
• Album
• Tracks (probably should change that to track #)
• Year
• Genre
• Rating

However, it is discussed on the last page or two of the plug-ins thread about making what is / isn't shown of the track information to be customisable. Since 0.85 with the support was basically an initial implementation to get a feel for if i'd vaguely got things working correctly or not (as what was put in was from what had been first suggested for the details mode which is like the medium option in the library iirc). However that is a hefty change and i'd prefer to get the order of output changed first for the 0.9 release and then work on the custom ordering in the lead up to a 1.0 release.

-daz

[DrO]

Originally Posted by DrO

when it's done... will most likely pm you a test build directly anyway before it goes out publically.

and one has been sent with link and instructions on how to install and enable things (note there are some issues which are mentioned at the end of my pm).

-daz

[Artec123]

Originally Posted by DrO

and one has been sent with link and instructions on how to install and enable things (note there are some issues which are mentioned at the end of my pm).

-daz

Thanks DrO Will try it out. Please assure me that the test plugin will in no way
permanently harm any mp3. Just asking

[DrO]

it shouldn't do anything on the files since it's just using the information Winamp provides. the only possible 'edit' which can happen is if you've enabled writing of ratings into the file and happen to rate a file via the view which would then be handled by other parts of Winamp and not the plug-in itself. so as safe as installing any native plug-in can be.

-daz

[Aminifu]

A beta already!!! When do you sleep?

Originally Posted by DrO

the aim of the plug-in is to show details about the album and not individual tracks, though i think it was raised as something in the plug-in's discussion thread (and is related to the next part of my reply).

it currently does (in the following order):

• Artist
• Album
• Tracks (probably should change that to track #)
• Year
• Genre
• Rating

-daz

Ok, I now understand. I assume the original intent for the 'Tracks' data was to indicate the number of tracks on the album. Since this is not a simple number to determine, the track number of the currently selected/playing track is displayed instead.

Going forward, would you consider adding the title tag for the current selected/playing track? Currently, this plug-in is the only one I would consider as a fall back for when Cover & Tag stops working. Being able to see the track title, without waiting for it to scroll by elsewhere, is very useful.

Any further comments I may have about the Album Art Viewer plug-in will be posted in it's thread. Posting about it here seemed to flow naturally with the discussion in this thread.

[DrO]

Artec123: how did things go with the test build i sent?

Aminifu: i will most likely make it so the details view will allow for the currently selected items title to be shown (if set to show information from the current item) though would be part of the configurable options (or so i hope).

-daz

[DrO]

i'll part bump this thread as i've never heard anything back from Artec123 about the test build which was sent and i've moved things on a fair bit since then that i cannot wait any longer to not release an update as per http://forums.winamp.com/showthread....90#post2847690

-daz