Announce: Enhancement to SlimScrobbler/LastFM

[mwphoto]

When using the SlimScrobbler/LastFM combo it is now possible to configure a 'number of recent artists' to go to artist radio.

Long description:

1) when playing (lastFM or music from the local collection) a record of recent artists is maintained

2) when browsing the lastFM plugin (Web or via remote) you can play artist radio for the recent history.

Listening experience

For me this is like a directed discovery mode, I start playing random tracks from my collection, then after a while I get bored so I browse the recent artists and start playing similar artist radio from lastFM. If it's not to my taste I browse recent artists again and pick another.

Configuration

There is only one new parameter available on the prefs page. It's pretty simple.

Installation

This feature currently ONLY on the dev branch of SlimScrobbler, so you need:

6.5b1 slimserver
Latest SlimScrobbler and LastFM from http://slimscrobbler.sourceforge.net

NB this requires CVS to download, no packaged downloads available yet.

Malcolm

[mwphoto]

SlimScrobbler updates . . . .

I've just started a build process for non-CVS users. I didn't really understand the sourceforge stuff so I did something independent.

The latest SlimScrobbler code is now at http://www.bpscgi.co.uk/SlimScrobbler/SlimScrobbler.zip

This should get updated pretty much all the time - however as with all dev code it might be flaky :)

Malcolm

[atlslim]

Malcolm,

I might be missing something but I don't see the additional artists from history when I browse to "Change LastFM Station" either on Web interface or player menu. Running 6.5 trunk and lastest CVS plugin.

Any debug tips?

Thanks

[mwphoto]

Ok,

running slim server with --d_plugins (perl slimeserver.pl --d_plugins) should give a variety of messages related to this functionality.

In particular you should see 'LASTFM: Adding ARTIST_NAME to station list' messages each time a track starts. If you don't get these can you post the log file as an attachment so I can take a look?

Just to be clear all the track history is kept in memory so it is lost when you restart the server.

Once you've seen one or 2 of these messages using the remote you should be able to browse to:

Internet Radio / LastFM / Press play to start LastFM (press RIGHT here not PLAY)

when you've gone right you'll have a list of stations, you always get your user station (user/xxxxx) and the SlimScrobbler group (group/SlimScrobbler). You should be able to use the down button to find the new stations.

Alternatively if LastFM is playing you reach it with the Change station option.

Malcolm

[atlslim]

Turns out the LastFM folder (from within the SlimScrobbler folder of the CVS repository) was not updated when I updated the SlimScrobbler directory. Not sure if I didn't retrieve correctly but I was not seeing the: 'LASTFM: Adding ARTIST_NAME to station list' message each time a track started until I updated with the plugin included in the zip file you provided.

Working as advertised now!! Thanks!