A REALLY LONG idea for context-view (mockups included!)

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From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 02, 2010 10:32:16

All right. It's not really something that belongs as an issue, but I didn't want it getting lost on the discussion board, and it was WAY too long for irc... plus it's easy to upload images here. Apologies in advance, this is going to be long...

People want context views for their music in-player. I don't really see the point, personally, but I understand that it is WANTED. So I've been mulling it over, because if it's going to happen, it might as well be done in an interesting, nice-looking, and (if at all possible) unique way. Going in, I knew I wanted one thing the most: if we're going to have another view, it should probably go in the left pane. While utilizing the left pane means we can't navigate while viewing our precious info, this is multitasking that I don't think anyone is capable of doing anyway. Choosing songs while reading artist bios? Bitch please. As long as we're able to switch to a section (lyrics?) quickly and easily while retaining our place in the other section (library?), this becomes a non-issue.

So what can we do about this? Let's start with what doesn't seem like an elegant implementation (not personal, just the way I feel about said methods):

• buttons above playlist, on the right: I did like that they were out of the way, and don't actually take up space that was in any real use (just part of the filter bar, which was huge anyway). Problems? They opened up a bar on the right, which takes up horizontal space (precioussssss), and the word-buttons themselves feel out of place on that top bar, populated almost exclusively with tidy little icon-based buttons. The real issue there is that there's no good icon equivalent for the three buttons we're trying to use, so words are the only real way to go. Let's move on...
• large buttons spaced vertically on the left: This doesn't mesh with me, for a few reasons. I can see these being used in non-music apps, and they give off a good vibe for a preferences panel (actually, basically how preferences are set up currently), but once again, horizontal space and lack of good icon equivalents for our new features makes this seem less elegant than it could be. I do like that the left bar is used here, though, so it's a step in the right direction.

In the end , I feel like the very first approach (a slide out window with tabs instead of buttons) made more sense (tabs with words definitely makes more sense than word-buttons, and they took up less space that way), but as I said, I'd like to avoid adding another pane. At the same time, I think we can all agree that if we just kept adding tabs to the left pane, it would simply get way out of hand (even though we can now thankfully make the pane thinner than the tabs might allow).

So what do we do?

I was turning this over in my mind last night, trying to think of a really interesting implementation of this. I think I may have figured one out. I have no idea if it's possible to code it, but in theory it seems very cool, and pretty original. It even keeps the player LOOKING streamlined (though in reality the behavior is probably a bit complex). Let's go!

Basically, I started thinking about the Now Playing widget. "there's some context for you," I thought to myself. "Really, all the context I need, right there." I obviously don't get out much. But while I was thinking about it, an idea struck me: if the Now Playing widget is already context-based, why not extend its functionality? Why not take this pretty thing that's already functional eye-candy, and make the thing a friggin button?

I feel like this is the eighth time I've said it, but HERE is my idea:

So, a user runs clementine, and chooses a song. Say, Battery by Metallica. Maybe the user wants to know the lyrics, so they can sing and rock out for a while. So, they mouse over the now playing widget that has already slid up so elegantly, and... well, something happens. I've attached a picture below of mouse-over, represented here by the appropriately-orange star in the corner (other possible implementations might use different icons, or something completely different... the basic idea is to show something is about to happen). Click the album art (or maybe the star, haven't decided yet), and WHOOSH! Just as the album art slides up mysteriously out of nowhere when a song starts playing, we now see the Now Playing widget was only the tip of the iceberg, as it shoots up to the top if the window (obscuring the top tabs), with our context panes below it (also pictured). At the very bottom, we can see upside-down tabs with our three proposed views (and one extra... couldn't decide what to do with the fourth, obviously not necessary).

The idea seems to hit everything I wanted it to, in theory. Everything stays on the left pane, our tabs don't become overly cluttered, we don't actually add anymore buttons, the Now Playing widget adds even more functionality, and people don't have to deal with it if they don't want to.

This idea was made based on the fact that we can make things slide around (and do it in a really sleek manner, I'd add), but I am worried it may not be possible to implement as-proposed. That can obviously be discussed below (I'm cringing at the thought, since I obviously like the idea, and the words "can't be done" would totally take the wind out of my sails). In the meantime, a few important questions to cover:

How to re-hide: I'm figuring probably clicking on the cover art/button again will go back to whatever "top pane" was being viewed (maybe have a different icon in the corner, like a down arrow), and have the original location in said pane remembered (similar to switching tabs currently).

What about the mini-widget: This idea works a lot better when thinking about the larger widget (not done intentionally because I mocked-up the large one, mine just happens to be more button-like). It could certainly work with the smaller one, since there is still a square of album art to click, but it looks more badass with the large widget. I wish we knew how many people were using each...

How to alert users to this functionality: this is a big one. I think it needs to function similarly to how clem alerts users to an empty library on first open, though it's trickier since the widget hides itself until a track is playing. Perhaps on first track play (of first run) it can show some sort of popup over the widget? Maybe a subtle glow around the edges to entice a user to mouse-over/click? Some sort of HEY, CLICK ME kind of thing. After that, it's simply a matter of publicizing the feature big time when a new release comes out, and after that, word of mouth can do the rest.

So... yeah. That was my huge-ass proposal. MAN I love to talk. Anyway... thoughts? Ideas? Questions? Comments?

Attachment: BUTTON.png context_mockup.png

Original issue: http://code.google.com/p/clementine-player/issues/detail?id=839

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 02, 2010 02:04:31

To my taste, all context information must be opened as another tab alongside with play lists tabs. I'd prefer such way rather current trunk state (as in QTCreator) or these two shots.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From john.maguire on October 02, 2010 04:42:35

Labels: tldr

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 02, 2010 08:59:24

Thanks guys.

tl;dr: click the album art, album art slides up, context info below. Click album art again, player returns to previous state. My apologies for being passionate about something.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From davidsansome on October 02, 2010 19:35:12

John: I know you don't give a shit about the user interface but please don't put down those who do. The primary goal I have with Clementine is to recreate the (in my opinion) perfect user experience that came with Amarok 1. By so openly disparaging people who are trying to achieve the same thing you're damaging the project and making yourself look like a fool. Yes I'm pissed off.

Zach: Sorry I didn't respond to this issue sooner. I had actually hoped when I committed the user interface changes that it would spark some discussion and hopefully get you to come up with something better for me :)

the word-buttons themselves feel out of place on that top bar

I know, I felt that as well - it seemed like a sensible idea in theory to put them over there, they were logically disconnected from the other tabs (choosing music vs. getting info about music), and it seemed like a good idea for the buttons to live on the right if the info was appearing on the right. But they definitely didn't look right up there.

precioussssss

I tend to treat horizontal space as expendable since I have a widescreen monitor. We do need to still cater to those who don't, though.

large buttons spaced vertically on the left [...] I can see these being used in non-music apps, and they give off a good vibe for a preferences panel

I guess you've already twigged I nicked the interface from Qt Creator: http://labs.qt.nokia.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/creator-screenshot.png . I am worried that using such a similar interface element might confuse users who have used used other similar apps before. Personally I'm (obviously) very familiar with Qt Creator so this interface feels really natural to me. I'm keen to know whether that's the same for everybody, or whether it's just me.

I think we can all agree that if we just kept adding tabs to the left pane, it would simply get way out of hand

Agreed completely. Even adding the devices tab was pushing it a bit far imo.

I obviously don't get out much.

:-)

Why not take this pretty thing that's already functional eye-candy, and make the thing a friggin button?

Yes! One of the ideas I had was to add left and right arrows to the now-playing widget that appear when you mouse-over the widget, like the iPhone has when you're viewing photos. Clicking an arrow would cycle through album art, lyrics, artist info or song info. My idea was to shove all that info into that tiny box (perhaps by reducing the font size), but I felt that there was too much to display all at once, and the arrows might be too fiddly to use.

appropriately-orange star in the corner

I like the star :) The white-gradient-background-overlay-thing is a nice touch too.

WHOOSH! Just as the album art slides up mysteriously out of nowhere when a song starts playing, we now see the Now Playing widget was only the tip of the iceberg, as it shoots up to the top if the window

This is the bit I'm not sure I like the sound of. The now-playing widget is pretty cool the way it slides up out of the bottom of the window, but I think that only works because it's so (relatively) small. I feel that a whole panel sliding up from the bottom would look a bit out of place. Also I'm not keen on hiding (even temporarily) the main navigation controls (library, files, internet). I can easily imagine my grandmother clicking on the shiny-looking star and then being unable to figure out that she needs to click the star again (which has now moved to the opposite edge of the screen) to undo it and get back to browsing her album of 1940's hit singles.

I wish we knew how many people were using each...

Me too. I'd love to add some kind of phone-home feature so we could gather some statistics but I fear too many people would be scared off by misplaced privacy concerns.

So, yeah, I think the most important points here are:

1. Having everything on display at once - it has to be obvious how to get back to "my music".
2. Presenting two different "modes" - one for choosing music and the other for learning about it.
3. Saving horizontal space.

I (earlier today) added a separator to the sidebar to do number 2, maybe number 3 can be implemented by having a couple of different modes for the sidebar (switchable by right-click menu): Large icons on left, small icons on left, small icons on top.

Please don't let (any of) this put you off. Some of us do actually care about making Clementine good and do really value your input.

Labels: -Priority-Medium -tldr Priority-High

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 02, 2010 22:21:12

I appreciate you. Thanks.

Down to business... I would start by saying that I certainly agree with the three important points you've laid out (though I have some idea on working around #1). I'm not a huge fan of the Qt Creator style. For one thing, it gets rid of the tabs we were already using, which I think made a lot of sense for what we already had. The tabs took up very little space, as well, where the side buttons can only add width to what we're doing. The vertical space the tabs took up was comparatively negligible, and the (previously mentioned) fact that we have no universal icons for our three new sections makes the idea less attractive (though I will admit readily that you've made it look very nice for what it is). Ultimately, the idea works well for Qt Creator because that side pane IS most of its interface. We already have a ton of buttons and other various ways to make this music player function in a somewhat minimalistic and (I apologize for overusing this word) elegant manner, and it just seems to make this sidebar look out of place. Maybe it's just me, but I really do prefer the tabs here. I'd say minimalism is why I did prefer the word buttons on the right to the Qt Creator style on the left (though I obviously didn't care for the extra pane)... at least it could be hidden, and not consistently take up more space.

I would also say that I know my idea is a mammoth change, one that would need to be set in place after careful consideration to not utterly confuse users. The LAST thing I want to do is confuse your grandmother (she's got good taste, by the way). Your comment did clue me in to the fact that were we to actually make the whole panel slide up, we'd definitely want the user to know how to OMGZ CHANGE IT BAAAAAACK!!! I've added in the attached picture a mockup which would keep showing a down arrow (I used a tango icon, linux could probably use system theme or something) on the same corner of the album art (whether moused-over or not), to give an explicit hint that normalcy is a mere click away. I had a few other ideas, one of which being that we'd move the panel up, but not hide the top tabs (clicking one would move the panel back down, perhaps always keeping the top and bottom tabs visible?), but this seemed like a bad idea, since having visible tabs on top and bottom just seems confusing and odd. An ever-present icon seemed the best way to go, here.

The main reasons I still think I have something here are as follows:

1. preserves our horizontal space - important, and no extra panes means a less busy player
2. builds upon existing (super sleek) functionality - I still LOVE that the art slides out the way it does, and I never would have thought to do it in a million years. Moving the whole panel is indeed a huge movement, I definitely agree, but it really clicks with me. I like the idea that Clementine has additional functionality hidden under its various peels (sorry...), and I think as long as we can make users aware of how to operate it, the fluidity of the final implementation will blow people away (even grandma!). I just wish I could code it myself, it'd save you the trouble and I could show you how nice I think it'll be in action. I'm sure it's going to take more code-magic than the last two ideas you tried, too.
3. I dunno. I told my friend, and she really liked it? :P

I'd be interested to hear other concrete ideas, but I still feel strongly that I've got something here. Obviously it'll be your call, however we go. Thank you for taking me seriously (when I want to be :P).

Attachment: context_mockup_2.png

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 03, 2010 00:55:51

Not to fond of this idea myself, the sliding up/down animation wastes seconds each time you want to switch between lyrics and collection. Switch between two categories enough times and the sliding will start to piss you off big time.

Why not just use the Amarok 1.4 setup? Vertical tabs on the side for categories and horizontal tabs on the top for each subcategory, seems like the best solution to me.

I like the current setup too, not too fond of the three buttons, but those can be compressed into a single button that shows/hides an additional context panel (lyrics, artist etc), though that would mean less horizontal space.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 03, 2010 01:42:42

If something like this does get implemented, please consider adding a static button somewhere, chasing the artwork around the interface would get really tedious.
Examples of possible placement below.

Attachment: slide1.gif slide2.gif

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From john.maguire on October 03, 2010 08:48:29

Zach: I didn't mean any offence by my comment, it was just a joke, Sorry.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 03, 2010 11:05:18

It's okay. I guess I just went into it anticipating a negative reaction, or at least some actual feedback. I think if I'm going to keep pitching ideas I'd better thicken up my skin. Do you care for the idea in any way? I was hoping for some feedback from you, since you are a dev...

The classic buttons-on-the-left-side approach of older amarok has been considered, but their devs caught a lot of flack for it. I guess it's a "huge no-no" in terms of gui design, and I'd at least agree that while it was pretty effective, it wasn't the prettiest way of getting things done. I'm doing my best to figure out an idea that won't just crib from amarok once again, also (though the player was utterly fantastic, and we probably wouldn't be here discussing without it).

My thoughts on chasing the album art around: although I made the mockup thinking you might have to press the star to make the pane shift, I think now that the whole album art would certainly be clickable (with the star being just a visual indicator of... clickiness?). As such, chasing what for most users will be a GIANT PICTURE seems like it wouldn't be as big an issue as people might think (especially since you'd want to keep the panel somewhat wide to actually make it usable in context mode, properly displaying lyrics and such). I like this better than the dedicated button idea, but maybe I'm not understanding your idea properly? what's going to happen when someone clicks that button?

As far as the animation itself, I don't see it taking more than a second to complete. It's important in the concept not to make it instant, because I want users to know where it's coming from (partly wow-factor, and partly so they can already have some idea of how the player will go back to normal). As I said in my first post, if you're looking up lyrics on a song, or checking out the artist, you're likely not also searching frantically for another song to add in your library. However, your position in the library pane (and others) would be preserved for when you click back, and playback buttons will still allow you to pause the song if you absolutely MUST keep reading about said artist (if that's a concern). I obviously would like to try the feature out myself, and can't give definitive answers without doing so, but it seems like the feature wouldn't be one you would constantly clicking back-and-forth in, and therefore would (I hope) never get annoying. The animation part is what I could see getting the most tedious, but I think if done in a quick enough manner it won't start to suck for an impatient user.

But don't just go on my word... Download svn and try the side panel that's currently in there. When you're looking at lyrics and such, do you find yourself clicking back to the library tab a lot? Like, more than once during a song? If not, it really doesn't seem like it would tax users much. Tabs within each mode will still be instantaneous, so this one animation is the only "issue" people would have to deal with. I just don't see it being a big problem, personally.

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From phoebe@spambog.com on October 03, 2010 14:53:43

I don't see the problem with tabs on the left, it's space efficient, practical and everybody understands it.
Shifting interface parts and superfluous animations on the other hand are a no-go in my book. They impose the unnecessary need to hunt for your click target, make the interface visually fidgety and the shiny novelty of an animation wears out quicker than you could animate them.
Rant mode continued: Another complete design failure is that bread crumb thing in A2, more clicks, nesting and targeting for the same task, brilliant.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From gobnuts on October 04, 2010 06:26:42

I'm with Comment #10 on this.
The way old Amarok handled it was quite nice and - at least to me - intuitive. The vertical tabs were nice and efficient and what I also like(d) is the ability to turn off entries you don't need. I also really appreciate the functionality of using the scroll-wheel to change tabs there.

I just got the new version of Clementine and I gotta say that I'm not too fond of the new bar on the left. It's a little too big and breaks the overall appearance of Clementine.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 04, 2010 18:03:05

sigh

Well, I prefer the old amarok sidebar immensely to any of the other ideas... as long as it's pulled off in an attractive way. The ability to hide side tabs you don't use is pretty nice, as well.

Can't fight city hall, I guess. David makes the final call, though, so if he doesn't want to do it it's back to the drawing board.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 04, 2010 19:04:33

maybe I'm not understanding your idea properly? what's going to happen when someone clicks that button?

Dang, not sure why, but the animations don't play on the website, but they do play after you download them. Basically you click the button and the lyrics pop from behind the artwork or the artwork slides up with the lyrics.
I'm not fond of this idea either, but at least the position of the button stays the same so you can click it without thinking whenever you need to.

As long as the animation can be disabled I have nothing against it. I can see how people can enjoy that sort of stuff, I just need to see the lyrics when I press the button :)

My number one choice is still the old Amarok interface.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From darko.ronic on October 04, 2010 23:49:34

I agree with comments #10 and #11. Tabs on the left are great. What's even better is having both horizontal and vertical tabs like Amarok1 had. It saves space, simplifies the user interface and makes it easier to work with. And on top of that, having vertical tabs allows you to hide the tabs (again, like Amarok1) so the playlist is bigger. IMHO I would really like if Clementine followed the Amarok1 principle in designing user interface because that was probably the most intuitive interface I've ever worked with in a music player.
Just my 5 cents. :)

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 05, 2010 00:07:10

I don't understand why context information on the left is great. If you, say, look at artist info, you need much wider panel rather library tree does have. This is a reason artist info must be (at least) as wide as play list is. IMHO.

Don't keep in mind lyrics only, please!!

Lyrics on wide panel is acceptable. Html page about artist (with photos, tables, lists and so on) is not acceptable on narrow panel.

Another question - synching context with "now playing". There are, of course, two possible ways - to sync or not to sync :-) Syncing looks cool (automation, civilization), but to my taste "not to sync" option is "must have". Saying another words - opened by request and fogot.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 05, 2010 04:13:42

I'd say that a width of 300 - 350px is more than enough for any type of info that Clementine may display about artist, song, etc. That's pretty reasonable for a wide screen display.
Even the Last.fm scrobbler doesn't use that much space (as wide as the playlist) for the artist bio, in fact, even the Last.fm website uses roughly 350px, minus the padding, for the artist bio.
The panel is resizeable anyway so I don't see the problem with this.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 05, 2010 04:41:07

1. Look, say, at this wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_coltrane Then narrow a browser to 350 px.
2. I'm sure it is bad idea to suggest wide users' screens. Say, I hate them. At any case it is a matter of individual taste, isn't it? Forcing user to move panels splitter every time she wants to see artist info... Well, do you seriously say about it as about something acceptable?

Moreover, at any case library tree is not too wide by defenition - tree depth is strictly limited. Even with wide screen and wide left panel you will get very "pleasure" big wite spot on the screen.

1. I don't understand why to prefer questionable variant when we have good one in hand (I mean wide play list panel). Yes, I know: to invent problems with the aim to get adrenalin in overcoming them - it is common human way :-) But for wide spreaded software, as Clementine is intended to be, such way isn't reasonable, I think.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 05, 2010 08:36:23

I disagree completely, and until I see a mockup that convinces me otherwise, I don't think you have a case. I'd rather get rid of wikipedia lookup than have a humongous pane covering the actually-important playlist pane, when all I'll ever use context for is the non-width-intensive lyrics pane (if I use it at all). Why wouldn't someone just look up the wikipedia article in browser, anyway? I'm entirely unconvinced that having an additional means of navigating here in something I use to simply play and organize my music is in any way necessary. If it's going to be added, I DO feel that it should be unobtrusively in the left pane.

Anyway, did you ever use classic amarok? They made left pane context work just fine. Obviously we'll need to use a smaller font to display it better, but I don't really see that being an issue... if you want it bigger, why not look it up the way it was intended to be read?

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 05, 2010 08:54:06

You just show I have mentioned above: there are different use cases for different users. Say, I'm never interested in lyrics but am interested in artist article from wikipedia. It isn't contention, it's just different way to use the app.

Yes, I have used Amarok 1.4. And - what? It doesn't mean that decision was great. It is funny, along with many crazy things, A2 now permits to arrange context with playlist (I mean tabs).

As for fonts size - please, don't forget not all users have perfect eyesights. Again, this is a matter with the same question: does Clementine force users to do some extra efforts, or not - as with panels splitter.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 05, 2010 09:14:25

@andrew.gaydenko

1. That's pretty much a layout issue, cut the navigation section and shift some images around and it's pretty usable and you should't have that amount of information displayed in Clementine anyway.
   You should have a short description of the artist/album/whatever and a link directing you to the web address where you can find out more, just like in the Last.fm scrobbler.
   You basically want a full-fledged web browser integrated in a music player, that just seems overkill to me.
2. I'm not suggesting that you should manually move the splitter, the program could resize the panel to a more appropriate width each time you click the context menu.
   As for widescreen, it's more or less standard now.
3. I prefer to think of it as tried-and-true instead of questionable, since this setup worked very well on Amarok 1.4

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 05, 2010 09:58:20

for I_am_the_nightfly@yahoo.com:

1. Let's permit anybody keep own taste intact, aha? :-) - I mean "you should" and "you shouldn't", "you want".. You see, I'm free to have own visions, as well as anybody is.

Qt is going with WebKit, and it would be obvious decision (I hope) to use it for presenting wikipedia information about an artist. With WebKit we all have almost efforts-free perfect web content rendering. Again - why to reject something we already have? It isn't overkill, it is already there.

1. Resizing depending on context is even more eyes-evil, isn't it? Well, I see, somebody free to prefer jumping UI.

As for screen width standard - well, at first, there isn't such one. As for monitors, even in my location (deep russian province) we have wide set of suggestions for any proportions. Next, there are plenty other devices (netbooks, notebooks, ...) with, again, different proportions.

1. Tastes again. From my POV, this worked awful on Amarok 1.4 :-)

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From ioansolteanu on October 05, 2010 13:34:24

1. So keeping my tastes intact means sticking a web browser in my music player? If a web browser is what you want from a music player, why not just use Songbird instead of Clementine? :P
   Joking aside, it seems more reasonable to just offer some basic info and let the user decide if he wants more by offering a link alongside which can be opened by his favorite browser.
2. True enough, it was a poor solution.
3. Agree to disagree it is :).

I say we just wait and see a more polished implementation for the artist info first and pick this up afterwards, for now this back and forth is going nowhere :).

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 05, 2010 13:42:50

1. Probably I'm wrong, but to my feeling it is already coomon practice to use "web browser widget" in different apps.

Agree, some short information with carefully prepared :-) external links is accepted way also.

I say we...

Probably we supply Clementine developers with evening reading and nightly dreaming :-)

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 09, 2010 19:46:46

Hey, thanks for r2115 , it's nice to have options. Set mine back to tabs on top, but I definitely like and appreciate the small sidebar (classic) and the icons on top is very pretty (just wish I could think of a more expressive icon for the context stuff...). Questions: should the small sidebar panes perhaps expand vertically to the height of the player, and not leave any empty space at the bottom? Should we be able to hide individual tabs/buttons, or will it get too "busy"? If hide is made available, we could add a "restore to default" option to the pane's right click menu as a fallback.

And which one do you want as the new default? The large pane, I'm assuming?

Also feel like the three context options should be merged into one button that can be toggled through (felt this way about library and file view tabs, as well), which would indirectly solve our thee buttons, one icon issue, but there's such a crazy large amount of into in each section (potentially) that having one "context" section (even if you could only maximize one at once) would probably get too busy.

Anyhoo. Thanks again.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From davidsansome on October 10, 2010 06:20:09

Yeah I took the easy way out - instead of making one awesome UI, make four bad UIs and let the user choose ;) I'll find some more icons for the three different context tabs eventually - I'm just using the same one atm out of lazyness.
I've never liked it when vertical tabs expand to the full height. Amarok 1 used to do this, but KDE4 apps seem to have moved away from the idea (see Kate). It looks daft on really big monitors, and I can't see any usability advantage of doing so.
I'm not fond of options to hide individual buttons either - if screen space is an issue there are other layouts now.

Yesterday I was thinking of making the large sidebar the default, but now I've made the small sidebar prettier I'm not so sure any more :D

I'll probably merge the song info and lyrics tabs together (and have lyrics in collapsible sections).

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 10, 2010 17:59:34

Ooh. The new small sidebar is very pretty. Has the sleek look of the large one, but takes up way less space. Very cool. I agree with your other points, as well.

Honestly, unless you or someone else on this thread are planning on continuing to use them, I'd drop the large sidebar (small is way nicer in comparison), and the icons on top (just because people may find it confusing, even though I do think it's cute) at this point. You can keep them if you're attached, but having two pretty solid options feels more than sufficient. What do you think?

Other thoughts... should the song/artist info buttons/tabs be accessible when nothing is playing? I feel like it makes more sense for them to be greyed out, or whatnot. In those two sections, can we have the player remember which sections we've minimized ("collapsed") for future plays? I'm only going to be using song info for lyrics, for example, so I'd like to be able to see them immediately, and not bother looking at the lastfm stuff.

Actually, I shut off scrobbling and the love/ban buttons... why am I seeing lastfm stats in the first place? Is that something that can be detected by the player?

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From andrew.gaydenko on October 11, 2010 00:11:38

I see, context-related work is in progress. So, just another opinion instead of a new issue. Context font size seems to be less rather default one. As a result, context information is almost useless for my eyes (I need to spend too many energy to read such small font). OTOH, spacing between lines is big, and it is fine! :-)

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 16, 2010 21:53:39

I'm liking the ability to set font size, and I'm REALLY liking line breaks playing nicely with context info now. Two points:

• I am of the mind that lyrics should go back to wrapping if the pane isn't wide enough. A horizontal slider isn't shown currently (though I can navigate left and right with the arrow keys), but I don't think it would be a good idea anyway. Anyone reading/singing their lyrics won't want to be sliding back and forth every line. If people want it to look "prettier" they can widen their panel on songs with longer lines, but as some songs will inevitably be written/grabbed in long-line form, wrapping would be optimal. Font size helps a bit, but is more useful for fitting a song vertically, anyway.
• I'm liking the artist pictures that are being grabbed, but most of them are comically wide for the way my panel is set (many of them not being perfect squares contributes to this). Is there any code magic that could be worked for the larger images to resize to a maximum horizontal width (i.e. panel width)? This will make the panel prettier in general, and if an image is too small, the user has the option of widening the panel, or using the handy "show fullsize" option you've given them. I do think this is a good idea, despite then losing the images-of-uniform-height thing we've got going on. Better to see the image as intended.

Besides that stuff, the context info seems to be coming along very nicely. Most excellent work!

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From davidsansome on October 17, 2010 04:11:46

I can't reproduce the problem with lyrics not wrapping. Does it happen on every song or only some? Can you tell me which song it's happening with, and what Qt style you're using?

Artist pictures should be limited to 400px wide already, but maybe that was a bit too big - I've reduced it to 300px now. I'm not sure scaling to panel width makes sense, since the height is fixed anyway and it'll look weird when you resize the panel and all the images start to shrink.

On the topic of sidebar style, I started off loving the wide side buttons but I've been using the small sidebar more and more and I really like it - considering setting that as the default instead of the wide buttons. Do you guys agree?

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From Antony256 on October 17, 2010 05:18:53

I have the issue of not wrapping. It's the tags that don't wrap because they are not multi-line that cause this for me.

Small sidebar as a default for sure.

One point. Song and Artist tabs starting completely empty is weird on slower connections. Blur effect and Empty sections or Lorem Ipsum info maybe?

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From himynameiszacHandiamapirate on October 17, 2010 10:11:05

Hm. Actually, I'm only seeming to have the font issue in very specific cases. I only seemed to be getting it in my A Perfect Circle - Rose lyrics grabbed from elyrics (further testing, this is also happening with their song Weak And Powerless). The font was showing up different (larger) than the other lyric providers, as well. Other providers are showing up properly, and in fact, elyrics mostly seems to display correctly besides these two songs, thusfar. The only thing I can think of is that I may have right clicked and "change font"'D for those songs specifically, but A - That definitely applies globally, and B - I'm pretty sure I shrunk the fonts because they weren't wrapping already, so...

Antony, I guess I'd ask if you're only experiencing the non-wrapping with the elyrics lyrics specifically? My tags are wrapping, so that's not the issue over here, at least.

Haven't tried the latest build yet, but I will let you know about the new image resizing values. I also vote for small sidebar as default (as you already knew), you made it look very nice.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From Antony256 on October 17, 2010 11:42:31

You can make anything non-wrap. Just make the panel smaller than your largest single tag (not single line of tags). If you then hide the tags, the lyrics/bio wrap fine.

[Clementine-Issue-Importer]

From davidsansome on November 21, 2010 08:49:27

Status: Fixed