[S9/J3/X7] Cheetah XT

[juKajitsu]

Hi, Kizune. Can you add option to switch off ff\rew buttons in block mode? Is it possible for cheetah or sense(better)?

[Kizune]

Originally Posted by Eumldeuml

Suggestion: Can you make a fast-access function for the picture viewer too? I have a wallpaper pack, which contains about 200 pictures and it's very annoying to browse them by scrolling down, waiting one or two seconds, scrolling down again and so on.

How would that fast-access function look like? I mean, how would you use it, what's the result...?

Originally Posted by Eumldeuml

Question: Will I be able to export playlists from awesome Sense to more awesome Penguin?

I'll create a small app for this task

Originally Posted by mutescream

I was thinking about something similar, when I was playing around with wallpaper... I think it would be faster if there was a wallpaper function somewhere, that opened the picture viewer, but only pointed to a wallpaper subdirectory (and ignored all otrher pics, such as album art, or other personal pics.

Is that really necessary? 1. You don't change the wallpaper very often and 2. thanks to the navigation bar at the top it's easy to open the "Pictures/" folder directly and then open the "Wallpaper" folder.

Originally Posted by mutescream

I've also wondered why the coverflow in the stock music player is so much faster in scrolling images than the picture viewer... It even seemed faster than Vision for that function.

That is because for coverflow, Cowon implemented a function to resize the thumbnails using the firmware. For thumbnails in the picture viewer this function doesn't exist so the picture you see there are resized by the Flash engine. And this causes more lag.

Originally Posted by juKajitsu

Hi, Kizune. Can you add option to switch off ff\rew buttons in block mode? Is it possible for cheetah or sense(better)?

If "block mode" is the state where the screen is switched off: Cowon provides an option in the settings: Settings > System > Hold Mode: All.

[mutescream]

Originally Posted by Kizune

Is that really necessary? 1. You don't change the wallpaper very often and 2. thanks to the navigation bar at the top it's easy to open the "Pictures/" folder directly and then open the "Wallpaper" folder.

I'll concede the point there... It was more thinking outloud and wondering if it would be easy to implement.

That is because for coverflow, Cowon implemented a function to resize the thumbnails using the firmware. For thumbnails in the picture viewer this function doesn't exist so the picture you see there are resized by the Flash engine. And this causes more lag.

I take it there is no way to access this function for the picture viewer then? If not, this was a VERY poorly thought out set up by Cowon. Why wouldn't we want to scroll through pics quickly? Or maybe create a database of thumbs (like many pic viewers for windows seem to have) only once, so that can be accessed instead of recreating thumbs every single time?

[Hare-deLune]

This is something I wanted to ask about as well.
I have a lot of large, high resolution pics on my J3, and it's frustrating to wait several seconds each & every time I swipe to scroll through them, particularly when I'm trying to get to a certain picture that I want to show someone. I am using Sense for this, btw., not the stock UCI.
So, do you think the improved speed of the new UCI in Cheetah XT will overcome this problem somewhat, or are we stuck with it because of Cowon's firmware?

[Kizune]

Originally Posted by mutescream

I take it there is no way to access this function for the picture viewer then? If not, this was a VERY poorly thought out set up by Cowon. Why wouldn't we want to scroll through pics quickly? Or maybe create a database of thumbs (like many pic viewers for windows seem to have) only once, so that can be accessed instead of recreating thumbs every single time?

I agree, the firmware is anything but efficient or well-coded. Though, it has improved a lot since the S9 (S9, J3 and X7 use the same firmware, and it was slow as hell at the beginning).
About the thumbnail thing: This is a route I don't want to go. It's similar to el maco's way to realize his coverflow, and what I dislike about that is that the user has to do lots of things to ensure everything works flawlessly. What I want to create is a UCI which works perfectly fine at default values (install > ready to use) but which is also very customizable. This way, I make Cheetah suitable for both beginners and advanced users.

Originally Posted by Hare-deLune

So, do you think the improved speed of the new UCI in Cheetah XT will overcome this problem somewhat, or are we stuck with it because of Cowon's firmware?

The loading times of pictures depend on the firmware and nothing else, Cheetah's apps can't change that.

[mutescream]

Originally Posted by Kizune

This is a route I don't want to go. It's similar to el maco's way to realize his coverflow, and what I dislike about that is that the user has to do lots of things to ensure everything works flawlessly. What I want to create is a UCI which works perfectly fine at default values (install > ready to use) but which is also very customizable. This way, I make Cheetah suitable for both beginners and advanced users.

Gotcha, but I think I may have explained what I was suggesting poorly... There would need to be a process that checked the pics on the player (like the album art check at the beginning, by the firmware), and verifies all of the pics to see if they are in the database, and then add thumbs for any not previously created. It would be really slow once, and when large updates occur, but I think it would probably be faster more often than not.

[Kizune]

Ah, I see. Well, yes, that would be awesome.

[mutescream]

Originally Posted by Kizune

Ah, I see. Well, yes, that would be awesome.

Now the big question I have, is that something that is possible, without a ton of work for you? I think it would speed things up a lot (in keeping with the theme of Cheetah)... But, I'm getting the feeling that it would be difficult for you to code, or can't be done?

Even if that can't be done, could the thumbs for album art (for coverflow) be loaded into the pic viewer from wherever they are stored? It would seem that would be faster than recreating something already done by the firmware.

[Kizune]

Originally Posted by mutescream

Now the big question I have, is that something that is possible, without a ton of work for you? I think it would speed things up a lot (in keeping with the theme of Cheetah)... But, I'm getting the feeling that it would be difficult for you to code, or can't be done?

That's the route I was talking about in my previous post.
+ It would be difficult, yes.

Originally Posted by mutescream

Even if that can't be done, could the thumbs for album art (for coverflow) be loaded into the pic viewer from wherever they are stored? It would seem that would be faster than recreating something already done by the firmware.

Nope.

[juKajitsu]

Originally Posted by Kizune

If "block mode" is the state where the screen is switched off: Cowon provides an option in the settings: Settings > System > Hold Mode: All.

Yes, but I mean only ff\rew button.
For example:
The player is in my pocket vertically. If I try to pause a book for talking with people, my finger can press rew button instead of (or toghether with) pause. One chapter can has 40mins and you dont see how much time already was.

In block mode D2 has function: ff\rew or volume up\down on the same buttons and long press on pause = ff track. So, if J3 has 2 different buttons for it, only dd\rew can be switched off with addition play\pause\ff function.

[Kizune]

Ah okay. That's impossible due to firmware restrictions.

[juKajitsu]

Ok, thank you for information.

[Hare-deLune]

Originally Posted by Kizune

The loading times of pictures depend on the firmware and nothing else, Cheetah's apps can't change that.

Thanks for the info., but I am not Mutescream.

[Kizune]

[Hare-deLune]

I have had a strange & interesting thought today while reading these latest posts. It is somewhat off-topic, but I considered it interesting enough to share.
Having read through many, many posts on forums like this over the past several years, I get the feeling that there are quite a few people online that are passionate & knowledgeable about this type of technology (and others). At least a few of these people are also skilled with creating/improving the technology, such as our own Kizu. Many times I have read of the deficiencies of Cowon's basic code of the J3, and/or the firmware code. I'm sure we've all felt, at some point: "wouldn't it be great if Kizune (or someone like him) were to write/re-write that code so we could have something really good that does what we want?"
So I was thinking, what if I owned a company like Cowon, and instead of hiring a team of programmers to make the code for my product, I hire one or two guys for QC, and go on some forums like this, asking if the readers would like to work on developing the code. It would be open-source, peer reviewed in development (on the forum threads), then given a final check by the QC guys I hired before being put on the market. The end result would be a killer optimized product with code that could be customized/improved at any time, elimination of programmer costs (because the programmers would be doing it because they love to do it, instead of because they have to for money), and hopefully something that would be very popular and purchased by the truckload!
Then, to be fair, those persons who developed the code could receive some compensation for their efforts.
Perhaps this is a very naive thought, but it seems to me that it could be a situation where everybody wins!
Well, it's just an idea.....