Ipod-style Mp3 menu

[nyeark]

I'm thinking of using an HD44780 LCD as the front-end for my carputer, which has replaced my head unit for my car stereo needs. I've already looked into soldering up tactile switches to a keyboard controller and using LCDSmartie and the hotkey plugin by smack, and testing on my main machine here makes things look very feasible.

The only thing missing, however, is a way to browse the MP3s on the carputer - I'd like an Ipod-style menu system, where I can simply go into a folder and pick a song to play. Even better would be playlists created for each artist/album, but that may be too hard to do.

Any skilled coders want to try this one?

[fishthecat]

This would be a great addition to the Smartie plugin family.
Sounds tricky though.

You need a plugin that you can control using real buttons and where your can specify your root mp3 folder (like c:\mp3s).
Then allows you to navagate through folders to an mp3 or folder. 'clicking', the mp3 or folder would then open it up in winamp.

EDIT:
We'll also need some way to get to the menu while winamp is playing.

[fishthecat]

Here's a link to a post about a winamp plugin that lets you wire up external buttons on a serial port.
http://www.lansley.co.uk/forum/phpBB2/v ... =9606#9606

Using com-port's keyboard 'presses' and winamp and smartie, we have most of the parts we need for this ipod menu plugin.

What we now need is someone to write a program that runs in the system tray. It 'listens' for keypresses that we plug into com-port and send using the external buttons. We set up our root mp3 folder in the app and then we can navigate the folders with it. It would need to be able to open folders and/or mp3s in winamp on a different keyboard press.
To display on screen, it could write the screen output to a file or something and on smartie we have a screen that displays the file's contents on the LCD.

Am I thinking straight? Can anyone make that application?

[jonny]

i know this isn't exaclty what you are looking for, but there is a global hotkey plugin:

Hotkey plugin

All you need to do is write the menu plugin, and i think i have seen one around, maybe on the sourceforge smartie page?

[fishthecat]

i know this isn't exaclty what you are looking for, but there is a global hotkey plugin:

Hotkey plugin

All you need to do is write the menu plugin, and i think i have seen one around, maybe on the sourceforge smartie page?

It's very useful for this request: http://www.lansley.co.uk/forum/phpBB2/v ... php?p=9612

As for the ipod menu, that's the hot keys detecting but we still need something that can create file and folder lists...