killersquirrel's dashboard

Good point, hadn't thought of that.. – killersquirrel, on April 29, 2009 11:55

CDex could provide a solution for the implementation of the cd-ripping feature.
Its functionality is similar to EAC + its available under GNU General Public License (but I'm surely not an expert in these legal matters).

Implementation via an official add-on could be the way to go:
in this case, the user would be able to decide on first install if they want this feature or not, so nobody would have to install something they deem unnecessary.

I think Songbird could profit a lot from the implementation of an already existing, well-tried program, instead of going to the trouble of developing their own ripping feature.

Hmm, I just took a look at EAC's website and, sadly, I don't think that an integration will be possible after all since the SDK really only is available as a commercial license. This is what I found:

"Commercial SDK
A SDK of EACs extraction routines is available for licensing. The SDK consists of a DLL that can easily be integrated into a variety of programming environments like Visual C++, Delphi or even Visual Basic. It comes with interface definitions for these environments and a detailed documentation.
As this is a commercial project, the licensing cost is most probably only affordable for commercial projects. EACs routines are often used for archival purposes, e.g. in YLE and other radio stations. It is also used in end-user applications like e.g. CD-Tag.
Please ask for exact pricing for your needs, which depends for example on whether you need a company wide license or whether you want to bundle a number of licenses with your own applications." – killersquirrel, on April 28, 2009 19:32

I completely agree with you maxer!
I really hope that someone from the Songbird team is considering this possibility..
If the licensing is a problem, maybe it could be integrated via an add-on? – killersquirrel, on April 28, 2009 18:40

Why not let the user decide what happens on double click?

- Songbird should incorporate several playlist options (such as "play", "enqueue next", "enqueue last" etc) in a "mouse control" menu and give the user the possibility to choose from several actions (such as click on a song/album/link, double click, click+key combination) and thus make the controls completely customizable.

Concerning the problem of losing your current playlist by accidentally double-clicking etc:

- Songbird should provide an option to undo changes to your playlist, e.g. in the playlist's context menu (MediaMonkey has this) or as playlist control buttons.

- Furthermore, drag+drop for as many parts of the application as possible should be available, as it's the most intuitive way of using a program.

@stevel:
I understand and appreciate that Songbird has to offer some fashionable killer apps (such as Mashtape, or last.fm support) that show the potential of its unique concept and create a buzz in the blogosphere.
However, as far as I can tell, Songbird is still an insider tip, mainly used by bloggers and power users that are open to trying out new stuff. Those are also the ones that will give you feedback in your surveys or collaborate on a site like this - most others will simply deinstall Songbird without taking a second glance if it doesn't live up to their expectations and keep on using their old players.

If you want to appeal to a wider audience, you should really consider the habits of these average users - and (sadly) a HUGE part of them uses either Wndows Media Player or Winamp.
Both of these players offer a "playlist pane" - so people that are used to these players will expect something similar in Songbird. Stuff like Mashtape is certainly nice to toy around with, but if something as basic as playback handling is impractical all the other stylish features won't make up for it.
You also mentioned the importance of improving the performance for everyone: how does iPod-support achieve this goal for me if I don't even own one?
A stable playlist pane would at least be something ALL users could profit from. Of course, I'm just exaggerating, but I 'd like to bring to your attention that usability is at least as essential as some of the "core functions" you mentioned.

This is also reflected in the number of related requests in this forum. There are numerous similar threads (and a lot more than our 30 requests):
- Suggestions for improving the Now Playing List: http://gsfn.us/t/ltz (46 requests - 7th rank in the most popular topics!)
- please make enque system, like in winamp: http://gsfn.us/t/pot (26 requests)
- Now playing feature w/o installing add-on: http://gsfn.us/t/k2j (18 requests)
- Right click song & queue song to play: http://gsfn.us/t/1uyv (16 requests)

These threads show that the issue certainly is not just one neglectable demand among "a *ton* of things Songbird users want"!

As for integrating a playlist pane "into the core":
I still think that this feature is SO essential that it should be integrated in the main program - but I guess what most people tried to express with "core" was just
the need for this function to..

1. work properly and elegantly, without additional memory loss or major bugs

2. get attention and support by the "official developers"

3. be shipped with the official releases.

If you'd at least make it an "official" recommended add-on (just like mashtape or last.fm) that can be installed during the first run, I guess most people would be happy with that. This way, those who wouldn't want to use it, could still decide not to, or simply deinstall it later.AND you'd be offering a basic and expected usability improvement to new users.

So, PLEASE make some of your resources available to the development of Moshy's add-on and ship it with the next release!