foo_random_pools, Select random groups from the media library Options

[fbuser]

foo_random_pools is a foobar2000 component for creating random playlist entries selected and grouped by various pool definitions.

Mainly you can define titleformat expressions for selecting random groups like albums including sorting and filtering from the media library.

Download the latest version: here

This post has been edited by fbuser: Sep 16 2011, 22:50

[TakuSkan]

Wow... this is closing in on something I've been thirsting for since the 1st copy of Winamp ever released. As you suggested, I set %artist% as my group definition, but dropped 'Rock-Pop' and set %path% HAS "\MP3s" as a filter for my entire library.

I say 'closing in' because, while I am getting few if any repeat artists played with things configured as you suggested, I'm finding that foo_random_pools seems to dwell within some folders more than others.

I played about a half hour's worth of my entire library, and noticed that I was hearing a lot of tracks from my 'World' folders. And I was hardly hearing any classical tracks at all. I have a foo_np_simple script logging everything FB2K plays. So I opened the log file and ran searches to see how many files from each genre's top folder were played.

I should point out that I only set foo_random_pools to add 1 track to the queue at a time.

I won't post all the results, but here's enough to make a point:

CODE

  Play    Total  Folder
  Count   Files

    12    402:  Miscellaneous MP3s 1
    31    557:  Miscellaneous MP3s 2
    6     1840: Classical (Choral)
    7     655:  Classical (Instrumental)
    6     416:  Classical (Vocal)
    2     323:  Country
    51    4651: Folk-World
    7     448:  Jazz
    6     50:   Jazz Collections
    10    48:   Jazz Webcasts
    13    183:  Pop FM Broadcasts
    34    7960: Rock-Pop
    42    656:  Rock-Pop Collections
    8     109:  Soundtracks
    72    835:  World
    --
    324 Total played (genres with only few files not listed above)
.

Look at the proportions:

Out of 835 files in the 'World' folders, 72 of them were played.
Out of 1840 classical choral files, only 6 were played
Out of 655 classical instrumental files, only 7 were played
Out of 414 classical vocal files, only 6 were played

Then look at the numbers for the 'Rock-Pop' files, and the 'Rock-Pop Collections' play counts:

Out of 7960 'Rock-Pop' files, 34 were played.
Out of only 656 'Rock-Pop Collections', 42 were played.

That one really startled me. I'll test this a bit more, but I guess with a little code added to set priorities, I can level things out.

After about 1/2 hour of normal playback, I started to skip forward to quickly play the next queued tracks (a total of 324). Without waiting the 60 seconds FB2K requires to recognize them as having been 'Last Played', foo_random_pools would sometimes queue the same file again, or queue another track from the same album folder. Not a problem with normal playback, but it makes it a little hard to evaluate performance.

I'm still not clear on a few aspects of this component, but I'll hold off on questions until I've played with it a bit more. Overall it's really a fantastic tool for customizing random track playback. Thanks for all your effort on this fbuser.

[fbuser]

Wow... this is closing in on something I've been thirsting for since the 1st copy of Winamp ever released. As you suggested, I set %artist% as my group definition, but dropped 'Rock-Pop' and set %path% HAS "\MP3s" as a filter for my entire library.

This is a different scenario and so the results you described are not very suprising. If you want to equalize the results for the folders you should use $directory(%path%) as group and for using all tracks of your entire library you can leave the filter empty. If you have any subfolders in your folders, it will not work as described, but can be adjusted.

Without waiting the 60 seconds FB2K requires to recognize them as having been 'Last Played', foo_random_pools would sometimes queue the same file again, or queue another track from the same album folder.

'Last Played' and foo_random_pools are not related at all. foo_random_pools does not have any memory, therefore it can happen, that the same file will be picked twice in a row.