Thursday, December 11. 2008Drive-by Mockups
Yesterday, after nearly 2 years of hard work, blood sweat and tear, we finally released Amarok 2.0.0. Reactions so far have been mixed, but this was no worse than we had expected. We are drastically reworking an application that many people are very fond of, and taking it in a very different direction, and for some people this will not be the direction that they had preferred. Also, some of the features that some people depend on in the 1.4.x series are not yet in Amarok 2, and while we have tried being very upfront about this, apparently it is still a big shock to some.
One of the things that has been most controversial so far, is the new look. This has spawned a number of mockups from people who have ideas for way to improve Amarok. Some of these are really good! See these pages for some examples: http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/A+Media+Player+for+KDE4?content=94472 http://www.kde-look.org/content/show.php/Amarok2+Look+and+Feel?content=93854 From the comments on some of these mockups, its is quite clear however that we face somewhat of an issue of understanding. Comments like I like your mock =) and Amarok already has chosen a look and at best changes now are going to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary. besides being quite degrading to all the people who have worked very hard on Amarok 2.0.0, to me indicates a profound lack of understanding of the amount of work it takes to actually turn a good mockup into a working look for an application, especially from the artist. So while we get really nice mockups from time to time that we would love to implement, few of the artists so far has been willing to stick with us to do the actual hard, boring and repetitive work required to actually make it happen. Hence the term "Drive-by Mockups". So is there a point to this rant? I am not sure. I certainly dont want people to stop making mockups as some of these contain really good ideas, but I would ask people to not attribute to malice or stupidity from our side what is simply caused by few artist having the time and being willing to follow up on their mockups. Trackbacks
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I want that mockup in code and I want it now. Absolutely love it! =D
those mock-ups are really something
thank you amarok team for your work * i'd love amarok to look like that this, my friends, was a bullet-proof comment.
Do not get turned down by all this harsh criticism you are currently facing. It is usually much easier to write some harsh words instead of actually contributing to Amarok development.
As a matter of fact, any UI design you would consider would probably result in harsh criticism. And if you keep the UI as it is people will complain of your lack of innovation. Please keep up the good work! Amarok 2 is really promising and once people get used to the new UI and all the most-wanted features are implemented, the rants will stop. The amount of work you put into this release is truly impressive and I am looking forward to the things to come.
The problem is that Amarok is inheriting the stigma associated with KDE 4.x right now. No matter how much I tell people that 4.2 is crap hot and stable...they continue to think of it as incomplete.
So, they associate Amarok 2 with KDE 4 and immediately make it out to be unusable (what? no desktop icons in KDE4? what? You know, that kind of thing where they don't know what they're talking about but think they do). Guilty by Association I guess. The bad part about this ideology is that it really craps on a great piece of software. You guys did great on 2 !!! Congratulations!
Well, both KDE4 and Amarok2 managed to make almost every single mistake listed here: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000017.html
So they deserve quite a bit of criticism, I'm afraid. On this post: sometimes criticism is worth listening to, and sometimes it's not. If it's not, there's no point wasting time in flamefests; angry people will not understand anything you say anyway.
Actually, that "Media player" -mockup is not "replacement" for Amarok2. It is mockup for videoplayer what has similar look of Amarok2. Without Amarok2, that mokcup would not exist at all.
The question is we have Amarok2 as Music Player, it looks good and it is great. But we dont have such applications for video's!!! Kaffeine is.... where ever it is and Dragonplayer is too simple, KMplayer and SMplayer are great but "too" feature rich for basic user. This kind videoplayer would play music like Kaffeine, but everyone knows that Kaffeine is not replacement for Amarok. It's idea is to bring new ideas (as it is mockup after all!) for developers who would like to make a videoplayer for KDE4. To give users same great application for Videos, as Amarok developers has done for Music. Amarok slogan is "rediscovery your music" and on video side we have slogan "Where the **** is my player??!?!?!" So Amarok developers should not take this mockup as critic what you have done. But as compiment that you have done so much great what has inspired other to want samekind application for videos! Some people just takes that wrong as it would be Amarok2 replacement what's not it's point.... Kaffeine Developers... where are you!?!?! KDE4 needs you!!! 
I'm going to be kill by saying this, but those bashing comments were partially right. The interface is wrong designed, this is a fact, ask some usability expert and a graphical designer. The problem, I guess, is that Amarok has coders, but lacks specialist on other areas.
I was one of those "fan" users when the amarok 2 development started. Anyway, congratulation for your 2.0 release.
That is not at all what I am disputing. I don't think the overall idea of the interface is "wrong" but I do agree that it can be improved, and I have seen many mockups that look better than what we have now. What I take issues with is the implication that the Amarok developers are somehow dead set against anything else than what we have now, when the reason is simply, as you correctly note, that we have a lack of designers and artist who do more than a passing mockup before leaving, as doing the mockup is maybe 5% of the work ( for the artist) of actually making Amarok look that way.
Oh, I see, you're mad for the insult, not the critic to the interface itself.
My apologizes then 
5% of work but 100% of idea. If you say it's the hard work that's holding the team from implementing things than maybe it's time for those members to stop development. That's maybe rude but targets should not be chosen by the complexity and time they take to implement.
Anyways, good luck with the project!
That is not what I said.
I am more than happy to put in the work (and I have done so already with the theme that we currently have), but I do not have the graphical skills to make good looking elements that can actually be used in Amarok, which is why I also need a dedicated artist. And once we start working on this, it is really a cycle of trying stuff out, tweaking it and trying again, which is why we need the artist to stick around for a while.
Maybe I need to point out that I actually ment the artists (as they are part of your team).
So there's no way to find artists willing to do the ugly stuff? That's really sad.
"If you say it's the hard work that's holding the team from implementing things 'than' maybe it's time for those members to stop development."????
I think you should learn how to speak first, buddy. Don't exchange THAN for THEN. It is bad grammar and they way you have it, your sentence doesn't make any sense. You do know what "Than" and "Then" mean, right??? I not only dislike to read stupid posts like that, but your English level also tell me your poor level of education. Go back to grade school and learn how to speak.
Ad hominem
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
Wow, the first one is really very attractive although I do like dragon-player to stay as it is because it is just what is needed and nothing more and nothing less (apart from the bugs I have logged).
I do like the Amarok interface (apart from the look of course) because it is very usable and clear (I would like to be able to get shut of the context section in the middle but can't find the option, it must be there somewhere). My only real criticism is that it is ugly not that there is anything profoundly wrong. My apologies but I do appreciate the work that has gone in and the "Amarok developers are quite "strange" people... It's their way or the highway" comment is harsh but fair given that there were few who liked the context area but still its there and apparently can't be removed. Oh now I feel bad for posting criticisms because I use it loads and there is no other alternative even close (Itunes is truly horrible because I just can't figure out how to use the GUI without what feels like 'workarounds' but dang it is pretty (and there podcast list is truly unbelievable))
"the "Amarok developers are quite "strange" people... It's their way or the highway" comment is harsh but fair"
No! If you take a look at where that comment was made, it was criticizing us for not being willing to implement any mockups even though they look much better than what we have now. If you have read the actual blog entry, you will know that "not being willing to" has nothing to do with why Amarok does not look like any of the cool mockups. In any case, you can actually easily hide the context view simply by resizing the browser and playlist to completely cover it. There is an issue that brings back the context view on each restart, but this is a bug and not a design decision as Amarok really should save the size of each of the views and restore it on startup.
"In any case, you can actually easily hide the context view simply by resizing the browser and playlist to completely cover it. There is an issue that brings back the context view on each restart, but this is a bug and not a design decision as Amarok really should save the size of each of the views and restore it on startup"
Try it - you can't cover it over completely at-least not in my build.
I have not got it hided either. Used SVN version bretty short time ago and distribution offered SVN packages.
It still leaves a bretty big space between panels. That should be possible to hide permamentaly. Then I would be more happy of Amarok2. That and the possibility to move the control buttons somewhere else and apply easily a custom skins for buttons (SVG skins etc). but, Amarok2 is best what is now there for KDE4.
http://nhnfreespirit.kollide.net/pics/Hidden%20contextview.png
It's not super easy currently, but it is possible. Resize the playlist to the left until it "snaps" onto the browser, then use the browsers drag handle to make the browser a bit bigger.
Even better. Shutting down and restarting Amarok actually does remember this view setup.
Your right thanks, I got there eventually and it looks sooooo much better. Many Thanks.
Dude! I made that second comment quoted above and I must say my intentions were quite different. Sorry if that sounded like this, but I actually like the Amarok2 look. Sure there are rough edges, but like KDE4, I see promising trends everywhere I look!
My comment was actually targeted at the mock-up artist. I genuinely feel that making such a drastic change to the A2 interface is too much work and would partially negate all the work that has gone into the 2.0 release. Besides, it's important to adopt a consistent look and feel to the point releases (hence, the remark that changes at least in the 2.0.x series should be evolutionary, not revolutionary) I am sure the design team had a very good reason to change the UI from the 1.4.x series. Would you WANT to ditch all that reasoning just because of a pretty mock up? Or would you work harder at realizing the vision you started with? I am an outsider to the development process, but my guess (and for what it's worth, my vote) is for the former. That particular mock up, like Fri13 says, is a perfect fit for Kaffeine. A2 looks good with the current design paradigm. Finally, a personal message to the devs: For whatever reason, the KDE4 transition has been fought by poisonous people on the net every step of the way. Everyone has an opinion. Please don't take their criticisms (real or imagined, like in my case) too harshly! This too shall pass and when most of the functionality of the original (KDE3, A1...) returns, so will the praises. For now, know that there is a silent majority that may not go around spouting their opinions as loudly as the naysayers, but still support you every step of the way. Just that we use bug reports and wishlists to express how much we love your work. I sincerely hope this makes all of you feel good about A2 and if this didn't help, go online and look at pictures of kittens all day. That's sure to help!
Maybe linking the first one (the one that is actually not an Amarok 2 mockup) from this blog was a mistake, but the reason I did so was because of the 2 comments I quoted.
This blog is not about those 2 mockups specifically though. It is meant as a response to the "well, you have a cool mockup, why don you just implement it. You must all be stupid or have some hidden agenda" comments that we hear quite often, and I am sorry if I mistakenly labeled yours as such. Some of these mockups are however based on the overall design ideas of Amarok 2, and could be implemented if the artist is willing to help out (and would indeed be a big improvement) but it is just not doable without the artist as there is a long way from a png mockup to the tailored svg elements for each part of Amarok that is needed for it to become real. That was the real point of this blog I think. Anyways, thanks for the words of support, maybe looking at kittens for a while is exactly what we need to do!
Some things that I like better in Amarok 1.4 than in 2.0:
- in 1.4 the playlist holds way more songs and more information on screen and it's more configurable. I marginally care about album art but certainly not so much that I want it all over my playlist, changing the layout. - 1.4 makes it easier to hide most "clutter", i.e. not playlist or player controls. The most offensive clutter for me is the non-removable plasmoid context view. Having that as another tab on the left would be just peachy. I'm not against it, I'm against making it too prominent (or shall I say in your face?) in the UI. Plus there is not a single plasmoid I'd want to use right now. - The big buttons in 2.0 are somewhat ugly-ish IMHO. The idea is okay but it doesn't look good to me the way it is done. - No PostgreSQL support in 2.0. What is so hard about writing compatible SQL? This is a honest question. There you go, no mockups and nothing extremely hard to implement.
"Plus there is not a single plasmoid I'd want to use right now"
The Last.FM events wigdet was great but has seemed to have gone since from my build 
The playlist in 2.0.0 is much simpler than then one on 1.4.x. This si something we are aware of and are likyl going to attack from two fronts. First of all we will amke the current one much more customizable (which is possible with the underlying implementation) and secondly, sice we use Qt's model/view architecture, writing an alternative view for the playlist is quite simple. A while back I did a quick and dirty prototype of a "classic" view, and I know some devs have plans to finish this and allow the user to switch between them.
Se my post a few places above on how to hide the context view (complete with screenshot) The play control buttons are going to get redone soon. In general the look will likely evolve quite a bit over the next many releases. The main issue with supporting multiple database backends is that there is currently no databse abstraction layer that provides adequate support for the quite complex database operations we perform. In Amarok 1.4.x, coding anything that used the database was hell, as you always had to check which backend was in use and adjust many of your queries accordingly. This caused so much "drag" that we decided that for the sake of development speed, it would be better to just have one. And as Mysql embedded came along which is both significantly faster than sqlite, config free (for our queries at least), and will make it possible to allow the user to connect to an external mysql server without changing any of the code that uses the database, it was decided that this was the best solution all in all. I hope this answers your questions and concerns
Those are the answers I wished for, thanks!
About the databases: I was unaware that you are using complex queries - I don't see where but I'll take your word for it  About the context view, sorry. I unintentionally proved again that the best way to find out how to do $X on Linux is to say: "Linux is wack, it can't even do $X!"... and people will reply "you are teh stoopid, you can do that easily like that or like that..." ^ not meant to ridicule your answer, honest :o
Amarok shouldn't have gone the way of a fixed, static, immutable UI since it cannot please everyone. It should have gone the way of foobar2000 which offers a few sensible default layouts, but allow the user to fully customize what compnents you are viewing and to make the player as bare of eye candy as you want. Want to turn it into excel ? o problem. Want to turn it to a beautiful interface. Possible. Fixed and hard-coded imposed by the mighty developers layout feels so much as a thing of the past...
Sadly but I can confirm it's partially true too. Some Amarok devs are welcoming, but some are the opposite. I had a less-than-stellar experience with at least two.
The two main problems I see (not only in Amarok) are: 1. Some devs are overly sensitive to criticism. 2. Some devs assume they're aways right, and try to ridicule those who disagree with them. I found a comment from a dev in the Amarok 2.0 anouncement (http://amarok.kde.org/en/releases/2.0?page=1 , submitted by nhnFreespirit on December 10, 2008 - 18:49) to be extremely arrogant ("The truth is that we are aiming squarely at ourselves, as we are some of the biggest music fans out there...", "...and in that case I would likely have tried to point you in the direction that better fits your needs. But as it stands, the only thing you post are strange assumptions abut out goals for Amarok 2, none of which fall anywhere near the truth, so the only thing I can tell you is that if your really have that little faith in us (and remember, the people who have created 2.0.0 are much the same as those that created 1.4.x) then you are truly better of elsewhere."). That sole comment made me think about saying to him to stick Amarok2 where the sun doesn't shine and press play. I believe Magnatunes don't pay an Amarok coder to develop for himself with complete disregard of Magnatunes' and users' interests. That said, all this rethoric about "we code to ourselves" only makes people feel "Amarok developers are quite 'strange' people... It's their way or the highway". We get this feeling from their own words, nonetheless (at least some of them). Now if this image perception is not a problem for them, so be it. People will start using Songbird or Winamp/Wine, some amarokers don't seem to care anyway. Let me remember that the comment in the release anouncement I mentioned is in fact what is "quite degrading to all the people who have worked very hard on Amarok 2.0.0", such a kind of comment that backfires and signals a bipolar disorder in some amaroker's discourse, who at a moment say "... we are excited to have you join us for this event... Give it a try!" and at another moment say "we are aiming squarely at ourselves". When it's released to_the_community (and it only makes sense to release something to the community if you care about the community, if not amarokers could just save their jewel to themselves) it's for the benefit of everybody, but when the first negative comment arrives Amarok suddenly becomes no one else's matter, made only for their developer's personal leisure. Every developer has the right to be as stubborn as he/she wants, but doing so does a disservice to KDE. The rest of KDE devs handled much better the huge wave of criticism that came along with KDE 4.0, why some amarokers can't? Now lots of people are congratulating devs, and others feel the UI ugly, disorganized, cumbersome, full of features they don't use, confusing, lacking information and functionality, and more geared to web services than anything else. Some more technical types feel the plasmarokoids were a really bad (and badly executed) idea, putting a desktop inside an application, instead of using KParts. Others are upset because Amarok 2.0 broke their usage patterns. Some don't accept the argument that "you can still use 1.4.x" as it sums up to saying "you can use this brand-new car with a steering wheel behind your neck, or stick to riding that aging horse and dealing with its poop yourself". Blaming (and trying to move the focus from Amarok and devs to) me and other dissatistied people doesn't magically fix these (perceived by a "vocal minority") problems or make us disappear in a puff of smoke. Telling us to go away will do just that: make lots of once-Amarok-users go away and use something else, damaging KDE's image. If these are your (direct or indirect) goals, you're doing just fine. That's not all, it's ostracizing some would-be developers/artists, that don't want to work with Amarokers because of the perceived inflexibility of the project, based on some devs' "public performance". If some devs are upset about what I'm saying, they should do themselves (and the whole KDE project) a favor and grow up. Before some of them start to blame me and other complainers for being intelectually disabled and incapable of understanding the new, golden, shiny concepts that will make us "rediscover music", guided by "some of the biggest music fans out there", take a note that I (and others) wouldn't spend time writing about Amarok if we didn't care about it. Like it or not, Amarok has users, and an unmeasurable "vocal minority" of its users would like to have a KDE-based, intuitive, powerful, useable, enjoyable music player, something that some of us can't find in Amarok's current incarnation. I wish Amarok Team all the best.
Cláudio,
Seeing that the comment you quote from was written by me, and that I am the dev hired by Magnatune to (about half of my time) work on Amarok, I think I can answer most of your points. "1. Some devs are overly sensitive to criticism." I really don't believe that this is the case. We are just as dependent on input, both positive and negative as as any other community project. What we do have an issue (I know that I do at least) with is when people put words in our mouth, such as the comment I was actually responding to on the release announcement, that claims that we have decided to go for a completely different demographic and that we dont care about the traditional Amarok users. This is simply not true. Amarok 2 might not be up to speed with the 1.4.x series for many specific use cases, but this is not because of any unwillingness from our side, but simply a result of Amarok 2.0.0 being a very new app while 1.4.x is an amazingly mature and stable application that has seen a lot of stabilization and bugfixing for a long time. "2. Some devs assume they're aways right, and try to ridicule those who disagree with them." I don't think any one of us assumes that we are always right. Obviously, many desicions we make will be right from the perspective of some people and wrong from the perspective of others. We try to do the very best we can based on the time, community response, motivation and technical skills we each have, but we are aware that we cannot make everyone happy all the time. So sometimes we have to stick to our guns when when people disagree with something we have done. This does not mean that we do not take criticism into account. as for ridiculing people, my answer to the comment on the release announcement might not have been super polite, but the comment made me really angry as it implied a level of malice on our part that I think is completely unwarranted. I am only human so sometimes that anger spills over into a comment even if I try to keep it civil (Which I still think I did.) "we are aiming squarely at ourselves", "I believe Magnatunes don't pay an Amarok coder to develop for himself with complete disregard of Magnatunes' and users' interests." I think you misunderstand what I meant by this. We have a very large and diverse community and we get a lot of different often contradictory ideas and feedback. The only way we can decide what to act on an what not is to use ourselves as a filter. This does mean that Amarok is strongly colored by the views of the developers, and obviously not everyone will agree with us, but this is what keeps Amarok moving forward. An you are in fact wrong, this is exactly what Magnatune pays me to do. Basically the only condition that they place on my work on Amarok is that I do not directly work on integrating competing music stores, and that I otherwise use my best judgment to move Amarok forwards. So I am not going to call you "intelectually disabled" or any such thing, you obviously spend thought and effort to write this entry, even though I do not agree with much of it. I am however a bit sad a being called arrogant as that is something I strive very hard not to be. I cannot say however that I dont get angry every once in a while and let this spill into some of my comments. Having spent as much time and effort as I have working on Amarok, I do take it very personally, and people claiming that we somehow have ulterior motives sort of presses all the wrong buttons with me. - Nikolaj
Claudio,
As a disclaimer, I am not an Amarok dev. Regardless, you have taken nhnFreespirit out of context in his post. He was replying to Andrew Gaydenko, who said "Hey, I see, you are trying to find fans among mp3/pepsi/beer community." Regardless, I imagine his answer was the simple truth. As with most community-driven projects, devs work on what interests them, and what they'd like to see implemented in their project. This is not unique to Amarok in any way. If this does not include something you'd like to see implemented, you can either ask and be patient, or work on it yourself. Instead, you insult them, while offering no help yourself.
I'm sorry if I was the one who started the 'I develop for myself' wave of responses (some time ago concerning Lancelot) but you have to understand the developers to understand what that means.
We do what we do because we like to do it. I don't know any free/libre software developer that develops things he doesn't use (I did for some time, and then I got bored and started developing L). So we are developing for ourselves. And the good thing is that most of the time, what suits us, suits the users as well. Sometimes you get criticized, and if the user proposes the solution to his discomfort, and you like the solution, you implement it. If the solution is completely opposite and clashes with everything you stand for, you give the polite answer describing why you don't want to make that happen. And, then, there are trolls that are just able to say 'this is ****', 'you're a bunch of ****' or something similar. What would you feel if someone, without specifying any specific reason, starts bashing something you have been dedicated to for a couple of years? You could ignore it. You could ignore it a couple or more times. But, eventually, you will have to snap and vent yourself through a reply.
This comment is exactly what I've noticed, and it's part of the reason I won't use Amarok. The other reason is that everything is locked down - very difficult to configure. And the devs don't even seem to respond.
I'm sure most of the devs are great people, and they've obviously given a lot. But in pretty much every thread I found from google asking if it's possible to remove or re-arrange the context menu, the response was "It looks cool this way. You'll come around to it." Sure, there's a work-around to hide the context menu, but if you're not careful with the slider bar it'll re-appear. It's not exactly difficult to allow rearranging of panes or even removal. Yet devs won't even consider it. Not to be rude, but look at the name of this blog - "Drive-By Mockups." If I can configure appearance, I don't need a layout mockup. I'm sure creating layouts everyone likes is difficult (actually, impossible). But if you give me the option to configure things myself then I will be happy. Yet for unknown reasons I can't configure things. So it's back to Songbird for me. It's not a great player, but at least I can make it usable.
Hey Devs,
Those mock ups do look great. I remember a while ago Amarok devs were asking for help with the look (as people have been criticizing the "gray mess" since the betas). Not much has changed in that department in the final build. Here's a talented guy, who clearly has good taste and great ideas. I say Amarok folks contact him and see if he's willing to collaborate on getting Amarok 2 to look like that in future builds. Despite the look, I love Amarok 2 for its features and flexibility. Don't let the criticisms get you down. But do take worthwhile suggestions (such as this drive-by* mockup) and run with them. Alex * It's only "drive-by", if you don't try to get the guy to work with you. I think you guys need talent like his.
Hi all of you,
I defenetly like the new ui. It's great and I like the plasma thing in the middle. I do not want to see it all the time but for me this is a great point of Amarok 2. I am a developer too (but at the moment nothing to improve kde stuff) and know this community/customers thing. To my opinion it is a social problem and nothing more. For me the new UI for me is much better than the old. It is not very pretty and wastes space at some places but these are not major things. I really like the mockups and it would be nice if Amarok could look like that. But I really don't like rude comments about a great work like Amarok 2 which has a huge benefit for us. If someone likes small playlists or something like that this is okay, but to critize a developer team only because you can't hide something you don't want to see immediatly like the plasma area is not the right way to improve something. Developing for people, no matter if they are a community or customers is always half of fitting peoples needs and driving them into a direction. There are a lot of people who are not willing to take any new direction. But this way nothing will be changed and nothing will be better in a development cycle. And a lot of that users who are flaming and critizing a missing the whole point. You are like children at christmas who are waiting for there presents and if you don't like it you start flaming and bashing. Look at the comments to KDE 4, even Vista and you can continue this list ultimately. Why isn't all just at is was before? I don't say Vista is good but I say that the most people who say that it is the last thing on earth either didn't use it or just wondering why things are different than before. I don't like it too but if I speak to people about it they just ignore the things that are defenetly better than in XP. Or think on the desktop icons thing in KDE 4, how many comments have been wrote about the fact they don't like to have icons in a little square somewhere at there desktops? Whats the big problem of that? People are whining and the devs are starting to work on solutions to that but please don't stop the development because of them. We are concerning the same problem as in the music industry. The mainstream is willing to have music like you here it and see it everywhere and all is driven by the needs of the customers. In the past the artists brought music and generally arts and the whole process was more forward than today where everything is driven by the "people", the "democracy" and the top of this the "community". Don't get me wrong, communities are great but in all of that democratic systems there will ever be a small amount of grumbling people and often they are the loudest. I often tend to think that the people are stupid but in this moment I have to think about that not everybody likes to be in that special subject I am working with. If they had there taskbar or kicker or whatever and the loved to do especially this and that with it, it is really difficult for them to adapt to something new. But at the other side: it is not that difficult. Not enough to start bashing and flaming. Are you bashing you friends for something you don't like at first glance? Sorry but this is a kind of social incompetence. Fact the problem of bringing something new. I hope my bad english doesn't destroy the message I wanted to send...
"Hey if they were not then amarok 2 would not bad as it does today. =/"
I really had to laugh about that. Without you there wouldn't have been an Amarok 2. Anyway I do not like some aspects of Amarok 2 myself, but I do understand that similar to the transition to KDE 4 it needs some steps to reach the original target. And I'm eager to wait, while I'm using Amarok 2.
Well, I must admit that I can't get used to the new interface, but I do also admit that you are doing a great (and hard) job, so kudos for you all!!!
By the way, I really liked the second mockup you showed
I've played with amarok2 its cool but i cant get it to play sound on kde4.1.3
I've been waiting for months for this release .... but I'm not sure what the point is.... No Media player support?
Sort of shoots the app in the foot. Looks like I'll be waiting a few more months. Looks pretty ... but the strength of 1.48 was that it just works .. I bit of a system hog ... but works... Sux
To all the devs: thank you guys! Keep up the good work, we love you.
Please don't take dumb criticism from uninformed people too seriously. And you can always see the good part of it: if they get mad at changes is because they love amarok, in a deranged, insane way maybe, but it's still love
First i would like to thank you for the great app you created. Good job!
Theres a couple of things I really do miss dough... 1. visualizations like used to be on amarok 1.4 between volume and play buttons. It had a great effect on the overall look in the application, and it really looked stunning. 2. In the context view i seldom get to see the whole track name because there's not enough space, and if want to do something about it I need to resize the application so it's humongus. So whats the point with the current track info when i cant read the complete names? But I'm not to put off by this... Thats because I know Amarok will continue to improve.
The first mockup makes a very good point: I do not want to add music to my playlist and get information about it simultaneously. The division of most of the area into playlist/(visualization/context information/collection/Internet services) would be a great improvement.
IIRC I read somewhere on the wiki once that visualizations would probably return as a context view applet. Visualization and context information should be separate like in the mockup, though. Are you really going to pay attention to a visualization and read at the same time? I think though that the devices view should be integrated into the collection, much like it is now. Somewhere there should be information about the device, like type and space available, but I am not sure where this would fit. This could be expanded to include showing information about the filesystem that the local collection is on.
Those mockups just look good. I can't see them being any more usable.
However, I've learnt that if you make it pretty, people generally claim it is usable, and love it, irrelevant of other flaws. So really, my advice would be, make it prettier for 2.1.
First of all congratulations with version 2 !!!
All this criticism about databases makes my smile I'm totally outsider. Simple Linux PC user, having no idea about how it works. Proportion of regular users like me will increase much faster than number of geek users, if linux will get more popular. I like applications witch work out of the box. Like most of my friends I use default settings for all applications. Why should I think about database that amarok use? There is no difference for me. The only decision I need to make is what music to play, and developers can decide the rest. Thats Ubuntu and gnome success story - "it simply works". You should be real geek's judge music player for not supporting posgreSQL. I understand your decidions to remove that support, you can save a lots of time of developers for more important tasks than satisfy couple of geeks (e.g. visual look of amarok 2 )Again I think 99% of users does not know that amarok use database at all. Anyway, it looks like KDE-PIM team moved to MySQL to so I will have 2 databases in my PC. Good look for amarok team!
Just keep the Amarok2 as music player, it rocks as that. Do not add videoplayer features for other tasks than musicvideos if it is a must.
These mock-ups are great for videoplayer and i want to get that kind kaffeine!!! But if those are implented to Amarok2, I would change from it to other player just for that reason. I just dont get that idea why people would like to make a complex non-good-features -player what does almost everything but sucks on all areas because of that. Things what I miss on Amarok2 are showing ratings on playlist and the options for chane the playlist size of entries. Sometimes the same albumb what includes various artits, everyone take space like a album. I dont like it. I want it to be listed as by albums, not by artits. |
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