BubbleDS: a Control Point for Android 2.1+ (in development)

[bubbleguuum]

BubbleDS is a DS Control Point for 2.1+ Android devices with WiFi connectivity.

Changelog

1.0.0

BubbleDS 1.0 released

- new: support for pre Cara6 devices
- new: initial support for dBpoweramp Renaissance as a Linn unit, although 2 issues remain:
- elapsed time sometimes not refreshed correctly
- in Library, sending track for playing will only add tracks to playlist. Play must be triggered from the Playlist.
- fix: rare and uncommon crashes
- fix: Library: on initial browse of a folder, alphabetical sections did not display
- fix: Now Playing: shuffle/repeat state was not correctly set when changing active DS
- chg: on very first app launch, do not set an external Linn Preamp as active unit (too confusing). Set only a DS or DS-I (if found)
- chg: Playlist: view type (albums or tracks) now retained after changing tab
- chg: Playlist/Library: lower album art quality on 16mb devices (HTC Wildfire for example)
- chg: allow app to be installed/moved to external SD card (untested)

0.9.7 (expires: February 15th)

- new: support for external Linn Preamps:

• automatically used for volume control when linked to a DS
• listed as separate devices for source switching and volume control
  

- chg: on resuming app, re-enable wifi if disabled
- chg: Now Playing: artist and album on separate lines
- chg: Now Playing: limit album art size to 500x500 to avoid possible Out Of Memory errors
- chg: Playlist/Library (in album headers): display correct Album Artist for Twonky albums (if Album Artist available)
- fix: possible DS / MS search failing on start depending on unlucky timings
- fix: Library: various inconsistencies: empty folder, folder with wrong content, ...
- fix: Library: don't display "Enqueue All", "Play All" in item context menu if current folder do not contain tracks
- fix: Library: browse error with registered version of Asset
- fix: Playlist: Various Artist albums where not correctly grouped as album in some cases
- fix: a few obscure crashes

0.9.0 (expires: January 31th)

revamped UI:
- iOS tab style at bottom (Android classic tabs still available in Settings)
- Now Playing: updated buttons/sliders
- all pages have new headers (can be disabled in Settings) offering better discoverability of some features
- Library: animation when navigating folders (can be disabled in Settings)
- Library: if a folder is an album display the artist below the title
- Library: tapping header goes up one level. On the top level, tapping the Library name display the Library chooser
- Library: adding/enqueuing tracks to Playlist is now a blocking operation that can be cancelled with the Back button. This was needed to fix some Playlist update related crashes

- display album duration in album headers
- Now Playing: display Composer below track title (if composer is known, and enabled in Settings)
- Now Playing: fixed Source selection menu not selecting correct Source on some products
- Now Playing: if playback is stopped, next/prev go to next/prev song in playlist but do not start playback
- optimized memory usage
- Library: better reporting of browse errors
- fixed many infrequent crashes related to playlist, bitmap handling.
- fixed obscure crashes
- workarounded bug in some LaCie NAS running old Twonky, preventing it from being listed
- attempt at fixing discovery problems when lots and lots of Media Servers and DS on LAN (Linn HQ)
- prevent album art cache directory from being scanned by Android (for indexing images)


Notes

• crashes are automatically submitted online (no personal data is sent, just details on the Android device and a backtrace).
• compatibility with Media Servers: a popup will display if the app cannot parse metadata for a particulear Media Server and a log is automatically submitted.
• the app is meant to work in portrait mode so landscape is disabled. There might be a Now Playing landscape mode in a future version.
• for high res album art to be sent with Twonky 6.0.28, you have to tell twonky that BubbleDS is a "Linn DS Control Point" in the Media Receiver configuration
  

Documentation

Volume Handling

By default, hardware volume keys control DS volume. This can be disabled in the Preferences. Hardware volume keys work in all tabs (Now Playing, Playlist, Radio, Library). Volume change is only applied when the key is released (and not in successive steps. If Volume is muted, using any volume key unmutes.

It is also possible to display a volume bar on the Now Playing screen (in the Preferences screen) To prevent dangerous volume changes (going from 30 to ...90), it is not possible to increase volume by just tapping the slider. Direct tapping can still be done to decrease volume. To increase volume, the slider must be moved slowly. If there are too many positions missing during slide, volume change is discarded to prevent accidental changes.

Library Search

The search functionality can be invoked pressing the regular search button from any tab.
It will aggregate 4 searches performed on the current Library, in a single result screen:

- UPnP search on album names
- UPnP search on track names
- UPnP search on artist names
- Local search in the currently displayed folder in the Library tab.

UPnP search submit the search query to the remote Media Server, if it supports it (Twonky and Jamcast do, Asset do not, foobar2000 partially).
Local search is only performed when search is invoked from the Library tab.

Found items can then be selected and played using regular controls.

Search history can be cleared at any time in the Settings

Common menu actions for all tabs

• Settings: show the Preference page
• Mute: toggle mute on/off
• Standby: toggle standby on/off
• Exit: exit application
  

Now Playing Tab

• prev/play/next buttons: self explanatory.
  It is possible to quickly get back to the beginning of current track by pausing the track then using the prev button.
• tap on cover (if source is Playlist): show the seek panel with shuffle and repeat buttons + technical track info (bitrate, codec, ...)
• swipe right/left on cover: next/prev track or radio
• long click on cover: show track in Playlist tab (in Album View mode)
• When track is paused, elapsed time blinks.
  

Menu actions:

• Linn DS: show a popup to select make a different Linn DS active (without going to the Preferences page)
• Source: change the source between Analog, Toslink, Spdif
  

When selecting an analog source, the volume slider is always displayed regardless of the relevant setting in Preferences.

Playlist Tab

Menu actions:

• Show playing: makes the playing track visible in the playlist (same as long click on the Menu Key)
• Clear playlist: clear the playlist
  

The playlist is populated by adding tracks from the Library tab (or another Control Point).

Tapping a track plays it. Tapping it again pauses it.

There's 2 view modes for the Playlist. Track mode display single tracks and Album mode group tracks by album. The current mode can be changed using the appropriate menu option. The default mode is configurable in the Settings.

At any time, the current playing track can be made visible by holding the menu button (this button usually pop the search dialog).

Several tracks can be selected in the playlist to perform a common action:

• swipe left or right on a track: select or unselect the swiped track. A selected track has a blue title
• swipe left or right on a album header (in album view mode): select or unselect all the tracks of that album
  

Track context menu actions (long click on a track):

• (if no selection) remove track: removed clicked track from the Playlist
• (if multiple item selected) Remove selected tracks: remove the selected tracks from the Playlist
• (if multiple item selected) Clear selection: unselect all selected items
  

Album context menu actions (long click on an album header, in Album View mode):

• remove album: remove all tracks of the selected album
  

Library tab

To select the current Media Server, use the Library action from the menu.

The app title bar (if displayed) shows the progress of loading folders. It is not necessary to wait that a folder is loaded before entering another one, as loading will resume if interrupted.

The back key is used to navigate up to the parent folder.

Most actions on folder or tracks or a selection of them is done using the context menu (long click on an item).

Single click (tap) action on a track is configurable in Settings. By default it sends all the tracks to the Playlist and plays first track.

Multiple items in lists (whether they are folders or tracks) can be selected as described in the Now Playing section, to perform an action. Selected items titles appear in blue.


Context Menu actions on folders (long click)

• Play: load the folder and send its content to the playlist and plays first track
• Enqueue: enqueue the folder's content to the end of the playlist
• Play selection / Enqueue selection: same than Play / Enqueue when several folders have been selected
• Clear selection: unselect any selected folders
  

Context Menu actions on tracks (long click):

• Play / Enqueue : play or enqueue the clicked tracks. Play replaces the Playlist content.
• Play All / Enqueue All: play or enqueue all the tracks. Play replaces the Playlist content.
• Play selection / Enqueue Selection : play or enqueue the selected tracks. Play replaces the Playlist content.
  

Settings

• Linn DS and Library: Show the currently active DS and Media Server and allow to change it. Active DS can also be changed from the Now Playing tab, and the Media Library from the Library tab.
• Show Time Elapsed: show playing track elapsed on Now Playing screen (only when playing from the Playlist)
• Show Next Track: show next playing track if any (only when playing from the Playlist)
• Show Volume Panel: show a volume slider and up/down volume buttons. Always displayed if current source is an Analog one.
• Show Seek Panel: show initially the seek panel
• Group By Album: set grouping by album the default mode in the Playlist Tab. The mode can be switched using the "Album View" or "Track View" menu action in the Playlist Tab.
• Show Playing Track Time: In Now Playing and Playlist tabs, change the time display to remaining time, elapsed time, or disabled.
• Cursor follows playback: If enabled, the playing track is automatically made visible in the playlist
• Track Tap Action: set the action when tapping a single track in the Library
• Load Album Art: enable/disable album art loading. Disabling album art can make the app faster and consumes less memory. This setting has immediate effect.
• Volume Keys: enable/disable the use of hardware volume keys to change DS volume
• Keep WiFi enable: prevent the system to stop WiFi when going to sleep.
• Theme: set the current theme, either light or dark, with fullscreen and without title bar variations. This setting has immediate effect.
  

[TomBK]

Good luck...

[Daria]

Like it like it!!

The buttons on top are looking quite cheap though.

How large is the screen? Hope the fonts are scalable, with them as large as above album names will not fit, it's going to be awful with classical music.

[TomBK]

Daria - excuse my language and bublgum - excuse my sarcasm...

Daria, you're too...-... young on these forums to be so overly excaggeratedly positive..!, Period!

And to you Bublgum - I really hope you're able to do it A LOT better than Peter, Paul and Mary...! - Sorry, that should have been Jason, Rik and Sean...

The more the merrier just doesn't seem to work when dealing with controlpoints...

Are we going to see the same endless beta-on-beta or do you have a cunningly laid out plan? - Maybe even having the software ready by now but just for hoaks running the usual 1-2-3 beta and then release...just like in the real world...?

If so...

Cheers and all the best...

Tom

[Run-GMC Linn Staff]

Excellent Bubbleguuum, this sounds like exactly the kind of thing I've been waiting for. Look forward to getting my hands on it.

[Hallgeir]

I like the simplicity of the GUI, and the fact that it's now avaliable on the Android platform as well as Apple. And I like that you can use the hardware volumecontrol. When you use library I'd prefer the ChorusDS way to the Songbook way, where you have to go through 4-5 clicks to go back to your music. Other than that it looks very promising.

Regards
Hallgeir

[zegel]

Looks good, I would love to be a beta tester, waiting so long now for an android app!

Btw, the look is very much the same as Squeezecommander, which is the perfect android app for Squeeze box.

[Daria]

BTW, I like the BubbleDS name a lot...! You have to find the right icon

[EMM]

I'm sure there is a good market for this control point.

The past 6 months, more Android phones have been solved in the USA compared to Apple of Blackberry. See enclosed chart.

[TomBK]

I still think it's scary...have any of you tried it yet...??? - and though you speak of this "just another piece of software" as if it was up and running...?

There's a good market for any controlpoint that does exactly what YOU want it to do...!

Have we had any such...???