Autoplay single song - implementation seems odd (to me)

Lishy

AnthonyB I see what you’re saying but you could also argue the opposite and what if you put a song after the song that you don’t want autoplay on.

peter

Yes, but as the current way to do it is already established (in use for more than 5 years) I will not change this. What I am indeed not happy about is the visual indicator. I will try to find a better indicator in version 4.

AnthonyB

I can appreciate that changing the way something has been done for so long, and people have learnt it and got used to it, is fraught with risk.
I can also appreciate that depending on how you think about it, are you autoplaying 'the' song you selected, or are you autoplaying from a song (which is what you select in ST3 to Autoplay) into the next song in a playlist? I'm still very much the former and I think the playlist reordering scenario kinda cements my logic as it reduces a lot of potential risk.

But hey, it is what it is and as long as I know how to get the desired outcome (and as long as I don't make a last minute playlist change and forget to change what song I have to tag with Autoplay 🙂 ) then all is good!

@peter thanks for looking to improve the visual indicator in ST4!

Damir

AnthonyB.

AnthonyB

Just pulling up this thread I originally started as I ran into an additional challenge with Autoplay that I hadn't noticed until now.

Scenario:

I have a Playlist of songs
Global Autoplay is OFF
Global Autoload next song is enabled.
Some songs are set to Autoplay into the next song, while others are set to be manually Started.
My drummer uses a MIDI trigger to Start any songs that require manual start. He is using ST3 as a Client connected to our ST3 Host iPad.

What I've just realized is that the ST3 Client has no visual representation of the individual song Autoplay.
On the Host you have the little Blue downward arrow on a song to indicate it will Autoplay into the next song, however there is nothing on the Client?
Even if you toggle the playlist out from left side of screen, there is no Autoplay visual cues like you see on the ST3 Host.

More broadly, it made me realize that the rest of the band members have no idea when they are going to get a quick break for a manually triggered Start song as we play through our Playlist.

Am I missing something here? Is there some option I'm not seeing to make song Autoplay visual cue available on a Client connected to a Host?

If not, this is something I'd greatly appreciate in ST4!

I know there are workaround I can employ, e.g.

Rename song titles with some sort of tag at the start of the title to indicate a song my drummer needs to manually trigger the start of. But this messes up the clean Title and Artist data AND I'll have to make sure any song that people are using local lyric sheets on mirror this same change.
I can use song colours to differentiate Autoplay versus manual start songs. This is what I will do as a workaround, however, it was farcical to watch the band conversation on what colour should indicate Autoplay song versus Manual Trigger song. Some people felt Green surely indicated 'Go - the song will autoplay', while the drummer was adamant that green would mean that HE has to hit a trigger to make the song Go. Everybody is different 🙂

Anyway, just hoping there can be a clear visual cue included in ST4 client.

littlespaceman

I'm really confused about how autoplay works, and wonder if someone can help me.

Firstly I agree with Anthony B, it does seem unintuitive to me that if you want a song to autoplay, you have to select it on the preceding song. But like many UI things, like the mouse/trackpad scroll setting on a laptop, what makes sense to some seems really odd to others and vice versa.

What I don't understand is this; I've set a few songs in a playlist to autoplay, by selecting it on the preceding song. So in this example, I want 'Go Your Own Way' to autoplay straight after the opener (Boys of Summer) and this seems to work. I also want 'Chasing Cars' to autoplay straight after 'Run', but what I don't understand is this does NOT work - instead, after 'Run', even though there are about 10 more songs that are not shown in the screenshot, 'Boys Of Summer' starts autoplaying, which I just don't understand.

Can anyone help please?

AnthonyB

littlespaceman In theory, based only on what is visible in the screenshot, what you are saying should occur, is correct.
I.e. Boys of Summer will Autoplay into Go Your Own Way, then
Run will need to be manually started, then
Run will Autoplay into Chasing Cars.

I suspect you have something else that we can't see enabled, configured, etc. that is causing Run to Autoplay into Boys of Summer. What that might be I can't say I've not encountered such behaviour before.

Damir

littlespaceman I'm really confused about how autoplay works, and wonder if someone can help me.

In Playlist mode, there are 3 ways to use Autoplay.
1 every playlist has its own master switch to select the whole playlist to Autoplay .
2 you can swipe left on every song which only selects that song to Autoplay to the next song no matter what choice you make as the next song to be, it basically means I don’t want to say anything after this song .
3 the top right button that temporarily auto plays this song or disengages it depending on its other Autoplay settings, this is there if you need it as a last second decision to manipulate the Autoplay function and it won’t remember its operation next time , it simply serves its purpose once .
I use all three methods ,
My background music playlist uses the easy to engage ALL Autoplay,
I use the individual auto play to plan where I want the Autoplay to occur,
And I use the temporary Autoplay when performing as a last second choice either by foot or finger control.
It’s very simple and quick once you get the hang of the three basic options.
Hope this explains Autoplay.

peter

Autoplay skips already played songs. The app assumes you don't want to play the same song twice during a gig. Either clear the DONE marker in the History tab or disable the DONE marker completely: https://stagetraxx.com/user-guide/settings/#show-done-marker

I am aware that this behaviour causes some confusion among new users. Version 4 will therefore not skip over played songs. The marker will only be a visual guide.

Damir

peter Version 4 will therefore not skip over played songs. The marker will only be a visual guide.

I find it usefull that it skips already played songs , perhaps an option to choose would be good in the settings of DONE.

littlespaceman

peter Thanks Peter, I managed to fix it after receiving your reply.

I do find the blue arrow difficult to see, when a song has the autoplay feature turned on - as a suggestion, how about adding a horizontal space or coloured line ABOVE the first song in a group that will autoplay from one to another, and also BELOW the last song in this group.

For example, in a set with 10 songs, let's say I want songs 3, 4 and 5 to autoplay through, and then I want to autoplay 7, 8 and 9.
Having a space or coloured bar horizontally between songs 2 and 3 will give me a very clear sign that the next 3 songs will autoplay in a group, and having the same space or different coloured bar after song 5 tells me very clearly that after song 5 I will need to manually select song 6...

littlespaceman

Damir I agree with having an option to skip or not.

And thank you, Peter for explaining - yes I was confused by this but now I know, I do agree that in v4, having the option to skip played songs or not would be better.

Off topic, but can I suggest another idea for v4; a pop up 'value' window for when you want to change volumes in the mixer window. For example I find that when I want to increase the volume of a backing track, relative to the click track, the drag slider is really oversensitive, and it is very difficult to choose the value you want; a pop up window where you can enter the value via a keypad would be really helpful. Thank you!

peter

Damir I think you are right. Even if this will not help in reducing configuration options but rather increase it.

littlespaceman I do find the blue arrow difficult to see, when a song has the autoplay feature turned on - as a suggestion

In version 4 this will be way better visible.

Damir

peter I think you are right. Even if this will not help in reducing configuration options but rather increase it.

The way it is it’s s great , it automatically helps not to play a song twice but it still allows you to select a done song so you can play it twice if needed but you have that choice , this might be rare but for most of the time it is automatically working for you, it just makes it much more beneficial on stage , the thing is just to understand the way it functions , it’s easy to learn without a manual you just need to play with it for a short period and it’s self explanatory plus you can completely disable done if it’s not what you need.