SubFire 0.9.0 for FireOS (FireTV), 0.8.2 for Chrome

[acroyear]

Version 0.8.2 has been released for Chrome and the web. This includes bug fixes. Now tablet devices will no longer 'zoom' on focus, which was a feature I only needed for the TV versions. The rest of this release is staging work for the 0.9.0 version.

Chrome: http://jwsdev.net/l/subfirechrome, Web: http://jwsdev.net/l/subfire

Version 0.9.0 has been submitted for review for FireOS TV, Stick, Phone, and Tablet. In addition to the above bug fixes, it now supports the ability to view the current play queue and (on TV/Stick) navigate through it to play a different song. Tablet and Desktop support for the navigation is still in progress. 0.9.0 also includes all previous updates from 0.8.0-0.8.2, including the ability to shuffle the current play queue. When approved, it will be found at http://jwsdev.net/l/subfireamazon.

Due to limitations of the Fire platform's html5 audio, it will not support the ability to seek to a different time within a file.

Coming next for 0.9.1 - Tablet and Desktop support for navigating through the play queue. After that, I'm still thinking about it.

A general android release is still on hold for now, but I am considering investing in a new Nexus AndroidTV, at which point I will probably work on that platform and then submit it to the play store for Android 4.2+ devices. I'm also considering releasing it on the Samsung app store, but I haven't done anything in particular yet. I have been producing apk's from phonegap and testing them on my Samsung tablet and phone (as well as testing on their browsers), so I know what works and what doesn't so far.

[acroyear]

And within minutes of posting, an idea struck on how to handle the desktop and tablet, so 0.9.1 is now out on http://p.subfireplayer.net and the Chrome app store link above, providing play queue browsing for Chrome. I have not deployed this new version to Amazon for Fire-based tablets yet.

[calismoonelf]

I'm having a few problems. The main one is that it is stuck on loading playlists. I have all of the login data correct. I've changed that a few times to make sure...and it weirdly doesn't erase when asked to. So, I've cleared cache and cleared data and started over. But, I may not bother any further, I see a playlist view and a folder view. Is there no album view, recently added etc?

[acroyear]

Folder browsing will get you down to individual albums, but I have not attempted to replicate the album-based front page that the subsonic page has. I personally had no use for "recently added" 'cause I know what I added to my own stuff and where I put it. I also tend not to use the random album feature very much except to see what albums I still need to grab artwork for. The app was originally optimized for playlist playing because I have another program (a java one, not released) that is able to produce shuffles of my library which is more useful to me than just grabbing some album at random (also, I'd add an explicit button to re-shuffle the random album page, 'cause I personally dislike the auto-refresh on the web ui - I'm usually only 1/3rd of the way through scanning them when it flips on me )

I can see adding some of those views (the sorted album view may be too much because implementing paging is a pain in jqm) being a little easier to build than the ID3-based browsing (which I've started), for getting one more key feature in for the "1.0". Would a list like it currently is be ok, or would you prefer a grid. I've never tried coding a grid before in this library, so that could be an interesting challenge this week.

I'll also be working on a way to cancel out of playlists-loading to try to get it to restart that query. I've not been able to replicate it consistently (and yeah, it is easier to 'reload' in Chrome than it is on an android app like Fire) so it'll take some hackery on my part behind the scenes to simulate it on my server. It does tend to be a networking issue, though I'm curious: do you actually have playlists on your server? I've never tried it on a server without playlists, so maybe it doesn't recognize that it got an empty list back. oops

"and it weirdly doesn't erase when asked to" - not sure what you mean here?

[acroyear]

I'm adding the album views. Please feel free to look at the web version at http://p.subfireplayer.net/ and comment here. I'll be working on adding the support for FireTV and tablets soon.

[calismoonelf]

>and it weirdly doesn't erase when asked to

Sorry that was sort of cryptic. When I go to a field to change the username or password, because maybe I put it wrong and that is why it won't work...I can backspace over the text, tell it to clear it, but the previous text stays and my new text gets appended.

I do have playlists, but they don't come up. I like the recently added feature because it is just convenient. Yeah, I know what I have added also...well, sometimes...but it is nice that the newest thing I've gotten is at the top of the list. Realistically, if I am going to scroll through my folders, I can use Kodi for that. I was hopeful for this to operate more like the phone apps or the web interface for subsonic.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trash-talking your app, I think it's great that you have made. It's certainly better than I can do, I stopped coding almost 30 years ago.

[acroyear]

Playlists: are you using the same account that created them? If "joe" creates a playlist and doesn't make it public, "joe-subfire" won't be able to see it. "joe" would need to go through each one and edit it to make it public.

I'm actually getting used to the album viewing thing, now that I have it. I suppose my main dislike with the android version was it took too many steps to get to anything in those album queries. My problem with the WebUI is that I've been doing DHTML/HTML5 style "single-page" programming for 10 years. The way the WebUI pages by reloading the whole inner frame is now very jarring for me, so I just ignored it. It got a little better (re: faster) when it added the support to just load albums from a single MusicFolder

In my app, the albums refresh without reloading the whole page, which is much more comfortable for me. Yes I have MusicFolder level filtering (for 5.2 servers).

as for login text entry: what are you using (Chrome? some other browser? Fire tablet? Fire TV?). Not sure if you're using some atypical keyboard short cut that I'm not used to using ("tell it to clear it"?). I used to know a lot of those...back on unix and vax terminals, but since I now am on 3 different platforms throughout the day, I don't bother.

[calismoonelf]

I'm using the firetv remote as input device.

All of my playlists are public. I never get to the spot where I can see the playlist, when it doesn't tell me that the connection was refused it just stares at me with the little swirly symbol that seems to indicate it is working. It never gets any farther.

I have tried to use the web version that you linked above, but I cannot get it to connect to my server no matter how I try.