AMP Wishlist Thread

[ckgreenman]

I don't remember if this has been suggested before or not but I have an idea on how to improve the functionality of the Music player.

While playing around with AMP last night it occured to me that you can't start playback unless you actually select a music file. This kinda limits you to either setting up a bunch of playlists ahead of time or only being able to play songs from a specific artist and album. What I suggest is that the UI work more like how the iPod does. For example, the iPod allows you to start playback at a higher level (i.e. Music->Genres-Metal) and doesn't force you to drill all the way down to an mp3 file. Say I wanted to play all music from a specific artist It would be nice if I could click Artist, select the artist, and hit play. The play button could then be reassigned to play/pause duty only (a feature that was talked about in the worklog thread) and another button created to emulate the function of the center button on the iPod.


Am I describing this well enough?

[aychamo]

What would be REALLY cool (and I'm not sure if this is possible) is to have AMP open the external application inside an encapsulated window. That way it would be a lot easier to switch to other AMP functions while driving because the AMP controls would still be visible.

That's pretty much the plan. A friend is sending me a GPS unit, so once I get that in and find some decent GPS software, I'll do it like that. I've found some seemingly generic AppleScript code that I can launch from within my ObjC class that sets the dimensions of other App's windows. So I should be able to set the size of it's window, and still have amp visible underneath to return to it as needed.

Oh, and your idea above, about playing music, is a good one. I'll look into that.

On a kinda seperate note, sharkbite mentioned above about an AppLauncher, this is actually fully finished and implemented in my dev version, and will be in the next release (which is actually getting pretty close - but I will need some quick feedback from you guys for bugs once I release, as a lot of new stuff is added in this release)

Here's a picture of it. From within it there is an editor, which is extremely simple.. You just select "New" then point it towards the application, and it guesses the name (but if you arne't happy with the name, you can change it), and it pulls the icon for it from the app itself.. So it's really completely effortless and quick (and entirely touchscreen friendly [TSF!])

[aychamo]

^^^ what a bunch of worthless in-car apps haha Oh, I'm on I-10, but how do I spell that word again?

[pepsibobby]

so are the apps gonna be opened in AMP or will it just open up the app? does that make sense? i hope it does.

[LightningMac]

Here's an idea: add a feature in disk utilities that says "use drive as primary source" allowing you to choose what drive (including an ipod)Amp will play the files from. Is that possible? When you choose this AMP would reimport all playlist and info from that drive and save the information so when you plug in an ipod or external drive, AMP remembers the songs and playlists etc.

You could also add a feature sync from ipod or ext drive to update AMP's files from an ipod or ext drive into your mac mini that's installed in your car. Or if you guys are feeling REALLY adventurous, make this a WIRELESS option as well that way you can sit in your car and have AMP sync with your home computer that you've downloaded (legally cough cough) more music,movies or music videos to! Maybe these sync ideas could be in form of a plug in and could or if it would just be easier require a home mac to have amp running as well, so it would be an AMP to AMP sync?

just some thoughts

thanks!

[JakobMetzger]

i really like the amp sync thing i think the big features needed to focus on is gps right now but im sure aychamo has that covered. is sirius not available for mac, just xm? also a wardriving type app like what CarMinX has in it. Just to join/turn off airport/switch networks etc... Ive been trying to get the source from paul hillman and have emailed him about 3 times a week for a month but i cant seem to get in touch with him. anyway.... great work aychamo

[LightningMac]

yeah I think GPS would be great and definitely XM, because I already bought an XM receiver from ebay! *hehehe* I suggested wardriving a while back and glad you brought it back into the mix! that way we could surf and check email while in the car! but the first two things require him to own the hardware to work on them , and I don't think he has a gps or xm receiver yet, so I thought I'd throw out some things that just required coding

[aychamo]

yeah I think GPS would be great and definitely XM, because I already bought an XM receiver from ebay! *hehehe* I suggested wardriving a while back and glad you brought it back into the mix! that way we could surf and check email while in the car! but the first two things require him to own the hardware to work on them , and I don't think he has a gps or xm receiver yet, so I thought I'd throw out some things that just required coding

Good news on GPS. Raceer, who I'm in constant contact with, is hooking me up with a GPS unit. Can anyone suggest the best software package?

[LightningMac]

I'd like to see Google Earth implemented somehow, since it is free, another one I think is roadnav which is also free

http://earth.google.com/products.html

http://roadnav.sourceforge.net/

[bcohen5055]

as far as wardriving goes, I think the best around is Kismac. If its a simple implimentation of just listing networks in range and chosing one to join however it could probably done with a simple applescript. Maby though as a more advanced idea you could have the gps location of the network from a program like kismac and then have some kind of if statement where if gps coordinates=network coordinates then send a message to ask if you would like to join the network.