[Rhythmbox-devel] Re: Jukebox playlist

[Thomas Lunde <tlunde mac com>]

Dan8827 has emailed me his UI mockup of a RB interface with a jukebox
play area, a browser and the library open.  You can see it here:

http://www.lunde.net/thomas/2004/rhythmbox/mockup-dan8827.png

I took the liberty (hope that this is OK, Dan) of cutting a small bit of
the empty space out as long as I was making a .jpg of it (in case anyone
has an older browser) to show what it would look like for someone who
doesn't have Dan's large screen. ;-}

http://www.lunde.net/thomas/2004/rhythmbox/mockup-dan8827-1280.jpg

I didn't want to mess with it further, but I'd add to the mockup by
butting a disclosure triangle by the library area also.  This would
allow the jukebox, the browser and the library areas to each be turned
off on demand which would allow for a nice small control-only UI.  (If
there was an optional Track column which could be displayed in the
browser area when the library area was not visible, that'd be a neat way
to add tracks quickly to the jukebox area without requiring so much
vertical screen real estate.)

Hmm.  As I look again at Dan's mockup, I realize that the area I've been
refering to as "the jukebox" is labeled "Current Playlist" and it would
make sense when displaying (and editing) any playlist, jukebox/random or
otherwise.  

One more idea:  the name of the Current Playlist could be listed to the
right of where it says "Current Playlist".  By implementing that as a
popup menu, it'd be a very discoverable way of allowing the user to
switch from playlist to playlist and (with a New Playlist item at the
bottom of that popup) adding new ones.   Also, the items in the status
bar at the bottom (shuffle and repeat boxes and the length of the
current playlist) could be displayed (probably right justified) in the
same line.

I strongly urge that RB should automatically save the playlists and not
require an explicit Save Playlist... command.  

Seth's idea of moving Sources from a list on the entire left side of the
UI to just another (optionally displayable column) in the Browser makes
a _huge_ amount of sense to me.  Of course, it does make it hard to
imagine how Internet Radio fits as a source... perhaps net.radio
stations make more sense as items could be added to the playlist popup. 
Have a dialog box (available from a menu item) which would present a
list of the net.radio streaming stations that RB knows about (and a way
to add to this list) and allow them to be added to the available
"playlists" which the user can select from.  I think that Radio stations
are more similar to playlists than other potential sources of music: 
unlike other sources, it isn't possible to pick particular tracks.  Like
other playlists, it is at least possible to show what is playing and
what has played and (with some stations) to show the next few tracks.

Just my $.02,
thomas