iTunes Beta plug-in 2.5.0.0

[rjh]

Here is the first beta of the re-written iTunes plug-in version 2.5.0.0.

Changes:

* Same changes as our latest Media Player plug-in which include:
* New ASPX page with ability to add tracks to existing playlist (playlist is the list of tracks currently playing)
* New track management, uses iTunes to manage tracks rather than an internal database
* Much faster loading as it parses the iTunes XML database file rather than communicating over COM (which is slow)

Note that playing a large selection of tracks (thousands) may be slow as an iTunes playlist needs to be created.

Download installer from here:

ftp://ftp.homeseer.com/updates/Beta/...es_2.5.0.0.msi

[mwaite]

Hi Rich,

The XML loading is AWESOME! I really hated the long load times, HS starts up in 38 seconds now - FANTASTIC!!!

I am experiencing issues now:

1. I have an event action that uses "Pause if playing" and get "iTunes Error - Cannot run iTunes actions in this event - actions are invalid." when this event is run. I went to the event action properties and updated the event and got "iTunes - Error in ValidateActionUI: Index was outside the bounds of the array."

2. In HSTouch, when I select a playlist I get "iTunes - Error, could not get tracks for playlist: Public member 'Item' on type 'IITUserPlaylist' not found." The playlists are no longer being populated, however songs on the playlist are loaded in iTunes and can be played with the next track button in HST.

3. The Music Selector in HSTouch now has a blank line after the top line (ALL Artists / ALL Albums). Viewing Albums and Artists have the blank line, however viewing Genres, Playlists, and Tracks do not! This blank line didn't exist in previous version. Clicking on this blank line returns the same results as the top line.

I reviewed the Help file, but can't see what, if anything, might simply be a new configuration issue.

But did I mention I LOVE the fast load times!

[rjh]

I am looking at 2 and 3.

The events have changed, so you will need to delete any iTunes events and re-add them.

Hi Rich,

The XML loading is AWESOME! I really hated the long load times, HS starts up in 38 seconds now - FANTASTIC!!!

I am experiencing issues now:

1. I have an event action that uses "Pause if playing" and get "iTunes Error - Cannot run iTunes actions in this event - actions are invalid." when this event is run. I went to the event action properties and updated the event and got "iTunes - Error in ValidateActionUI: Index was outside the bounds of the array."

2. In HSTouch, when I select a playlist I get "iTunes - Error, could not get tracks for playlist: Public member 'Item' on type 'IITUserPlaylist' not found." The playlists are no longer being populated, however songs on the playlist are loaded in iTunes and can be played with the next track button in HST.

3. The Music Selector in HSTouch now has a blank line after the top line (ALL Artists / ALL Albums). Viewing Albums and Artists have the blank line, however viewing Genres, Playlists, and Tracks do not! This blank line didn't exist in previous version. Clicking on this blank line returns the same results as the top line.

I reviewed the Help file, but can't see what, if anything, might simply be a new configuration issue.

But did I mention I LOVE the fast load times!

[mwaite]

Deleting / recreating event actions worked!

Other issues:

1. The player status no longer reports "Paused" when music is paused, it reports "Stopped". Therefore events to 'resume if paused' no longer work.

2. CTSampleRate now always returns -1 (used to work)

3. When playing music and iTunes transitions to next track, the trigger 'Track Change' does not fire (but will if HS or HST initiates a track change). This one may have been there in prev versions.

[rjh]

Thanks, I'll look into these. The problem with paused is that iTunes does not have a paused state, only stopped and playing. So I'm not sure how to deal with this.

Resumed if paused, should start it playing, as I did make a change to allow this, I'll check it.

I posted a 2.5.0.2, but these issues are not addressed in that version.

Deleting / recreating event actions worked!

Other issues:

1. The player status no longer reports "Paused" when music is paused, it reports "Stopped". Therefore events to 'resume if paused' no longer work.

2. CTSampleRate now always returns -1 (used to work)

3. When playing music and iTunes transitions to next track, the trigger 'Track Change' does not fire (but will if HS or HST initiates a track change). This one may have been there in prev versions.

[mwaite]

Hi Rich,

"The problem with paused is that iTunes does not have a paused state, only stopped and playing"

Just to confirm/clarify, in iTunes a music pause from HS/HST is respected by iTunes - the progress bar in iTunes stops in position, whereas a STOP from HS/HST clears the progress bar in iTunes (stops the song).

I confirmed these items fixed in 2.0.5.2:

2. In HSTouch, when I select a playlist I get "iTunes - Error, could not get tracks for playlist: Public member 'Item' on type 'IITUserPlaylist' not found." The playlists are no longer being populated, however songs on the playlist are loaded in iTunes and can be played with the next track button in HST.

3. The Music Selector in HSTouch now has a blank line after the top line (ALL Artists / ALL Albums). Viewing Albums and Artists have the blank line, however viewing Genres, Playlists, and Tracks do not! This blank line didn't exist in previous version. Clicking on this blank line returns the same results as the top line.

(maybe I should have stated this in the new beta version thread)

[rjh]

iTunes does not have a seperate stop. If something is playing and you hit the pause button, it just stops. But if you hit it again, it resumes. To re-play from the start you need to re-select a track.

In the old iTunes plugin we faked the pause, but this was problematic since there are so many ways to play music. In this version play and resume if paused do the same thing. Let me know if anyone sees an issue with this.

Hi Rich,

"The problem with paused is that iTunes does not have a paused state, only stopped and playing"

Just to confirm/clarify, in iTunes a music pause from HS/HST is respected by iTunes - the progress bar in iTunes stops in position, whereas a STOP from HS/HST clears the progress bar in iTunes (stops the song).

I confirmed these items fixed in 2.0.5.2:

2. In HSTouch, when I select a playlist I get "iTunes - Error, could not get tracks for playlist: Public member 'Item' on type 'IITUserPlaylist' not found." The playlists are no longer being populated, however songs on the playlist are loaded in iTunes and can be played with the next track button in HST.

3. The Music Selector in HSTouch now has a blank line after the top line (ALL Artists / ALL Albums). Viewing Albums and Artists have the blank line, however viewing Genres, Playlists, and Tracks do not! This blank line didn't exist in previous version. Clicking on this blank line returns the same results as the top line.

(maybe I should have stated this in the new beta version thread)

[mwaite]

I understand what you're saying. I use iTunes plug-in a lot! I did not have any problems with pause/resume, other than I knew that if it was paused it may come on again when HS finishes speaking. To eleviate that I just needed to STOP instead of pause.

Now the ability to pause/resume is completely broken. I had iTunes pause if playing when the phone was picked up, then resume if paused when going back on hook. This was huge, now it doesn't work (it'll pause but not resume).