I was thinking about a barcode-reading feature some time ago (mentioned
it 'in this forum thread'
(http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=20138)), and today I
remembered it. And I see that an implementation exists! Excellent. I
particularly like the use of a few special barcodes to control modes and
other functions. Thanks for putting the work in; it looks very cool.
I've still not printed a catalogue of my collection (the expense of the
trading card storage and a new printer doesn't fit well with the
relatively low priority of the printout!) but wanted to make a
suggestion anyway, in case it's useful for others. It concerns the ID
used to identify a given album: where does it come from? Is it a
SlimServer db internal ID? Is it prone to change on a rescan?
I propose this: have the basic play-this-album barcode be exactly the
barcode printed on the original CD's packaging. For those albums which
don't have that metadata stored, use a number based on the db ID (or
whatever is used currently) but adjusted to be in a range illegal for
the CD barcode. (I'm pretty sure there are rules and checksums for
those barcodes... least elegantly, they're not longer than 14 digits so
an adjusted ID above 1,000 million million would be sure not to clash!)
Personally, I have a PRODUCTNUMBER tag on every file (where the CD had
a barcode!) containing the relevant digits. I imagine that one could
extend the SlimServer db to include a custom album ID based on a
user-defined tag, or generated automatically in the absence of such a
tag. (I don't know if that's easy to do or not; it's just an idea
meant to trigger discussion.)
The obvious upshot of this is that the barcode scanner will now work in
the absence of a printed catalogue: I just scan the barcode on the disc,
which is on the shelf next to me (as I still find a use for all those
bits of plastic; haven't got SBs everywhere yet!).
Everything else ("Play all by this artist", changing mode, random mix,
etc) can be triggered by IDs outside of the album ID range. "Play all
by this artist" could be implemented automatically, without recourse to
another ID: if the scanned number is in some special range outside of
the album range, chop off all but the last 14 digits to identify the
album then dereference it to the artist. One could imagine other such
special ranges (eg 3x10^15, or '3' plus a 14 digit album ID, could mean
"take me to the album so I can pick a track").
Since I don't have a barcode scanner yet, and may be the only person
who would benefit from this, I'm not asking for any of it to be
implemented! I'm merely thinking aloud.
And on that note: would I be right in thinking that cheap barcode
scanners plug into a PC? I'd like to buy one, but I won't have a PC in
the living room, or even a laptop or PDA (and if I had the latter, there
are some good SlimServer skins to use instead). Does anyone know of
anything wireless (IR, bluetooth, wifi)? Although presumably that
won't be cheap.
Thanks again for DirectPlaybookPDF -- even though I haven't bought any
hardware to use it yet, I appreciate the fact that the software exists
and you've taken the time to make it work.
--
smst
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smst's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=752
View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=29630
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