Saturday, October 2, 2010

Modizer v1.0 : feedback welcomed

  I'm currently working on a first update to Modizer (v1.1), so any feedback on current version is welcomed!
  I've already optimized the artists listing (when selecting MODLAND then Artists/Files or Artists/Formats/Files in browser). Since there are more than 15000 entries, it was sometimes a bit slow as I was checking if some files for each artists were already downloaded. Now only the files listings are checked.
  MDX/PDX playback is also working quite well (Sharp X68000) and I've fixed some minor bugs in playback (for example, on some formats, the last second was cut at the end of each song, ...)

28 comments :

  1. This is a GREAT program. My suggestions would be:

    1. The ability to play/preview before downloading it to keep. I've only had it 10 mins and my library is already full of stuff i don't want !
    2. Some definite tidying. I get lost going through all the menus. I would like to, for instance, just choose an author and not worry about Protracker, Soundtracker, SNC68 or whatever.
    3. The addition of some sort of category based listing would be AMAZING! ie, I could browse to Amiga > Artist or Amiga > Game Title.


    Just things going through my brain.
    Keep up the good work!

    Nez.

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  2. first, big ups. i've been with you through the betas but just now feel the need to speak up ;)

    i think modizer has two audiences. first is those who grew up in the scene and know the artists they want to hear. modizer serves them fine with the search features. first thing i did was collect all my favorites =)

    then there are people who are coming to the scene with curiosity looking to discover new music. i fall into this category as well because i know there are lots of artists i would be interested in who i have not heard yet. one application that doest this well on iphone is ghostly discovery. another that i use on desktop (and yes, i coded it ^^) is cccatcher. i think this is where modizer could still use work to excel.

    i have a bunch of thoughts on ux/ui things but it could turn into an essay. let me know if you'd like that all spewed out here or if there's a better place!

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  3. does it support itunes file sharing?

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  4. yes iTunes files sharing is supported

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  5. Starpause, of course your ideas are welcomed! send me an email with more details : ymagnien at gmail dot com

    I've also some ideas, basically I would like to build a kind of network sharing service for playlists, either based on the user feedback (highest rating, most played, ...) or by admins selecting files based on categories/interests (amiga/atari, demoscene/games, ...)

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  6. Social ranking for SIDs/MODs would be great!

    Would it be possible to import playlists from existing mod players on desktops? For example, I have extensive SID playlists in SIDplay/Mac ( http://www.sidmusic.org/sidplay/mac, though you probably already know that) and it would be rather nice to import the favourites and playlists.

    I notice that a few SIDs sound odd. Not precisely wrong, but definitely with different filtering and modulation to normal. This could be a problem in the Sidplay library you're using, I don't know... but if there are any settings there that could be exposed to the user, that could help.

    Megabass in the ModPlug player seems unusable - every mod I've tried it on distorts totally to the point of being unlistenable, both on my iPad and iPhone 4 (both current firmware, unmodified). Is there some sort of trick to how to use this successfully?

    Anyway, well done and thank you. I'll make a small donation, and I'll follow it up again in future if development continues. Cheers,

    -Jef.

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  7. Hey. Just bought this app and it seems quite great, although the accuracy of SID playback seems a bit off? If you compare the start of M.U.L.E. (HSVC) track 1 to an accurate reproduction, there is supposed to be noise/percussion which seems to turn into strange blips.

    Any idea why this is occurring?

    Dean

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  8. Oh no! Wizball (Martin Galway) doesn't play at all.. it cuts out after the first 6 seconds or so. Seems like the SID playback isn't that reliable/accurate at the moment :(.

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  9. Can u add posibility to export mods to iphone ringtons?

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  10. the mod "2mins.mod" is somehow played terribly wrong. could you maybe check it because i really like that one.

    http://modarchive.org/index.php?request=view_by_moduleid&query=95620

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  11. ...nevermind, it plays fine with MODPLUG...i thought UADE is more accurate?

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  12. Bonjour, comme j'ai vu que tu étais français, je me permets d’émettre mes suggestion dans notre langue ;)

    Déjà, un très très grand merci pour ton appli, qui est juste génialissime (que cela soit dans l'interface, dans le nombre hallucinant de formats supportés, dans le design...). Comme je sais à quel point c'est galère pour un développeur de trouver les bugs de son programme et tout ça, je me permets de te faire quelques petites suggestions.

    Pour les bugs :

    - Je ne sais pas si ça n'arrive qu'à moi, mais lorsque je veux effacer un dossier dans lequel j'ai mis des musiques, l'application plante et quitte automatiquement toute seule.

    - J'ai remarqué que lorsque l'on écoutait des musiques qui avaient des "subtrack" (par exemple les fichiers de musique Nes ou Game Boy) et que l'on avait l'option "random" et "boucle" activées (je ne sais pas laquelle des deux est à l'origine du problème), le changement de "subtrack" peut planter et revenir à la première chanson du fichier de manière aléatoire (celle ci est alors jouée bizarrement et bugguée). Par exemple, je veux écouter la "subtrack" n°10, ben quand je passe chanson après chanson, avant d'arriver à la 10 ça revient aléatoirement à la 0.

    - Toujours dans la lecture des subtracks, j'ai remarqué que de temps en temps, lorsque l'on est en pleine lecture, le bouton pause redevient le bouton play, nous obligeant à appuyer deux fois pour arrêter la chanson.

    - Sinon, je ne sais pas si ça vient de l'appli ou de mes fichiers, mais j'ai remarqué qu'une grande partie des musiques "minipsf" ne peuvent être lues.

    Pour les suggestions :

    - Tu devrais peut être faire une version française de ton soft! Je n'ai pas de soucis avec l'anglais, mais sache qu'il y a quand même des utilisateurs et fans de ton application en France ;)

    - Sinon, je vais encore parler des fichiers qui contiennent plusieurs musiques! Peut être serait-il bien de faire une gestion des notes par "sous musiques", car si l'on aime bien un des morceaux, on est forcément obligés de noter tout le fichier. Pareil, ça serait bien de pouvoir sélectionner directement la "subtrack" que l'on veut jouer lorsqu'il s'agit d'un seul fichier (par exemple en les gérant dans la playlist comme plusieurs chansons et non un seul fichier)

    - Voilà, pis un petit truc qui aurait été cool, c'est le fait de pouvoir mettre sa petite image représentant le jeu dont les musiques sont jouées (quand il s'agit de musiques de jeux!)

    Bref! Désolé d'avoir mis autant de suggestions. Sache que je suis fan de ton appli et que j'attendais depuis longtemps que quelqu'un fasse un player aussi complet!

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  13. hi, thanks Phoebius for your detailed feedback :-)

    regarding mods and uade/modplug, usually UADE performs better except if the mod was composed on some specific PC soundtracker using some fork of the mod format.
    it is like .IT files composed in modplug tracker which won't play as good in Impulse Tracker...

    @Peppy : SID playback is not so good in v1.0. I was using a kind of 'corrupted' version of libsidplay2/resid. I have replaced all the code with a clean version and it's faster & more accurate :-) . Wait for v1.1 update and it should be far better!

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  14. Will be waiting for 1.1! In the mean time have been listening to a lot of GB/NES/SNES/MOD music and it all sounds great :).

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  15. This program is really great, it even plays modules that are powerpacked. Your efforts are really appreciated.

    Some things I would love too see in a future release:

    - An option to set songs played though Game Music Emu (and mdat) to only play song 1 time.

    - Disable splash screen and landscape orientation.

    For some reason it does not save settings when I quit, is there something I could do about this? I am on jailbroken iOS 4.0.

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  16. @hai: You know, you can lock to portrait orientation on iOS4: Click the home button twice and a multi tasking bar will pop, slide your finger to the right on the bottom and you will see a rotation lock.

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  17. btw, to answer some questions :
    - minipsf : cannot be played since it's only the "shared" part of multiple psf files.
    - splash screen : cannot be disabled since there is no real "wait" => it is the time all things get initialized...

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  18. Is there any way to just create a playlist with ALL the mods ive downloaded? i love listening to them while on the subway and bus would be awesome if i can just shuffle everything quickly!

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  19. Are there any plans to add the SAP format? (Atari 800 pokey player).

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  20. @Lawrence : v1.1 will provide such features but playlists will be limited to a max of 512 or 1024 entries (I'm currently checking what the best tradeoff between perf & playlists size)..

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  21. @yoyofr I've just tried SAP again with different files and yes it does work with a lot of files.
    Previously the first two I tried failed so I assumed it wasn't supported. The files that don't work are: "Crumbles Crisis.sap" and "black lamp.sap"

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  22. the issue seems to be more broken links in the MODLAND collection than a format issue : I get a "connection error" when I try to download "crumbles crisis.sap". I think it should work if you can find the files somewhere else and put it in modizer either with the FTP browser or by using the drag'n'drop feature in iTunes.

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  23. after more test, it is more likely of format issue with this song : I have downloaded crumbles crisis and I cannot play it with libGME (used for sap)

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  24. Thanks for checking and reporting back so quickly. I'll have to get in touch with the authors of libGME - as those SAP files do work with the WinAMP plugin. Cheers.
    P.S. I think Modizer is awesome! keep up the good work. I am looking forward to the next version :-)

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  25. I want to support the thought that some kind of rankings in the browser would be an excellent feature to filter crap from masterpieces. I got to say, having been a scener in the 90s, I have a few that I can remember, but there is probably a whole lot that I can't remember the name of. Given the amount of titles released by the artists, it can take quite a while to find the favorites from back then that you are looking for. The best would be to import some rankings from some other site...

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  26. I have some ideas regarding this, probably for v1.2 or later since I would like to have a feature allowing modizer users to share playlists/rating with tags (for example, demoscene/amiga/90's or games/all time favorites, ...)
    I have planned to do some testing with the google app engine (web app server).

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