SqueezePlay 7.1 Release Notes

This wiki page serves as the software release notes for SqueezePlay/Squeezebox Controller 7.1 release.

Note that while this document is specific for that platform, many of the changes described below are either all or in part software changes made to the core SqueezeCenter server code to enhance the interaction with the Controller.

If you are a SqueezeCenter user, you should update to 7.1 to take advantage of these features (after updating SC to 7.1, your controller will automatically detect there is new 7.1 firmware to install).

SqueezeNetwork users will receive notification of new Controller firmware to install after SqueezeNetwork servers are updated to 7.1-based code.

Key Features Added

Mixer Support (Music IP)

There has been general support added to the UI for custom mixers, the most well know of which is probably MusicIP (a core SC plugin).

• Mixable items (tracks, albums, artists, genres, etc.) can have their mixer(s) invoked by press-hold of the play key
• Mixable tracks can have items in the Track Info menu to create a mix (see screenshot)
• If more than one mixer is available (e.g., MIP + Dynamic Playlist), press-hold of play will bring an interim window to screen that allows the user to select which mixer to use.

Customize Home Menu

There is a new applet that allows the user to have control over what appears on the top-level "home" menu. Bug 5366

Navigate to Settings->Home Menu and use the checkboxes to hide/unhide items from the home menu

For example, promoting a few music services to the home menu:

Another example, a greatly reduced home menu for quicker visual access to what a user might want:

Song Scanner

Press-hold on FFW or REW while playing most local music and some remote streams such as podcasts, and a "Song Position" slider will popup. Use the scroll wheel to select the position of the track desired, then hit the center button to go to that position. Shiny!

NowPlaying Screensaver Behavior Improvements

The behavior of the "Now Playing" screensaver has been confusing to many users.

When the Now Playing screensaver is activated, it will now behave as follows:

• pressing the Home key will take the user immediately to the Home menu
• pressing the center button will take the user to the current playlist window (when playlist size > 1 track) or directly to the track info window (when playlist == 1 track)
• pressing any other key, including the back arrow or scrolling the scroll wheel, will jump the user back to where they were before the screensaver kicked in

User Preference for Sorting Music Library->Albums

It is now possible to set the sort order of Music Library->Albums (SC only) through Settings->Advanced->Albums Sort Order

Wake-On-LAN Support

The Controller now remembers the last Player and Server it was connected to. This allows a WOL packet to be sent to the server when the Controller is turned back on.

New Screensaver: "Screen Off"

A new screensaver, "Screen Off" has been added. This screensaver when activated completely dims the screen and key brightness.

Enable this screensaver at Settings->Screen->Screensavers->When Playing and/or Settings->Screen->Screensavers->When Stopped

Small Icon Menu Style

A small icon menu style has been added to assist Plugin developers that want to create menus with icons without sacrificing the number of items that can be displayed on a screen.

See Bug 6504 for more information

Recent Searches Cache

When making a search of either local music or any of our OPML-based services (Rhapsody, Slacker, Live Music Archive, Pandora, Last.fm, etc.), the search is cached for later callback. A "Recent Searches" menu item will appear in both the home menu and the Music Library->Search menu for these.

This is a server-side run time cache, so any cached searches will be wiped clean whenever SqueezeCenter is restarted.

note: this feature still has some growing to do, and will likely change somewhat in scope, placement in the UI, and behavior in coming releases

New "Track Info" Menu

The menu rendered when descending into the information for a track (e.g., Music Library->Some Artist->Some Album->Some Track or Now Playing->Playlist->Some Track in Playlist) has been completely redesigned.

• Less commonly accessed information has been dropped into a "More Info" submenu
• "On Pandora", "On Rhapsody", "On Slacker" etc. items have been added for users that have these services enabled. This allows a user listening to a track on one service (or locally) to see what's available on another service.
• Third-party plugins now have hooks to give direct access to this menu for adding custom items

Icons in Favorites List

Icons are now displayed for favorites, be they pointers to Music Services, Internet Radio, or Local Music

Add-hold to add and play next

Any place where pressing the add key (+) means: add to end of playlist, press-and-hold of the add key means: add as the next item (or items) in the playlist

"All Songs" available under Music Library->Artists->Some Artist->Album List

When browsing to Music Library->Artists->Some Artist, artists with more than one album will also have an "All Songs" item available in the menu. Bug 7439

New Wallpapers

Thanks to community member FredFredrickson for these nice new wallpapers!

Player Brightness Setting when connected to Players with Display (SB1/2/3, Transporter)

Players that have displays with brightness settings can now be adjusted via the controller

Honor SC User Preference to "Play All Tracks in Album" when hitting play on an individual track

There is a SC user preference that, when set, plays the other tracks in an album when play is hit on that track. This was previously restricted to the Player display (SB1/2/3, Transporter), but now has been extended to also work on the controller. This feature also works to play the selected track and all subsequent tracks when using "Browse Music Folder". Bug 5981

Add Sleep to Settings->Advanced->Power Off Menu

In addition to being able to power down the controller, it's now possible to put the controller in a power-save sleep mode. Depending on the user's settings, sleep can also automatically be invoked, but this gives the user the ability to immediately place the controller in sleep mode. Shake to wake up!

Architectural Improvements

Improvement of Server/Player Connectivity and Recovery

SlimDiscovery was reworked, as was much of the Player, Server, and Network classes to improve reliability and recovery of connections.

Service Registration API

Any part of the SqueezePlay Lua code can now register one of their methods as a "service", which can then be subsequently accessed by other parts of the SqueezePlay code. This allows for much easier interaction across applets and jive code.

One example of this code in action is the new Screen Off screensaver, which gets/sets the controller brightness via getBrightness() and setBrightness() services registered from the SqueezeboxJive applet.

Kernel Tuning

Boot time has been improved by ~5 seconds by removing unused devices

Other Key Bugs Fixed

• 7291 Add Play All and Delete Playlist menu items when browsing playlists
• 7642 New artwork resize parameter to maintain aspect ratio for Controller artwork requests
• 8020 Honor user preference for number of albums to list under "New Music"
• 8073 Stop using sets of concatenated strings, which often didn't translate well, instead use %s and \n chars.
• 6907 New popup "toast" style that wraps text
• Better handling of player firmware update messages
• Better help text on software update screen