Playqueue And Library Improvements Proposals

This page describe the changes I would like to add into the mixxx 1.6.x trunk in order to improve Play Queue and Library views

1) Play Queue Improvements

Current Problems:

1. the DJ can easily add several tracks on the play queue, but if he goes to this view, the tracks will not be displayed by play order, but by track name order for instance.

Solutions:

1. display the order the track will be played (1, 2, 3, ...)
2. make the items in the Play Queue view reorderable

2) Easilly listen music in the headset:

The Problem:

1. the user has to perform several confusing steps in order to listen one track in his headset :

• stop current listing track in the headset table
• double click on a track which load it in the headset table
• then press "play" on this table.

Solution:

1. double click on a track when in the configuration "one Player output on the master soundcard + one Player on the headset" instanteously stops the track played in the headset, load it in this player and start playback.

Note:

this is not a modification of the NEXT mode system, it is just a way to quickly loads a track in the headset Player in order to play without too much steps.

3) Library view Improvements

Current Problems:

1. the DJ cannot know easilly when browsing the Library view if a given song has already be played during his mix.
2. the user cannot easy know the Genre or the rating of a given song

Solutions

1. Display a little tag (or a leading asterisk, or change the text color) on any already played track in Playlist, Browse(?) and Library views (to prevent choosing several time the same track during one session). This may be based on the "TimesPlayed" value of the trackinfoobject or a similar one, like "TimesPlayedInThisMix". A button or a "reset played track" menu item may be required to be added in the interface in order to reset all these TimesPlayedInThisMix value to 0.
2. [DONE] Display a column in Library, Playqueue and Playlists with the Genre ID3 tag. On click on this column, tracks will be sorted by Genre, then by artist then by title.
3. Display a column with rating of the song in the Library, Playqueue and Playlists view (read only for the first step, then read/write)
4. Implements a Facet-like view for the "Library" (three column Genre/Artist/Album like in rythmbox)

Known issue:

1. Mixxx doesn't have ID3/ogg writing support. So rating of track must be performed by another software. I propose using Amarok rating system (a change in Amarok source/plugins would be required in order to write this rating value in the mp3/ogg file itself, instead of just using the Amarok database).

3) Minor bugs to fix

1. the Library view is not well sorted by default on startup, tracks are in the order read from .mixxxtracks.xml
2. user cannot type keyboard shortcut when the focus is on one item in the paylist view. Event doesn't seem to be propagated to parent window