New feature suggestion

[prprandall51]

Hi, love the app, I have been using it for some time on a Windows
Mobile device (old HP iPaq) linked to my PC. It would be great if the
signal client had a facility to issue a Wake-Up-On-Lan command to the
PC (perhaps through a button). The PC is permanently on but it drops
into Sleep mode to save power when not in use. It would be great to be
able to wake the computer without having to go to it and nudge the
thing into life before being able to access it via the iPaq.
And I am adding another vote for an Android version.
Thanks
Philip

[Matt Stevens]

Hi Philip,

Thanks, glad you're enjoying the app! There have been a few requests for WoL, I'll bump it up on the list.

--
Matt Stevens
www.alloysoft.com

[paddy.c...@googlemail.com]

loving the feature of getting album art for songs without it. had a look at the js code and it looks pretty good. couldn't get my head round exactly how it achieves it tho.

anyway a great feature would be to add the art to itunes. a tick box on the prefpane as to enable this feature or not would also be good or a button on the controller to add it to itunes.

however it does not always get it right so it may need a 'skip this image' feature. who knows.

hope this helps.

i am using just the index page without the default iphone border on a nokia e63. I know you have recently written different res versions for the pocket pc version but would it be possible to get a few different res versions to fit different screen sizes and they would be saved as different urls

i dont know how clear i am being. sorry for rubbish explanation.

[Matt Stevens]

Great suggestion! I've thought about this but didn't put it in for the exact reason you mention. When there's limited metadata available or the album is obscure sometimes Signal gets it wrong. I figured it was better to leave this capability to dedicated album art search tools.

I'd also like to make the web interface adaptable to more screen sizes. I have a few ideas on how to do this, ideally what I'd like to get to is one URL that adjusts itself to whatever the current window size is. This should support detection of changes between portrait and landscape without having to reload the page.

--
Matt Stevens
www.alloysoft.com

[uke...@gmail.com]

Once has to be very clear about where artwork would be added. iTunes stores it all in a separate (Album Artwork) structure and somehow links the music to the appropriate artwork there. But if iTunes cannot find the right artwork in the first place, there's currently NO way to add it oneself.

The alternative method is to embed the artwork as a tag in the actual music file. This is more portable, but slower for any management system to read and also needs to be duplicated for every track on the same album which might create storage space problems on an iPod.

Currently this is a very unsatisfactory arrangement as unless iTunes can supply ALL the artwork (which is unlikely as the iTMS is far from complete in this respect) the user ends up with a mix of iTunes stored artwork and some embedded in music files with no clear and easy way for the user to figure out which is being used for any particular track.

So if Signal had a way of being able to add artwork to iTunes own artwork storage system, that would be fantastic and a unique capability. If it just means embedding onto the music files, don't bother implementing this. It's easy to do in any case and just obfuscates the issue.

Could it add into iTunes own Album Artwork?

[Matt Stevens]

I’m sure it’s possible, but any third-party solution here would be fragile as the means by which iTunes caches downloaded artwork is an internal implementation detail and not part of any interface. Modifying the music library also seems a bit outside the domain of a remote control app, so I don’t think this is something I’ll investigate.

Signal does provide the ability to read artwork stored on the file system alongside the media files if none is available via iTunes, but it sounds like you’re looking for a solution that would display in both. In that case I believe the embedded artwork route is likely the best available.

Matt

[Ken Gillett]

On 23 May 2014, at 06:21, Matt Stevens <ma...@alloysoft.com> wrote:

On May 19, 2014, at 4:54 AM, uke...@gmail.com wrote:

...

Could it add into iTunes own Album Artwork?


On Sunday, May 15, 2011 11:49:47 PM UTC+1, paddy.c...@googlemail.com wrote:

anyway a great feature would be to add the art to itunes. a tick box on the prefpane as to enable this feature or not would also be good or a button on the controller to add it to itunes.

I’m sure it’s possible, but any third-party solution here would be fragile as the means by which iTunes caches downloaded artwork is an internal implementation detail and not part of any interface. Modifying the music library also seems a bit outside the domain of a remote control app, so I don’t think this is something I’ll investigate.

I quite understand. It's not something that Signal should obviously control. It's just that Apple has made it impossible to use iTunes' artwork storage mechanism if the iTunes Music Store cannot provide the artwork. There used to be a way, but they plugged that loophole. It's a shitty attitude to be honest, so I'm always on the lookout for some way to get around it.

I wouldn't ask that you try and build this into Signal. Apple would simply move the goalposts.

Signal does provide the ability to read artwork stored on the file system alongside the media files if none is available via iTunes, but it sounds like you’re looking for a solution that would display in both. In that case I believe the embedded artwork route is likely the best available.

Signal's ability to make use of artwork files stored elsewhere in the filesystem is brilliant. I just wish iTunes had a similarly flexible system.

Matt

Ken  G i l l e t t

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