Sound Juicer: TNG Plans

I have grand plans for Sound Juicer which, when I find the time, will make it a replacement for gnome-cd. Basically I'm going to change the user interface quite dramatically so that the main window is a read-only view of the CD, and add playback controls. I hope this will be an easier interface for CD playing than the current GNOME CD player (with its design based on a physical CD player). Then the information editing will be taken out into a dialog, which means that more options can be available as they are only visible when required.

Of course, pictures speak a thousand words, so here are some provisional mockups.

Sound Juicer main window

Sound Juicer album editor

Observant people will notice certain similarities with Totem... So, that is my aim for the future of SJ, once I've figured out how best to use the GNOME 2.6 audio profiles library of course (hi Thomas!). Comments are welcome (as long as they are positive).

NP: Tanto Tempo, Bebel Gilberto

15:28 Wednesday, 16 Jun 2004 [#] [computers/sound-juicer] (16 comments)

Posted by Link at Wed Jun 16 15:05:08 2004:
Looks great! A gnome-cd replacement would be wonderful. One suggestion I have is to move the "All tracks have the same [TAG]" check button. When I was looking at the Album Details window, my eye kept flicking up and down trying to place each checkbox with its associated text box. I think logically I would expect it to be on top, though the fact that the checkbox toggles the text entry's sensitivity may be enough for the association.
Posted by Ploum at Wed Jun 16 15:50:06 2004:
it becomes closer to "Grip".

Grip is IMHO a really great software, it just have a bloated interface.

A HIG equivalent of Grip is really needed and you are true, gnome-cd must be forgotten.

Good work :-)
Posted by Murray Cumming at Wed Jun 16 15:58:44 2004:
> I hope this will be an easier interface for CD
> playing than the current GNOME CD player (with its
> design based on a physical CD player).

Very sensible. Why didn't we think of this before?
Posted by Baptiste Mille-Mathias (crevette) at Wed Jun 16 16:52:48 2004:
As Link, I think all the "All tracks have the same [TAG]" check button in the edition mode, must be merged to a "this album is a compilation", which enable to edit each track properties.
in the play mode, the artist should be display only if this a compilation.

This new version of SJ is very well think, and should replace in an advantageous way the actual gnome-cd player.
Posted by Steven Garrity at Wed Jun 16 17:22:42 2004:
Great idea - I look forward to it.
Posted by Peter Adolphs at Wed Jun 16 20:18:54 2004:
Looks really good. Clear and beautiful interface.
Posted by Arafat Medini at Wed Jun 16 20:39:39 2004:
Can I still rip my CDs with it? SJ was a GREAT tool for ripping Cds and it would be very sad to loos it's ripping functionality.

on a side note: what about SJ and RB integration then?
Posted by Markus Bertheau at Wed Jun 16 20:48:20 2004:
Shouldn't this in the end be a VFS module that nautilus displays when an audio CD is inserted? Tracks play when (double)clicked and can be dragged somewhere to be ripped and saved on the hard disk.

And I don't think it is clear where to I submit the album data - for me at least. :)

Good work :)
Posted by Scott Sloan at Thu Jun 17 00:06:36 2004:
Looks Great!

>which means that more options can be available as >they are only visible when required.

I think that is key. Like one of the previous comments, grip is really nice but it's gui is clutter city. But these pictures look just the opposite which is uber sweet.

Great Work!
Posted by Britt Selvitelle at Thu Jun 17 00:54:35 2004:
Yes! Hope you have time to get around to this soon.
Posted by John at Thu Jun 17 09:09:11 2004:
Looks cool, but it would be even nicer if Rhythmbox was the complete integrated solution, ala iTunes.
Posted by drew hess at Thu Jun 17 09:18:27 2004:
Ack!  Do we really need another CD player?  Don't totem, rhythmbox, etc. do the job?

I can't even remember the last time I played a CD.

SJ is a fantastic ripper, and it does one thing and does it really well.  I guess I don't understand why it needs to evolve into anything more than that.
Posted by Owen Williams at Thu Jun 17 14:41:45 2004:
I think the whole "checkbox to extract" thing is unnecessary.  Instead, just add a button or toolbar item (tied to a menu item) to rip the whole disc. 99% of the time people rip a whole disc, not individual tracks, so the checkboxes are maddening.  There could also be a separate menu item for ripping selected tracks, which people don't do very often.  Most people know how to ctrl-click or shift-click to select multiple items, and if they only want to extract one track they only have to click it and then use the menu option.

I get put off by a CD playing app with ripping UI elements everywhere, it makes me feel like I'm just supposed to be previewing the tracks before I rip them.
Posted by Robert MacEwan at Sat Jun 26 13:01:17 2004:
Excellent idea in my opinion. Grib does seem rather bloated.
Posted by Christopher Warner at Tue Jul 27 04:46:02 2004:
It'd be really nice to rip multiple CD's at once. I have two cd drives and alot of CD's to juice. I'd be willing to help with this.
Posted by 2097 at Fri Sep 17 14:52:22 2004:
Playing CDs; why?
I'm with Owen for the most parts.

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