Some thoughts on the latest v3 interface, and a few suggestions

[andrewilley]

Note: The following are my own personal observations as a PA user, not as forum moderator. The italicised ones are points that would normally be deal-breakers for me.

• The three-dots icon changes position on every different screen. It would be much easier and more convenient for it to be in a consistent location - the static bottom row would be ideal. In fact, I would suggest combining it with the pretty-much redundant and currently space-wasting three-lines icon ('Settings' could easily be added to the bottom of the three-dots options, with the hardly-ever-needed 'Changelog' placed in the Settings menu near where 'Get Support' is already duplicated). Thinking about it, the four-squares icon at the left of that bottom row seems pretty-much redundant too, as its function is also duplicated in several other ways already.
• Why does the Queue not work when you are listening to Shuffled music? I currently use that feature all the time to break out from shuffled play to listen to an occasional specific track, and was really surprised to find it doesn't work on the new release.
• In Dark Theme it is almost impossible to see which Repeat and Shuffle mode is currently in use. For example the 'Off' and 'Shuffle All' icons look very similar against a pale background. The way that the Timer button works, adding an extra background to the icon when it is enabled, makes it much easier to distinguish between on and off.
• In Pro Buttons mode, the five playback control buttons almost completely obscure the seek bar, making it very difficult to use. The buttons really should be placed in a separate row (i.e. all five playback controls in one line, with the seek bar placed it its own separate space underneath them). There's plenty of room for this, even on 16:9 screens - well, as long as the Play button doesn't try to take up about half of the screen anyway
• What is the point of the up/down gesture on the album artwork? Up doesn't seem to do anything but bounce the image around a bit, and Down does the same as tapping the artwork or using the four-squares icon in the bottom left.
• On a related note, could the configuration feature for gestures be brought back as it was on v2, or even expanded a bit? I'd suggest a 'Gestures' section in Settings>Look and Feel, allowing the user to select what happens for Left/Right swipes (e.g. Change Track, Change List, Disable), Up/Down swipes (e.g. Change Track, Change List, Disable), Single tap (e.g. Show the 'options' popup, Go to List View, Download Album Art, Disable), and Long-press (e.g. Show the 'options' popup, Go to List View, Download Album Art, Disable). That would make it a lot easier to avoid triggering inadvertent gestures (which I manage to do all the time, especially tap).
• The Compact List view option is great, but ideally needs to be available in more categories (especially Folders, which often need more text space).
• On the Player screen, longer text items (e.g. title, artist/album, filename, etc) need to horizontally scroll back and forth as they did in PA v2, rather than always being truncated with ellipses. I have a lot of audio files where the title or filename is longer than the screen space allows, but the early portion of the name is the same for each track so I now can't tell them apart (e.g. "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Fit the First.mp3", "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Fit the Second.mp3", and tons of others).
• Similarly, in Folder/Playlist/etc list views, those sort of longer names should text-wrap onto the next line as there is plenty of white space to allow two or even three lines there where needed.

Andre

[TheBestPessimist]

I agree to all these suggestions!

 

(And i also see that they are in line with my own thoughts: 

)

 

[7OH]

Header (maybe only in folders) must be smaller with album art on left.

No need to show separate button "level up" - it more usable by pressing current folder name (as in v2).

Wanna see header static.

Need to see current song in list - now there is no difference between all songs in list and  currently played.

[Vestat]

definitely agree with all the suggestions above. particularly the ones about the progress bar that is often unpractical to use when adopting the pro buttons.I also suggest an option to put control buttons and progress bar on two different lines. Aside, I really liked the progress bar and the ratings visible in every list view. This feature was extremely efficient in daily use.

Thanks for your effort.

[andrewilley]

43 minutes ago, Vestat said:

 also suggest an option to put control buttons and progress bar on two different lines.

That would be my suggestion too.

The perfect solution for me would be to have a much slimmer version of the new dynamic seekbar (which I really do like for short distance navigation, and it looks nice) placed below the album art area, then the proper buttons under that (also a bit slimmer than at present, and ideally all the same size) and finally below those two would be a standard thin-line progress bar (like the one in v2) to show how far through the track you are and to make major position changes.

Andre

[Vestat]

3 minutes ago, andrewilley said:

The perfect solution for me would be to have a much slimmer version of the new dynamic seekbar (which I really do like for short distance navigation, and it looks nice) placed below the album art area, then the proper buttons under that (also a bit slimmer than at present, and ideally all the same size) and finally below those two would be a standard thin-line progress bar (like the one in v2) to show how far through the track you are and to make major position changes.

Yeah, that would be awesome. Slightly smaller control buttons would probably make the job easier considering the size of that control stripe and avoiding any major changes like reducing the album art area.

[7OH]

In sample skin for v3 there is one screen with progressbar under buttons and title under album art.

Now this skin in light version - will try today make dark version.

Did you try it ?

PA3_SamleSkins.apk

[djdarko]

12 minutes ago, 7OH said:

In sample skin for v3 there is one screen with progressbar under buttons and title under album art.

Now this skin in light version - will try today make dark version.

Did you try it ?

PA3_SamleSkins.apk

Where did you get that apk from?

[7OH]

Just now, djdarko said:

Where did you get that apk from?

Compiled Max's sample )

[djdarko]

Just now, 7OH said:

Compiled Max's sample )

Cool, have you tested it out? How well does it work?

[Mrmahdi]

@7OH Wow,tanks 

[djdarko]

On a side note: I agree with you Andre about your original post. You make a lot of good observations.

[7OH]

5 minutes ago, djdarko said:

Cool, have you tested it out? How well does it work?

It's white. I just compile to see HOW it work.

If this options will be in default skins in next version of PA - that will be great.

[Mrmahdi]

4 minutes ago, 7OH said:

It's white. I just compile to see HOW it work.

If this options will be in default skins in next version of PA - that will be great.

This is what I wanted, that is to say, the virtual button removed from the button, which is very useful, I think the themes of this version will be great.

[andrewilley]

1 hour ago, 7OH said:

In sample skin for v3 there is one screen with progressbar under buttons and title under album art.

Yes, I saw the photos that Max posted, that skin looked really nice. That sort of look would be ideal for PA IMHO - possibly with a less-tall version of the new-style seekbar added as well as the progress bar (not sure if skins allow both at the same time though?)

Andre

[Vestat]

tried the suggested sample skin, looks nice but it's not bugless. three dots button not working for me. better visibility and efficiency of the shuffle, repeat and so buttons. Not bad at all.