Shuffle Big Bug!

[peter madsen]

I'm in general very pleased with the Poweramp musicplayer.
But there is a major bug in the SHUFFLE function!
All I want is it to shuffle between all my around 5000 tracks on my android device.
I can not exactly reproduce the error but sometimes when I shuffle between all tracks it seems stuck on just shuffling between one artists tracks, and I have to fiddle around with the shuffle mode to get it to shuffle all tracks again. I know the app has different shuffle modes and no that's not the problem for me.
It has to do with when I once press shuffle, take a break from listening and then go back and continue where I left off, and then it just plays that one same artist in shuffle every time. It must be an app bug and not a "me bug". Please fix.

[andrewilley]

Tap on the Shuffle icon in the player screen to get to 'Shuffle All Available Songs' - or long-press on that icon to select directly from a list of options.

Alternatively, go to Library > All Songs and tap the Shuffle icon (top/left of the songs list) and the whole of your library list will start playing shuffled.

If you exit the app and come back, just press the Play/Pause button on the player screen to restart playback from where you left off, and you will still be at the same point in an All Songs shuffle.

If you later go into another Category (e.g. Artists) and start playback again using the Shuffle or Play icons at the top of its song list, the Shuffle mode will be changed to shuffling that artist. You can always go back to the All Songs shuffle at any time by using the Shuffle icon on the player screen.

Andre

[peter madsen]

Thanks for the quick answer Andre.
Yes that would be the logic solution. And I can start the shuffle allover as you say. However it seems to get stuck shuffling on that same artist when I continue from a break.
 

[andrewilley]

If you have not changed the shuffle mode from 'All Available Songs', PA should not bias towards any particular artist, album, folder, etc.

To check, look at the counter displayed in the centre of the control icons line. When you start shuffling all songs it should show as "1 / nnnn" (where nnnn is the total number of songs in your library). This should count up with every song played, "2 / nnnn", "3 / nnnn", etc.  As long as the counter continues to increment normally, no reshuffle has taken place.

If the number ever resets back to '1' then you have triggered a new reshuffle and if you are now listening to new sequence. This could be an Artist or an Album, in which case the nnnn figure will be reduced according to how many songs are available in that grouping.

Andre

[Sam_W]

There is still an issue with the shuffle.

When I'm in a genre and try and shuffle, the only thing that pops up is "Shuffle songs and categories". That's the only option that appears as tapping the shuffle icon more than once does NOT cycle through options, and neither does holding my finger on shuffle.

Android version is 10.

[peter madsen]

No. It's just really weird. If I go to the "all songs" pane, then press shuffle inthere I would assume it would shuffle all the songs. Instead it takes one random song and then go on to play this one particular artist. Shuffled. But it's not every time. I have 4000 songs on my phone.

[MotleyG]

36 minutes ago, peter madsen said:

No. It's just really weird. If I go to the "all songs" pane, then press shuffle inthere I would assume it would shuffle all the songs. Instead it takes one random song and then go on to play this one particular artist. Shuffled. But it's not every time. I have 4000 songs on my phone.

@peter madsen I’m not sure why this would be, or which option you may have changed. I have not experienced this issue, on three different phones over the past six or seven years, and an Android powered DAP too. Are you sure the repeat mode isn’t set to something other than repeat all? Same with the other issue you are seeing with the same track repeating.if I use the shuffle button in the all songs list, the counter total shows the correct number of songs (almost 24k) and counts up from 1. If I don’t change anything, it will continue each time I start a Poweramp. This is even from overnights, and can go on for days. Of course I’m often make changes to what I want to hear, so I have never gotten to play through my entire All Songs list!😋

[peter madsen]

Hi Motley,

I don't see any counter anywhere, but what I found was "que" where all these around 400 songs it always fell into shuffling between was, so I cleared that, and now it seems to shuffle between all songs! I don't know how they got into the que in the first place.

 

[andrewilley]

Even if you are playing previously enqueued tracks, you can still adjust the Shuffle mode on the player screen by tapping or long-pressing. Normally that won't have any affect until the queue is completed and PA exits back to regular Category playback though, as the Queue is normally played in the order you added the tracks. That can be overridden by turning off Settings >Library > Queue > Ignore Shuffle.

In Genre playback you can still tap or long-press on the Shuffle icon on the player screen and see all of the options. There are some modes (such as All Songs, Top Rated, Recently Played, etc) where Category shuffle options are not really relevant though, as there are no other 'categories' available to change to.

The song counter is located in the centre of the player screen, between the 'Timer' and 'Repeat' icons above the Play/Pause/etc buttons - although it is possible to hide it by disabling Settings > Look and Feel > Player UI > Show Track Counter, so it might be worth checking that option.

More information can be found in:

Andre

[ultrarunner2019]

I was having a similar problem with shuffle:
I had artists repeat within a shuffle, and just a while ago a song played twice in the same hour of listening. I never stopped the player, but paused it a couple of times.

What I found is that I had shuffle Shuffle All selected.
I changed to Shuffle Songs.

I have the idea that when shuffle ALL is selected, PA will shuffle songs, albums, artists, etc. Could this cause more than one song by the same artist to be played?
Perhaps the song I heard twice in an hour was first played by the artist shuffle, then by the song shuffle - with Shuffle All turned on.
I guess I'll have to listen for a while to find whether changing to Shuffle Songs fixed the problem.

BTW: Thanks for the instruction on how to get the track counter to appear. I had it switched off.

[andrewilley]

'Shuffle All Songs' does exactly what it says on the tin, it randomises the entire available library of available song files into one huge shuffled list. No consideration is given to titles, albums, artists, folders, etc, which means it is quite possible that the same artist may turn up twice in a row as that's the nature of randomness - but not the same physical file.

PA then progresses through that list, song by song, until everything has been played. You'll see the track counter increment for every new song, and there can be no repetitions of the same file. You can manually move backward and forward through the list with the << and >> buttons by the way, the whole shuffled sequence is remembered from start to finish. So if you think a song has appeared twice you can scroll back until you find it; perhaps you have the same piece of music as separate files in two different albums, such as the original release, a collection, and even a live version?

If you do something that triggers a re-shuffle, the track counter will go back to 1 again and all bets are off as to whether you happen to encounter something that you heard recently again. The new shuffled order does not remember anything about the old one. 

Andre

[ultrarunner2019]

What is the difference between Shuffle All and Shuffle Songs?
When I heard a repeat song, I had PA set to Shuffle All. I now have set to Shuffle Songs.

Now that I have the track counter, I will know if shuffle has been reset.

Edit #2:

Sorry; I must have completely missed that you posted the link 'How to use Repeat and Shuffle in Poweramp'

Edited December 3, 2021 by ultrarunner2019

[ultrarunner2019]

Uh; My bad!

I just realized that I had Repeat Category selected while I was using Shuffle. I suppose this can really mess things up within a normal shuffle. Most likely the cause for hearing the same song twice in an hour, and perhaps the cause of the OP's issue with shuffle.

 

[andrewilley]

If you are listening in 'Shuffle All Available Songs' mode, there are no actual Categories to repeat as it's one huge long list that will continue until everything has been played once. When playback does eventually need to repeat, there will be a full reshuffle so you will hear a completely new randomised sequence of All Songs the second time around. 

Practical note: when any Category repeats with a newly reshuffled order, the final song from the original sequence will be shown as the first song of the new order - so the new order will appear to start at track #2. This is to avoid the (admittedly remote) possibility of the final song in one shuffle turning up as the first song of the next reshuffle, so you hear that same song again immediately. Of course the penultimate song from the old list could still turn up as song #2 in the new order, but that's randomness for you.

Andre