I've been looking into the use of the Composer/Conductor/Band tags so I can describe them in the BeginnersGuide, not having used them before - and also in response to a query by "Listener". I've looked at the tags and how Slimserver uses them, and it seems to be well less than ideal.
First, here is my understanding of how it works - if I've got this wrong could someone tell me? - if the composer/conductor/band tags are present (in any combination) Slimserver will add them to the database as contributors... artist/composer/conductor/band are all flagged in the database as different "roles", so in principle any software querying the database could look up any combination of these tags to make a selection - Slimserver, however, currently makes a very crude use of them: you can tell it to include any or all of these as "artists" for the purposes of browse or search. So, for example, I might then find "Karajan" and "Berlin Phil" in the Artists list as well as Beethoven. Drawback - get a cluttered Artists list. Second, I was wondering how it might be better? I can easily imagine extending the web search form so you could put some or all of these in. I'm having much more trouble imagining how you would construct the UI using the remote to do this (eg via a Plugin). Lets say an "Extended Browse" function (built-in or plugin) allowed you to choose between browsing Album, Artist, Song, Conductor, Composer or Band. You choose Conductor, get a list of Conductors, from which you choose Karajan. Now - do you just get a list of the Albums where Conductor=Karajan (presumeably this wouldn't be too hard to do)? Or, for extra points, do you have an extra choice at the top of the menu for a further search by Composer or Band? You could then choose Band, get a list from which you choose Berlin Phil, which now presents you with a list of all albums by Karajan AND Berlin Phil. Ideally this functionality would allow you to make your selection of Composer, Conductor and Band in any sequence. Thought, anyone? Two points of view: - is this going along the right lines for functionality? Or is what I've just described too complicated to be usable, especially via the remote? - is this implementable? Or even in progress? A quick search of the bugs list gave me bug 709, a very old enhancement request, which is quite similar. http://bugs.slimdevices.com/show_bug.cgi?id=709 Regards Ceejay -- ceejay ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ceejay's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=148 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=18767 _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
