Seek Tool

Boy, I love Seek Tool. But given that it significantly modifies how the controls work, it would be nice for there to be a way to easily jump back and forth between it and whatever our other favorite Info mode is, like the long down press for jumping between Visual and Info modes. Of course, it's always possible that this already exists and I'm an idiot.

With the remote control it's easy, the Info button toggles through each of the info modes. I guess you're suggesting a front panel control though.

Rob

I don't understand the problem?

When I hold down the bottom button on info: seek it toggles between that and my last visual mode (which is usually Transient). Works like the other info/visual toggles. Isn't that what you were asking for?

If you want easy front-panel cycling of info modes, use Mark Lord'd Hijack kernel to remap the knob-press to be "Info".

That's correct. I almost never use the remote.

Nope. What I'm specifically asking for is an easy way to toggle between Seek and Track, both of which are Info modes. Obviously, a real solution would be less specific in some way.

I can use Hijack, but I think that this RFE is not just for me, but for other folks who might use this software who might not even know that Hijack exists, like, perhaps, folks using this on the HSX and whatever other goodies the empeg folks have coming down the pike.

The problem is that the controls change drastically when entering that mode and it feels to me like a different mode altogether. Maybe it shouldn't be included in the Info modes or the Visual, but have some separate setting. Maybe a toggle from somewhere. I'm not really sure of the answer, but, despite the fact that I love the mode, it feels kinda inconsistent from a UI point of view.

Here's the way I think this all should work.

By default (without Hijack): I think the knob should be a volume knob in all info modes. A press of the knob should change it into a seek knob (regardless of the info mode). Another press should put it back into volume mode (optionally, seek mode could timeout after 5 seconds or something.) A *press and hold* of the knob can put it into the sound settings or whatever.

With Hijack: Again, the knob should control volume in all info modes. A single press should be redefinable by hijack as it is now, with the new option of entering the "seek mode" as described above. Press-and-hold should bring up the hijack menu, and press-and-hold for another second should, as it does now, switch sources.

In order to do this, we would also want (need, in the case of Hijack) to allocate a remote button for toggling this seek mode. I vote for the "Select mode" button which right now doesn't do much besides switch insert/append/replace mode and re-seed the visual. It can keep that functionality while in the search screens. As for re-seeding the visual, that's not often needed, so make that a press-and-hold of the Select Mode button.

Anyone like this idea? Now Seek is just another Info mode whihc shows you the "phrases" in the song (very interesting if they implement my suggestions about manual editing of the "breakpoints.) Control of the seek becomes a mode you enter into with another button press. I think it all makes sense, but I'm open to alternative points of view.

BTW thanks to the team for including this "technology preview" in the beta so that we can make suggestions and brainstorm new ideas. I like that approach much better than keeping things under wraps until much later. Besides, now that SonicBlue doesn't give a damn about the product, we might as well start releasing alphas to the general public! (okay maybe not.)

How about having the "chord" of the left and right buttons pressed together become the jump-to-seek-mode key? Mark's already demonstrated that chords are possible.

That's a nice idea but what's wrong with using the single knob press? It doesn't change any current functionality except the sound options (how often do you need to change balance, loudness etc?) get moved to press-and-hold if you don't use hijack. The knob press is underutilized and I think the seek feature is important enough to be assigned to the single knob press.

The reason I don't like chords is that they're not really intuitive if you ask me. Plus if you miss the chord, you skip tracks by accident. Maybe if some new features are added we use chords for those, but I think seek deserves the prominence of a single knob press.

Let's wait until other people chime in and we can do a sort of unofficial vote. I know someone's going to say "make it configurable" but too many config options becomes a nightmare (as anyone in my test team at work will tell you.)

I agree. The new use of the knob press in the 2.0 series is the only thing I actively didn't like. I set up fader, balance, etc. once and pretty much forget about it. All the 2.0 feature does is allow me to accidentally change it, which I think I've already done twice. I would have preferred that it just be the button to get into the menus, but that was before seek mode. I like Tony's idea of using it to toggle between volume adjust and position adjust, probably with a timeout to fall back to volume. And then also a chord or something to get to seek mode. Edit: For that matter, we could use the long up press. How many people are constantly turning the player on and off? My favorite part of seek mode is the positioning, but the other features are quite nice as well, especially if we get to tweak the profiles.

Again, obviously we can use Hijack to do this all ourselves, but I think that a more consistent UI would benefit everybody, not just me.

(I feel like I'm grousing. I'm seriously not. This is the best upgrade ever.)

I think that by default, the current knob press is the correct behavior because other stereos do it that way (knob press selects bass treble balance fader). This is good for "newbie" users of the player who have used other stereos where the knob press changes sound settings.

But I also think it's great that we can hack it to do other stuff such as change the info mode with Hijack.

Damn, dilemas. :)

I agree with BOTH Tony & Tony. :)

I quite like the new seek abilities (even though I have yet to use it while actually listening to music - I've been doing all my bug hunting without my speaker system being online :) But, I do think that when viewing the seek display it would be nice to retain tradtional button functions - next track, prev track, etc... Otherwise this mode does not fit into the paradigm of an "info" mode - it is far more than a display mode, it's an interaction mode.

Having an alternate way to access seek (using the knob for instance) allows access to the seek functionality without giving up your current info mode. I like the ability to seek, but that doesn't mean I want to keep the display showing the seek graphic at all times.

Bruno

Yeah. I think the seek graphic/info mode is cool and should be kept (with some tweaks maybe, like the small font used for the timecodes at the top, allowing for more detailed map of the "phases.") But it shouldn't be tied in any way to the "seek input mode" so to speak.

As for the newbies having their balance and loudness, who cares? These functions are USELESS once you've dialed in your settings. Why waste a very important button assignment (single press of the knob) on newbies who want it to resemble a factory head unit? As the product is EOL and stock is almost (entirely?) depleted, there WILL be no newbies soon.

Also guys, Hijack could, of course, only allow this functionality (seek in any info mode) if the player software were written to have an IR code which had this ability. Right now the seek functionality is tied to the Seek Info mode. Don't mean to insult anyone's intelligence, but just wanted to mention this so we remember that we need a remote press for it as well. Again, I suggest the Select Mode button.

This is a feature request Empeg definitely has to help us on, Hijack can't do it all (at least I don't think so.)