Shuffle folders in a parent folder

[hrolf1713]

Hi there !

I don't really know if this has been addressed before but I couldn't find something in the forums talking exactly about the behaviour I'm searching for.

Here's the situation:

To illustrate my point, my library is sorted by folders and every album has his own folder. I have a folder hierarchy that looks like that:

> New albums
   >> Album 1
   >> Album 2
   >> Album 3
> Selected albums
   >> Classical
        >>> Album 4
        >>> Album 5
        >>> Album 6
   >> Jazz
        >>> Album 7
        >>> Album 8
        >>> Album 9

Etc

My concern is: 

I would like to be able to shuffle folder contained in a parent folder, and only those. In other words, using the "shuffle categories" option to shuffle folders, but only the folders contained into a selected parent folder.

For example, I would like to be able to shuffle the folders contained in the "New albums" parent folder. 

What happens now if I go to the "New albums" folder (through the folder hierarchy menu) and press the shuffle icon at the top, is that it plays the folders contained in that parent subfolder at random, but the songs in those folders also are shuffled, what I don't want.

If I change the shuffle option to "shuffle categories", which would be the behaviour I'm looking for, it begins to shuffle ALL my folders, including those outside of the "New albums" folder, which I don't want either. 

In the 816 built, an option was added to shuffle all songs contained in the folder, which again I don't want either.

Is it possible to implement the behaviour I'm talking about ? 🙂

[hrolf1713]

Edit: To delete. 

[hrolf1713]

Anyone? 

[andrewilley]

At the moment, in build 816 if you ask PA to play a folder (which has subfolders) in shuffled mode, it will play all of the tracks in the first subfolder in songs-shuffled mode, then it will play the next subfolder in songs-shuffled mode, and so on until it has played all of the folder's subfolders. This is better than the previous behaviour which seemed to play all of one subfolder shuffled as expected, but then it would randomly select another unrelated folder elsewhere.

To clarify though, are you asking for the Shuffle icon inside a Folder to work with the entire contents of all of the folder's subfolders combined, and shuffle the whole lot until all of the songs in all of those subfolders have been played?

Andre

[hrolf1713]

On 1/2/2019 at 2:04 AM, andrewilley said:

if you ask PA to play a folder (which has subfolders) in shuffled mode, it will play all of the tracks in the first subfolder in songs-shuffled mode, then it will play the next subfolder in songs-shuffled mode

In fact, what I'm searching for is the exact opposite.  I would want, if I press the shuffle option in a parent folder that has subfolders in it, that it will play those subfolders shuffled but with songs inside them non shuffled. 

It doesn't have to be the default behaviour. But I think it would make sense to have it as an option. 

[hrolf1713]

On 1/2/2019 at 2:04 AM, andrewilley said:

Shuffle icon inside a Folder to work with the entire contents of all of the folder's subfolders combined, and shuffle the whole lot until all of the songs in all of those subfolders have been played

I think this is exactly the behaviour that has been added as an option in the 816 built, right? But that's not what I want. 

[hrolf1713]

@andrewilley This is the concern I talked about in the 822 release thread. 

[andrewilley]

4 hours ago, lrkjglksjhdfgkl said:

@andrewilley This is the concern I talked about in the 822 release thread. 

As stated in the previous post, and by me in the 822 thread, I understood that this was implemented a few releases ago. Have you selected the option: Settings > Library > Lists > Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy ?

Andre

[hrolf1713]

15 hours ago, andrewilley said:

As stated in the previous post, and by me in the 822 thread, I understood that this was implemented a few releases ago. Have you selected the option: Settings > Library > Lists > Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy ?

Andre

As said in the other thread, what I would like is the ability to shuffle folders that are contained in a parent folder (without shuffling the songs inside them) and only those folders. 

The option you talked about shuffles all song contained in that parent folder. 

[maxmp]

@lrkjglksjhdfgkl this is how it works for (flat) Folders, where each folder is a separate entity. As for Folders Hierarchy, by many user requests, shuffle via header button specifically shuffles whole hierarchy starting from the current folder.

[hrolf1713]

17 hours ago, maxmp said:

@lrkjglksjhdfgkl this is how it works for (flat) Folders, where each folder is a separate entity. As for Folders Hierarchy, by many user requests, shuffle via header button specifically shuffles whole hierarchy starting from the current folder.

Thanks Max for answering me directly.

But do you think though it would be a possibility to add, as an option, the ability to shuffle folders from current folder sometimes in the future?

Plus, this is already possible to shuffle categories/songs from a parent folder. The only thing that would change is the implementation of the shuffle categories/songs in order option. 

I know this may not be a popular request, but I honestly think it makes sense. I don't really use the (flat) Folders menu because having a well structured folder hierarchy makes more sense for my personal use. The only issue I encounter is the lack of flexibility when it comes to playing/shuffling what's inside those folders... 

And that's honestly too bad for me, because Poweramp truly is my farourite player in terms of sound and options. But I'm always forced to keep returning to another player that I've installed in parallel because it gives me more possibility in terms of advanced shuffle options. 😔

[andrewilley]

To clarify, you are asking about a situation where you have a folder called (for example) "Local Bands", with 20 subfolders for individual local artists inside it (and probably more subfolders another level down for their albums too). In this case, you would like to be able to select the "Local Bands" folder and then have Poweramp shuffle all of its layers of subfolders so you would be able to listen to one random local album at a time, but with the tracks played in order.

The current behaviour (with "Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy" turned off) is to shuffle all of those local band sub-folders into a random order first, and then play the tracks from each of those folders in random order too.

Thus you want the "Shuffle Lists, Songs in Order" feature to be able to base its shuffle start-point on a specific folder, rather than all folders. If Max was able to implement this, I suspect the same should go for the other shuffle options (such "Shuffle Songs, Lists in Order" for example). Maybe this could be done via long-pressing on the Shuffle icon that is shown at the top of a folder view to present a list of choices from that point?  

Andre

[hrolf1713]

5 minutes ago, andrewilley said:

To clarify, you are asking about a situation where you have a folder called (for example) "Local Bands", with 20 subfolders for individual local artists inside it (and probably more subfolders another level down for their albums too). In this case, you would like to be able to select the "Local Bands" folder and then have Poweramp shuffle all of its layers of subfolders so you would be able to listen to one random local album at a time, but with the tracks played in order.

The current behaviour (with "Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy" turned off) is to shuffle all of those local band sub-folders into a random order first, and then play the tracks from each of those folders in random order too.

Thus you want the "Shuffle Lists, Songs in Order" feature to be able to base its shuffle start-point on a specific folder, rather than all folders. If Max was able to implement this, I suspect the same should go for the other shuffle options (such "Shuffle Songs, Lists in Order" for example). Maybe this could be done via long-pressing on the Shuffle icon that is shown at the top of a folder view to present a list of choices from that point?  

Andre

Allright, exactly that! 😀

I also imagine it could be done by long-pressing the icon, as you said, or maybe by changing the on/off "Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy" option for a list of the different possible behaviours of the button. 

[andrewilley]

1 hour ago, lrkjglksjhdfgkl said:

or maybe by changing the on/off "Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy" option for a list of the different possible behaviours of the button. 

I have issues with that being a global setting anyway, it would make a lot more sense to provide local temporary changes via long-press of the Shuffle icon (like you can in the Player screen). The selected option could then stick in that view for any future single-taps until the user changes it again.

However I have no idea how much extra complexity this would add to the code, and also how you could see what variant is currently in use from the Player screen.

Andre

[hrolf1713]

1 hour ago, andrewilley said:

provide local temporary changes via long-press of the Shuffle icon (like you can in the Player screen). The selected option could then stick in that view for any future single-taps until the user changes it again

Yes, you're right. If the option is effectively saved for later single-taps, it makes more sense. 

1 hour ago, andrewilley said:

how you could see what variant is currently in use from the Player screen

You already can. When you tap the shuffle icon in a folder in Folder Hierarchy, the shuffle icon in the playing screen matches the behaviour of the shuffling. 

With the "Shuffle All Songs in Folder Hierarchy" option on, it shows the "Shuffle all songs" icon:

 

With the option off, the "Shuffle categories and songs" is showing:

It could simply be the same for other shuffling options. I also guess it could use the same icons at the top of the list in the library to show what behaviour has been saved. 

[andrewilley]

44 minutes ago, lrkjglksjhdfgkl said:

You already can. When you tap the shuffle icon in a folder in Folder Hierarchy, the shuffle icon in the playing screen matches the behaviour of the shuffling. 

That only shows the basic options covering all categories. It does not show if you are in a subfolder (which one?) or other similarly limited category choice. It's really just for toggling through the top-level choices and can't control anything more detailed that was started from a library sub-view.

Andre

[hrolf1713]

1 hour ago, andrewilley said:

That only shows the basic options covering all categories. It does not show if you are in a subfolder (which one?) or other similarly limited category choice. It's really just for toggling through the top-level choices and can't control anything more detailed that was started from a library sub-view.

Andre

I see. That's not a big concern for me though as for now I have the use to just go back by taping on the cover to see where I am. 

But if that's something worth implementing, it could just be by adapting infos already present at the bottom of the playing screen, because it already tells you in which category you started from:

(It says "Folder Hierarchy" in French by the way 😊)