Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year. • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#61

Post by dekz » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:25 PM UTC

mdiep wrote: post #56

Very cool! A few things for you to consider: 1. Consider putting preferences in their own window. This is the standard Mac behavior, and it's a little confusing to have your app do something different. You could also use the standard preferences toolbar look. 2. The artwork for your playback controls looks off. Specifically, I think the anti-aliasing of the circles looks uneven. 3. For the gear menu at the bottom lef…

    6. I was very surprised that spacebar didn't control play/pause and was even more surprised that there is no keyboard shortcut for play/pause.

Seems to work for me.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#62

Post by chetan51 » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:26 PM UTC

Wow, excellent experience importing my library from iTunes. One click and 30 seconds, and it was done. Loved it.

Has all the features that I need, without the extra bloat of iTunes. Perfect.

All it needs is a more beautiful, polished UI. Currently even iTunes looks better, but if you improve the aesthetics, you've beaten iTunes in every way. (Hint: Maybe take a leaf from the book of Sparrow, the Mac Gmail client.) Also, a mini-mode that simply shows the Now Playing list with a search bar to add new tracks.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#63

Post by shinratdr » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:28 PM UTC

overcyn wrote: post #50

shinratdr wrote: post #43

It imported my little "other" iTunes Library of about 1,500 songs, albeit with some stalls. However, for my main 20,000 song library it just crashes out. I hate to say it considering the other feedback, but I'm not a fan of the UI. The giant words instead of icons, off colour and sort of grafted on now playing box, and no ability to hide the "browser" all put me off pretty strongly. Integrated preferences was a bad c…

The sidebar is a "now playing" playlist and I think the most interesting part of the app. When you double click a song it copies the current library into the sidebar. It lets you edit the order things get played, or what gets shuffled. You can drag and drop songs in and out of it. You can hide the browser by right clicking the header and selecting 'hidden'.

> The sidebar is a "now playing" playlist and I think the most interesting part of the app.

Why is mine filled with things that aren't playing and I haven't played? If that is its intended purpose, then it needs to convey that a little better by not filling it with other unrelated content for no reason. As someone who rarely uses sub-lists and typically just flips around the main library, copying the entire existing library to the sidebar isn't a great idea. I get it for playlists and other subsections, not so much for the entire unfiltered library.

> You can hide the browser by right clicking the header and selecting 'hidden'.

Good call, although this is a UI issue in and of itself. No function like that should be hidden behind a right click, something many Mac OS X users don't even know how to do.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#64

Post by phil » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:29 PM UTC

This is very good work.

I've been doing some iOS music work lately and have a pretty good idea of some of the complexity you've dealt with to get to this stage.

Drop me a line if you're interested in chatting (email is in my profile).

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#65

Post by chetan51 » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:32 PM UTC

You don't need iPhone / iPod sync functionality. All you need is for Enqueue to sync back to the iTunes library. So when you change a rating or playlist in Enqueue, it should automatically update the iTunes library and the change should be reflected in iTunes.

Then I can just use iTunes to sync my iPhone / iPod.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#66

Post by chetan51 » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:33 PM UTC

chetan51 wrote: post #65

You don't need iPhone / iPod sync functionality. All you need is for Enqueue to sync back to the iTunes library. So when you change a rating or playlist in Enqueue, it should automatically update the iTunes library and the change should be reflected in iTunes. Then I can just use iTunes to sync my iPhone / iPod.

Seriously, this is the only functionality missing that's keeping me from completely switching from iTunes to Enqueue.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#67

Post by adrinavarro » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:41 PM UTC

Just a question: how can I switch to a side panel, like the first screenshot on the site? I find it mildy annoying having the screen split in two.

Other than that, I love this app. I'm using it to (re)build my music library, something I had pending to do for a long time. Hope you keep working on it, there still a lot to do (dupes, auto-tagging using external databases, syncing back with iTunes, cover download, folder managing…) but I love it and will use it daily. Thanks a lot for your work!

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#68

Post by adrinavarro » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 10:43 PM UTC

adrinavarro wrote: post #67

Just a question: how can I switch to a side panel, like the first screenshot on the site? I find it mildy annoying having the screen split in two. Other than that, I love this app. I'm using it to (re)build my music library, something I had pending to do for a long time. Hope you keep working on it, there still a lot to do (dupes, auto-tagging using external databases, syncing back with iTunes, cover download, folder…

Oh I just found it. Right click on the top header bar of the three columns, 'on left'. Nice. :D

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#69

Post by overcyn » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 11:07 PM UTC

mdiep wrote: post #56

Very cool! A few things for you to consider: 1. Consider putting preferences in their own window. This is the standard Mac behavior, and it's a little confusing to have your app do something different. You could also use the standard preferences toolbar look. 2. The artwork for your playback controls looks off. Specifically, I think the anti-aliasing of the circles looks uneven. 3. For the gear menu at the bottom lef…

Ty for the feedback. nice catch on the artwork being off center.

Re: Show HN: An OS X music library I've been working on for the past year.

#70

Post by calloc » Mon, Nov 07, 2011, 11:16 PM UTC

conesus wrote: post #41

Overcyn, This is phenomenal. Were you a Windows Media Plyaer v8-v11 user? The playlist on the side reminds me of my favorite feature from the WMP8 days, where I could queue up music even while another album played. It was wonderful, and when I went Mac full-time nearly a decade ago, I lost the easy queueing in iTunes (where I had to create a playlist every single time). Bravo, this is a great app and I would love to…

You can add new songs to play to iTunes DJ, if you queue up songs there you can add and remove songs as you please.

The other thing, so far Enqueue does not support syncing back to iTunes, so I won't have my star ratings and all that stuff...