Re: G2.10 Module Proposal: Sound Juicer

[Samuel Abels <newsgroups debain org>]

On Wed, 2004-12-22 at 20:26 -0400, Steven Garrity wrote: 
> Ryan McDougall wrote:
> > Any luck waving/speaking/collaborating with the goobox maintainer?
> > http://gnome.org/start/2.9/desktop/#proposed
> 
> I just tried out the latest Goobox (0.6.0) [1], I'm quite impressed. The 
>   UI is dead-simple, but does everything I need.

I just had to try Goobox either, still 0.5 from Sarge though. While I do
prefer the CD player controls vom Goobox (they are more HIG-compliant,
since none of the buttons have multiple functions applied - which is
something that I would like to see adopted in Totem either, btw.), they
should be consistent with Totem (and thus, at the bottom, or Totem
should be changed).

Goobox pros in my opinion:

- Good Cover art support. (The Internet search works great here.)
- The window can be made smaller by hiding the track list.
- The mainwindow is more HIG compliant.
- (Does it remember manually entered title lists already?)

Cons:

- I wondered why I had to open an editor when the titles are there
already presented. This is IMO easier in s-j. I realize that the Disc
title needs to be named somewhere, but then the editor could contain
*only* the Artist, Disc Title, Genre and Year (which would also help in
solving my next point), the titles could still be editable in the main
window.
- The Title editor looks a too cluttery:
   - The entry boxes are non-aligned with each other.
   - I am not sure why the "Advanced *disc* options" are hidden. They
     are simple, not too advanced for any user to comprehend.
   - Why can the "Advanved track options" be hidden if this doesn't make
     the window smaller? In fact, it does not even reduce the number of
     widgets, since it makes only one widget visible and requires an
     additional interaction.
   - What is the purpose of the non-editable (thus, confusing) "Extra
     track data" text-area (which is empty in my case)?
   - The CD cover dialog that appears when using "Edit-> CD Cover ->
     Search on Internet" (shouldn't that be "Search on the
     Internet", btw.? (apologies if that is not correct, I am not a
     native english speaker)) has an "Apply" button - IMO a candidate
     for "Instant apply".
- Uses CDDB instead of Musicbrainz. Musicbrainz lets you identify single
titles, not only CDs, which is an advantage.
- One thing I didn't quite get, I tried "Hiding" the Goobox interface
using H and then didn't know how to restore the window, so I had to kill
the application.
- CD extracting and title editing are more easy/discoverable in s-j.
- IMO the user should not have the directory URL and Audio format
chooser presented every time he rips a CD. Having this as a one-time
setting with a good working default like s-j does seems like a more user
friendly alternative to me.

So basically, I find the s-j interface a bit cleaner and simpler, while
Goobox's Cover Art support is quite appealing. Still, I for myself will
probably stick with s-j for now - one-click CD extracting (and title
renaming) is just too cool.

> Goobox is something of an unfortunate name

Agreed.

> I also wonder, perhaps in the longer term, if all of these capabilities 
> should be included in Rhythmbox.

CD playing could be just another "Source" in Rhythmbox, I am not sure
about CD ripping... on the other hand, I wouldn't be too fond having to
start Rhythmbox only to rip a CD, as it takes quite a while. As for
myself, I found Rhythmbox too heavy-weight for my needs. The "Music
directory scan" eats a lot of CPU/HD time either and makes the PC less
responsive, also, Rhythmbox requires a very well-sorted Music archive to
be useful, otherwise it is sorted into categories that just do not fit.
Personal preferences aside though, I think integration with Rhythmbox
would make sense, even if I personally would still use smaller
applications like s-j.

-Samuel
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