Neutron Forum

Feature request: A way that when you finish playing all the files in a folder, the player automatically jumps to another random folder and starts playing those files. Preferably with a way to configure and edit the list of folders selected from.

This is a feature that is in Rockbox, which is an alternative OS I've used on my old mobile DAPs in the past - would still be using it but my car doesn't have an aux jack. Much of the great features that I like about Rockbox has are included with Neutron, but not this one (yet). The way it works is kind of complicated - you select the "Random Folder Advance" option in playback options, but it doesn't work until you've run a small applet called Random Folder Configuration, which basically makes a folder list of all the folders it finds on the device, and then you can edit which ones you want to use or ignore, and then save that edited list. Then it works as advertised, and is really nice when you're driving for instance - jumps to a random album when you finish playing one, so you don't have to fiddle with your device/phone to get something going. I'm not sure exactly how all of this could be implemented within Neutron, but it would be a great extra feature to have.

You you would like to see an expansion of the existing playback mode :

It should add a sort of "Random Sequential" mode which after playlist completition switches to a random folder/album, not just the next one in line.

And you would like to be able to somehow define a subgroup of folders/albums to be set apart for that purpose.

As to the idea with the subset also see here

Yes - perhaps adding a variation on the Sequential option, so that instead of the next folder, it's a random folder

Advancing to a Random Folder could be problematic IF your library isn't strictly adhering to structure such as Root -> Artists/Album-Artist -> Albums -> Songs/Tracks. Should it only advance randomly to folders which contain only tracks, and not higher level Artist folders which could contain multiple other folders/albums?

'Advancing to Random (Blank)' for me ought to advance to a Random Album. The goal being, to shuffle albums from all artists in the library, and have those albums' tracks be played in original order.

WitzyZed wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 18, 2021 12:58 am

Advancing to a Random Folder could be problematic IF your library isn't strictly adhering to structure such as Root -> Artists/Album-Artist -> Albums -> Songs/Tracks. Should it only advance randomly to folders which contain only tracks, and not higher level Artist folders which could contain multiple other folders/albums?

That would indeed be quite a complicated task to specify this properly, let alone implement it !

WitzyZed wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 18, 2021 12:58 am

'Advancing to Random (Blank)' for me ought to advance to a Random Album. The goal being, to shuffle albums from all artists in the library, and have those albums' tracks be played in original order.

As I understand it the category where the random samples would be taken from would the one that you're playing : playing albums would advance to random albums, playing folders to random folders etc

And the specification problems would not be limited to folders : in PowerAmp they had quite a discussion what a random album would mean - any album or an album from the artist currently playing. And such considerations inevitably lead to a lot of complicated issues - you'll have to implement not only one but many different random-select-options, and/or implement filters on the tracklist to restrict the selection ( as proposed here in the original post ).

WitzyZed wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 18, 2021 12:58 am

Advancing to a Random Folder could be problematic IF your library isn't strictly adhering to structure such as Root -> Artists/Album-Artist -> Albums -> Songs/Tracks. Should it only advance randomly to folders which contain only tracks, and not higher level Artist folders which could contain multiple other folders/albums?

'Advancing to Random (Blank)' for me ought to advance to a Random Album. The goal being, to shuffle albums from all artists in the library, and have those albums' tracks be played in original order.

That's why I'm asking for random FOLDER advance specifically. With proper folder list editing capabilities, it's extremely useful, depending on how the end user uses folders of course. Asking for random album or artist advance could be a problem.

Hi

I want to be able to shuffle all tracks in 1 folder but when I turn it on it shuffles all folders. Is there not a play through folders option I can turn off?

Thanks

Afaik there's only one shuffle-option, and that can be on or off, and should affect each and any tracklist, no matter what and where

I haven't seen anything about shuffling in the library-setup-drilldown yet.

I merged this with an existing development proposal, as both hint at ways to rework and extend the existing shuffle option.