iTunes - HQPlayer front-end re-visited

[Sevenfeet]

5 hours ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

…and here is yet another new version (2 in one day, phew!!!) copy_of_a, this should make you happy! It fixes the false padding to 24bit for non 24 bit files when converting to WAV. So now all files are converted at their true sample sizes; to 16bit WAV for 16 bit sample size files and 24bit for 24 bit sample size files.

 

This new version uses ffprobe a companion to the ffmpeg app. ffprobe allows us to get useful information about music files (such as; but not limited to, their Sample Size). Had Apple provided this info in iTunes it wouldn't be necessary. It may have some more interesting implications in the future though.

 

For the curious, this involves me writing an xml file named "Track Details.xml" in your ~/Library/iTunes folder. This xml file should always hold the information for tracks that were converted. This is only true for tracks that do have to be converted to temp files.

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

 

Awesome to hear that there was a solution to the sample size problem.  And thanks for giving more flexibility on the Ramdisk size...I'm now using just 10% on my Mac Pro with 28 GB of RAM which is more than enough to convert and load a typical album.

[DancingSea]

I was able to fix it somehow.  DSD plays fine.

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

13 hours ago, ivarsmu said:

Dear Geoff ,

new version works perfect with keyboard,

but as with previous version  Remote failed.

Little bit more investigation show that selecting album from Remote ends with fulfilling RAMDISK with songs from song view 

, beginning always from first song fom list , till Ram full. Somehow iTunes interpret Remote command as song view from very beginning  instead  of chosen album.

Ivars M.

Dear Ivars,

 

Thanks for the feedback. I tried to re-create the problem with the remote app. For me, if I'm in Album view on the remote app, it just plays the album I select to play.

 

There is no relation between whether you use the remote app or iTunes on the Desktop as far as iTunes - HQPlayer Server is concerned. The only possible effect is if iTunes - HQPlayer Server and HQPlayer,  by using some additional resources, could cause confusion between iTunes and the Remote app in some cases.

 

iTunes - HQPlayer Server does need to pause playback to wait for the first track to be loaded and playback started in HQPlayer. This is necessary to keep iTunes and HQPlayer in sync as closely as possible. Whether this can cause confusion in some cases between the Remote app and iTunes, I really don't know. I don't think there's anything I can do about that.

 

Did you try performing all of these tests, just with iTunes playing to your DAC without iTunes - HQPlayer Server and HQPlayer running?

 

It would be useful to know if this ever occurs without iTunes - HQPlayer Server and HQPlayer running.

 

Can you also check the "Up Next" queue in iTunes? When playing an album it should only contain the tracks from that album. Otherwise you should clear it first and then try playing the album from the remote app again.

 

Please let me know.

 

Thanks.

 

Geoff

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

I noticed a small bug in yesterday's last version. It would only effect people trying to play lossy AAC files and converting them to WAV.

 

This is fixed in this latest version. So everyone should upgrade to it, especially if you ever play lossy stuff.

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

[Sevenfeet]

7 hours ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

I noticed a small bug in yesterday's last version. It would only effect people trying to play lossy AAC files and converting them to WAV.

 

This is fixed in this latest version. So everyone should upgrade to it, especially if you ever play lossy stuff.

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

 

Actually, that bug has been around for awhile.  I've been meaning to tell you but I kept forgetting.  Thanks for fixing that.

[ivarsmu]

Dear Geoff,

 

one more attempt to use Remote at my country location with iMac Retina (High Sierra) and last edit script.

Unfortunately each time Ramdisk loaded (till full) and therefore HQP play first songs from Remote song view (as numbered), not album selected.

iTunes same time play selected album as intended.

No any problems with desktop.

HQP output is NAA (modded mini mac and Korg or Auralic DAC).

iTunes same time play through optical system output to another DAC selected album.

There is some few sec pause till ALAC converts to wav as intended.

I even deleted all settings with another comp iTunes from Remote and did fresh pairing.

Weird.

Monday evening I plan to test with my downtown apartment iMac27 where it was more or less OK with remote.

 

Ivars M.

[ivarsmu]

Geoff,

I narrowed Remote problem.

If I select album and press album play triangle besides album tittle, then wrong operation begin (as reported) and after that Remote lost library sinc. 

Remote then react only to play and pause buttons.

If I press play on selected album first song, then all songs loaded and play correctly. Same in the Artist view, press first song and it's as intended. But not with pressing artist name.

 

So the problem is with choosing play album or artist tittle button.

 

Ivars

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

24 minutes ago, ivarsmu said:

Geoff,

I narrowed Remote problem.

If I select album and press album play triangle besides album tittle, then wrong operation begin (as reported) and after that Remote lost library sinc. 

Remote then react only to play and pause buttons.

If I press play on selected album first song, then all songs loaded and play correctly. Same in the Artist view, press first song and it's as intended. But not with pressing artist name.

 

So the problem is with choosing play album or artist tittle button.

 

Ivars

Thanks Ivars, That kind of explains things, because I only ever tapped on the first track (or track I wanted to start playback from) in an album; never on that triangle next to the album title.

 

I have no idea why it should make any difference; but at least it's something I can look into.

 

That triangle next to the item title doesn't appear on the remote app on my iPhone, only on the iPad. That probably explains why I've never used it.

 

Geoff

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

On 2/10/2018 at 9:48 PM, ivarsmu said:

Geoff,

I narrowed Remote problem.

If I select album and press album play triangle besides album tittle, then wrong operation begin (as reported) and after that Remote lost library sinc. 

Remote then react only to play and pause buttons.

If I press play on selected album first song, then all songs loaded and play correctly. Same in the Artist view, press first song and it's as intended. But not with pressing artist name.

 

So the problem is with choosing play album or artist tittle button.

 

Ivars

Dear Ivars,

 

This turned out to be very useful feedback, thank you!

 

I discovered the problem. iTunes reports the Playlist Kind as "Music" when you're in album mode and you tap/click on any album track within an album. I was relying on this to ensure we were within the correct Playlist Kind when request was made to play a track from an album. When you tap on that triangle next to the Album title in the remote app though, the playlist kind gets reported as "Library". This was causing "iTunes - HQPlayer Server" to attempt to load the entire library.

 

I now make a check for both the playlist kind "Music" and "Library". This results in the behaviour you would expect and just loads the tracks from the album whose title that triangle (play button) appears against.

 

This should be safe; because actual playlists are reported with something other than "Music" or "Library". It does look like an iTunes/Remote app bug to me though.

 

Please update to this latest version and re-test that play button from the remote app next to the title of the album you intend to play.

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

[ivarsmu]

3 hours ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

Dear Ivars,

 

This turned out to be very useful feedback, thank you!

 

I discovered the problem. iTunes reports the Playlist Kind as "Music" when you're in album mode and you tap/click on any album track within an album. I was relying on this to ensure we were within the correct Playlist Kind when request was made to play a track from an album. When you tap on that triangle next to the Album title in the remote app though, the playlist kind gets reported as "Library". This was causing "iTunes - HQPlayer Server" to attempt to load the entire library.

 

I now make a check for both the playlist kind "Music" and "Library". This results in the behaviour you would expect and just loads the tracks from the album whose title that triangle (play button) appears against.

 

This should be safe; because actual playlists are reported with something other than "Music" or "Library". It does look like an iTunes/Remote app bug to me though.

 

Please update to this latest version and re-test that play button from the remote app next to the title of the album you intend to play.

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

Dear Geoff,

thank You , indeed now in album mode everyting works perfect,

tested for some albums without any problems.

However in artist mode I had unpredictable result. I guess it depend on number of albums , including compilations where artist is present. Obviously artist mode interprets as list or library mode.

But now almost  everything is OK .

So big thanks for Your efforts, said it once more, highly recomennded for everyone,

who use iTunes for library mangement and HQP for sound quality , especially if your files are in Alac.

 

Ivars

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

26 minutes ago, ivarsmu said:

Dear Geoff,

thank You , indeed now in album mode everyting works perfect,

tested for some albums without any problems.

However in artist mode I had unpredictable result. I guess it depend on number of albums , including compilations where artist is present. Obviously artist mode interprets as list or library mode.

But now almost  everything is OK .

So big thanks for Your efforts, said it once more, highly recomennded for everyone,

who use iTunes for library mangement and HQP for sound quality , especially if your files are in Alac.

 

Ivars

Thanks Ivars! Glad the remote app commands are working better for you now. Nothing's ever "perfect". I try though

 

I think this really comes down to tagging. For me "Artist Mode" is just a way of grouping together all the albums of that artist. Then when you play one of the albums of that artist, just that album loads. So it's really no different to being in "Album mode", except that you now have the convenience of all the albums of that artist being grouped together in one view.

 

As far as compilations are concerned; I have the Album Artist set as "Various Artists" for all my compilations. So this just becomes like an artist whose name is "Various Artists" in the sense that this will now conveniently group all compilations together.

 

I think I know where you're coming from though; you have an artist who appears on her own albums, where she's the album artist and she is also present on some compilations, where I would set the Album Artist to "Various Artists". What if you want all of this artist's work to be assembled together though? In that case I would create a playlist (preferably a smart one) that gathers all the tracks where the artist in question is in the "Artist" field. This will pick up this artist on both her own albums, and any compilations she appears on. A smart playlist will add any new tracks where she is the artist that you acquire in the future.

 

At least that's the way I would approach it.

 

Geoff

[ivarsmu]

12 minutes ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

Thanks Ivars! Glad the remote app commands are working better for you now. Nothing's ever "perfect". I try though

 

I think this really comes down to tagging. For me "Artist Mode" is just a way of grouping together all the albums of that artist. Then when you play one of the albums of that artist, just that album loads. So it's really no different to being in "Album mode", except that you now have the convenience of all the albums of that artist being grouped together in one view.

 

As far as compilations are concerned; I have the Album Artist set as "Various Artists" for all my compilations. So this just becomes like an artist whose name is "Various Artists" in the sense that this will now conveniently group all compilations together.

 

I think I know where you're coming from though; you have an artist who appears on her own albums, where she's the album artist and she is also present on some compilations, where I would set the Album Artist to "Various Artists". What if you want all of this artist's work to be assembled together though? In that case I would create a playlist (preferably a smart one) that gathers all the tracks where the artist in question is in the "Artist" field. This will pick up this artist on both her own albums, and any compilations she appears on. A smart playlist will add any new tracks where she is the artist that you acquire in the future.

 

At least that's the way I would approach it.

 

Geoff

Thank You a lot,

but I have little different tagging habits.

First I did enormous efforts to tag by hand all essential tags correct , and I follow

standard iTunes tag set, including album artist tag everywhere.

For compilations there is no album artist (blank space), so no Various Artists.

I also use Grouping tag for genre groups , for example JAZZ grouping include

genres tags as Jazz/Vocals, Jazz/Contemporary, Jazz/Smooth etc. Also I have disc numbering as 1 of 1 or 1 of 3 everywhere to consolidate multidisc albums under single album name.

Anyway using Remote from Genre or Artist mode in shuffling make problems to any

developer mangling with iTunes . I remember Damien struggling with Audirvana iniTunes mode.

So let s use your script with album or playlist mode and don t worry about the rest.

One more thanks to You, I’m very happy!

 

Ivars

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

4 minutes ago, ivarsmu said:

Thank You a lot,

but I have little different tagging habits.

First I did enormous efforts to tag by hand all essential tags correct , and I follow

standard iTunes tag set, including album artist tag everywhere.

For compilations there is no album artist (blank space), so no Various Artists.

I also use Grouping tag for genre groups , for example JAZZ grouping include

genres tags as Jazz/Vocals, Jazz/Contemporary, Jazz/Smooth etc. Also I have disc numbering as 1 of 1 or 1 of 3 everywhere to consolidate multidisc albums under single album name.

Anyway using Remote from Genre or Artist mode in shuffling make problems to any

developer mangling with iTunes . I remember Damien struggling with Audirvana iniTunes mode.

So let s use your script with album or playlist mode and don t worry about the rest.

One more thanks to You, I’m very happy!

 

Ivars

OK, sure! There are no hard and fast rules for tagging, I agree. It's whatever works best for you. …and I'm glad you're happy

Geoff

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

I thought about what Ivars said regarding shuffling and playlists, artists, genres; etc. and realised there was room for improvement.

 

This new version is a radical change to the way all modes apart from Album mode are handled. It results in all buttons in iTunes and the Remote app doing what you'd expect them to do. Shuffle works as you'd expect for Albums, Artists, Genres and Playlists.

 

Another benefit of this latest version is that the minimum amount of tracks necessary are loaded at any given time. So where temp files have to be created, I'm using up as little space as possible in the destination of the temp files, which could be a small Ram disk.

 

In effect all modes are treated like the Album mode, in the sense that only one album's worth of tracks are loaded at a time. In the case of temp files the tracks that are created and loaded begin with the first track from that album which iTunes starts playing from. Then when the next track of a playlist starts playing in iTunes, if that comes from a different album to the previous track, all tracks are cleared from HQPlayer and the previous bunch of temp files are deleted. Then the new bunch of tracks are created (as necessary) and loaded into HQPlayer. Playback in HQPlayer, of course, begins with the track from that album that is playing in iTunes.

 

Since this is such a significant change for all non-Album modes I'd appreciate some thorough testing, by yourself Ivars, and anyone else using this, when you have the time, of course.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

[ivarsmu]

1 hour ago, Geoffrey Armstrong said:

I thought about what Ivars said regarding shuffling and playlists, artists, genres; etc. and realised there was room for improvement.

 

This new version is a radical change to the way all modes apart from Album mode are handled. It results in all buttons in iTunes and the Remote app doing what you'd expect them to do. Shuffle works as you'd expect for Albums, Artists, Genres and Playlists.

 

Another benefit of this latest version is that the minimum amount of tracks necessary are loaded at any given time. So where temp files have to be created, I'm using up as little space as possible in the destination of the temp files, which could be a small Ram disk.

 

In effect all modes are treated like the Album mode, in the sense that only one album's worth of tracks are loaded at a time. In the case of temp files the tracks that are created and loaded begin with the first track from that album which iTunes starts playing from. Then when the next track of a playlist starts playing in iTunes, if that comes from a different album to the previous track, all tracks are cleared from HQPlayer and the previous bunch of temp files are deleted. Then the new bunch of tracks are created (as necessary) and loaded into HQPlayer. Playback in HQPlayer, of course, begins with the track from that album that is playing in iTunes.

 

Since this is such a significant change for all non-Album modes I'd appreciate some thorough testing, by yourself Ivars, and anyone else using this, when you have the time, of course.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

Thanks again Geoff,

some first impressions :

album play from Remote everything OK;

Artist play also ok,

genre play seems also ok.

 

For me unclear thing is Shuffling all library, or genre, or playlist. I guess there is no library sinc with your script at all. Or sometimes if first 

tracks are from same album. I can't specify what's goin on.

 

Shuffling genre or artist is not in sinc with iTunes (both Remote and Desktop).

 

So for now, best prepare whole playlist and play (or skip some tracks).

 

Ivars

 

 

 

 

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

Let me try to explain a little more clearly what is happening with the help of some screen shots.

 

In my test iTunes library I'm going to shuffle the genre "Jazz".

 

The Cassandra Wilson track is the first one in iTune queue ("Up Next").

 

This causes the tracks from this album starting with the track that is playing in iTunes to be loaded to HQPlayer. Temp files are created for these tracks as they are Apple Lossless.

 

The next track in iTunes queue is from an AIFF album so no temps have to be created. HQPlayer's playlist is first cleared and the temp files which were created from the Cassandra Wilson album are deleted.

 

In this case all the tracks from the new Vijay Iyer aiff album are loaded to HQPlayer and iTunes - HQPlayer Server navigates to the track that is playing in iTunes.

 

iTunes - HQPlayer Server continues in this way throughout the iTunes "Up Next" queue until the end is reached.

 

The same processing applies for any Artist or Playlist you decide to shuffle play.

 

I hope that's clearer now.

 

Geoff

 

[ivarsmu]

Dear Geoff,

 

indeed shuffle mode works as described.

Some misunderstanding arises when all next tracks, after chosen shuffle (or playlist) track, from respective album,

are in decoding (from ALAC) and loading into RAMDISK process aren't yet finished, then iTunes react but script wait till loading finished.

Apologize for my rudimentary English, have difficulties for easy explaining.

I wonder, isn't there a possibility not to decode and load in RAMDISK next tracks from album, those tracks are deleted anyway, when next

playlist (or shuffle) track begin to play.

Ivars

[Lio_B]

Hi,

I had tested Remote app with the last version, but I had always the same issues, in album mode, HPQ don't follow iTunes.

For me, Remote works only in tracks mode.

Sorry I can't help you with Remote.

About not loading next tracks form album, I 'll be agre with the idea, but you will have a delay at each end of each track during the loading time...

thks

 

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

Ivars, I understand what you're looking for and it's quite a good suggestion. I can give you some of what you want; but the following restrictions apply:

 

This will only work for user defined playlists either smart or dumb.

 

It will not work if you try to shuffle an artist in Artist mode or shuffle your entire library.

 

The reasons for the restrictions are that Apple did not provide access to the iTunes queue in the Applescript dictionary. This is a great missed opportunity in my view and must be a cause of frustration to a great deal of iTunes script developers, such as Doug's scripts.

 

If they provided Applescript dictionary access to the iTunes queue, this app would have been much easier to develop in the first place.

 

Without that I can't differentiate between whether the tracks in iTunes queue all come from the same album or whether just the next track in the queue comes from the same album as the previous track. Info like that would have been really useful.

 

So I can't apply the change I've just made for shuffle mode to the general Library or Music library. Only to playlists you've created yourself.

 

When you shuffle a user defined playlist with this new version, if the track currently playing needs a temp file to be created, only the temp file for that track and sometimes the track that follows it will be created. So this should solve your problem for user created playlists.

 

This new version also fixes a bug I found which affected multi-disc albums in AIFF format, when temp files are not created. This bug prevented any tracks from loading to HQPlayer which were not in the first disc of the multi-disc album. In those cases it also caused communication between iTunes and HQPlayer to be lost.

 

So everyone should upgrade to this new version, whether you're a shuffler or not

 

 

 

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

Small correction:

 

Please use the following version instead. It prevents an additional unnecessary track following the playing track from being created/loaded.

 

Thanks,

 

Geoff

iTunes - HQPlayer Server.app.zip

[ivarsmu]

Few words more about last edit Script.

 

Overall I am very satisfied about possibility to play with good quality upsampling my library in ALAC.

I want to play some of the files in process of editing metadata (artwork, genre, track name misspellings etc).

For me iTunes is most obvious library (using Get info) and  playlist manager in Apple ecosystem. 

 

But as player iTunes have some serious problems (no auto sample rate, no posibility to use NAA or another network endpoints, no DSD).

HQ Player have excellent converter/player engine, but no ALAC and weird  library manager (Album sorting as Composers tag, but not as Album artist). For me possibility to play CD or HD library as DSD128, while editing incorrect files is best of two worlds.

Plus possibility to use Apple Remote app on iPad.

 

Some small difficulties with Shufflin genre, artist  or whole library are unsignificant.

 

For Album Play, Song Play or Playlist Play everything works as intended.

 

So biggest thanks to Geoff and recomendations to everyone!

 

Ivars M.

 

 

[Geoffrey Armstrong]

2 minutes ago, ivarsmu said:

Few words more about last edit Script.

 

Overall I am very satisfied about possibility to play with good quality upsampling my library in ALAC.

I want to play some of the files in process of editing metadata (artwork, genre, track name misspellings etc).

For me iTunes is most obvious library (using Get info) and  playlist manager in Apple ecosystem. 

 

But as player iTunes have some serious problems (no auto sample rate, no posibility to use NAA or another network endpoints, no DSD).

HQ Player have excellent converter/player engine, but no ALAC and weird  library manager (Album sorting as Composers tag, but not as Album artist). For me possibility to play CD or HD library as DSD128, while editing incorrect files is best of two worlds.

Plus possibility to use Apple Remote app on iPad.

 

Some small difficulties with Shufflin genre, artist  or whole library are unsignificant.

 

For Album Play, Song Play or Playlist Play everything works as intended.

 

So biggest thanks to Geoff and recomendations to everyone!

 

Ivars M.

 

 

… and thanks so much to you Ivars. Your comments helped me see how to improve it.

 

Best,

 

Geoff

[Sevenfeet]

In the future, could the opening dialog box include a small version number?  That way it'll be easier to track that we are indeed on the correct version.

[Jamesroy]

I shouldn't be in this area. I tried doing the "Ignore this Topic but still getting the post sent to me. I'm running A+.

[ted_b]

Unfollow not ignore