Mini Mods - vbMp3 & XEON vbMp3 Player

vbMp3 Player + XEON vbMp3 Player
See second Message for CMPS Block version for vbMp3 Player. XEON vBa CMPS install instructions are in the XEON package.

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vbMp3 Player designed by Syrus XL
http://www.digitalport.co.uk
IMPORTANT: No longer supported on here - if you require advice or support then this is only available from www.digitalport.co.uk

Requirements: Any vBulletin forum (requires no database to function)


XEON Update:
The Xeon vBmp3 player will be released soon to full vBulletin integration, this means you will able to add tracks to the 5 playlists from the AdminCP, all urls,track titles and playlists are stored in the database.

[high]Supporters:[/high]
If you would like to support my work with this modification please contact me via PM regarding donations, and I will add you to the supporters list. You will receive advanced notice of future beta releases, and also permission to beta test them.

Support: Only given to members that have clicked 'Installed'.

[high]The 'mighty' XEON vbMp3 player now available for download.[/high] Note: XEON is a beta release, replacing the 'Black Gloss' version. There are a few bugs with playlist switching, these will be 'fixed' in an update, hopefully within the next few days. This is a high-quality designed mp3 player and has many new features that the iPod 'lookalike' lacks. If you have the space, I would recommend you update to the Xeon version. The vBa CMPS XEON version is also demonstrated at this address, [high]Click HERE for Xeon vbMp3 Demo[/high], this demo is using the full vBulletin integrated beta version all populated from the vb database.

XML Editing:
To change track data, edit the XML files with Notepad or Wordpad, and enter your own urls and tracks.

XEON Facts & Features:

• 50 mp3 playlist bug fixed, can now hold upto 100 tracks(debugging test environment).
• Multiple Playlist Switching(*see important note below).
• Volume control.
• Panorama (Balance).
• Visual Effects.
• Multiple function display.
• Blue Neon 'Media' effect buttons.
• Larger font display (as requested).
• Player coding updated for future vBulletin integration.
• XEON uses approximately 100 movie clips.
• Protect from Import implemented, to prevent copyright.
• XEON comes with 5 populated example playlists.
• XEON is fully compatible to the forthcoming Pro vbMp3 Player.

XEON To do List:

• Incorporate 'float' coding, enabling the player to 'float' within the main vBulletin forum or vBa CMPS.
• Add 'float' close button to XEON flash player.
• Add Alpha background to flash player (for 'float' to work correctly)

Note: These changes will only affect the XEON mp3 player, it will still remain compatible with the Pro version vBulletin integration.

*XEON Known issues:
1. A bug on XEON means I had to currently release it only in a beta stage. The issue relates to playlist switching, this has been currently set to only 5 playlists, the bug relates to when you click to load a new playlist, you may recieve no autostart upon new playlist load. This 'issue' I am working on, and hopefully have an updated version with unlimited playlists, by deleting the 5-button bank and replacing it with forward and back buttons to skip through playlists. Please note you may experience strange behaviour if you only populate a XML playlist with less than 5 tracks.
2. A sizing problem in the vBa CMPS block requires reversed dimensions.
3. Problem with populating any playlist with over 100 tracks, will cause the player to go into an infinite loop, and become unstable. [high]This was not caught during the 1,000 'dummy' track environment test.[/high]

XEON Fixed Issues:
An issue with the popup window displaying the height and width the wrong size is now fixed.

XEON vbMp3 Player Installation:
The Xeon uses very similar installation code to the vbMp3 Player, full instructions are included in the XEON download package. This player has been tested with the forthcoming vBulletin full integration Pro Mp3 player, soon to be released. For Pro Player details see towards the end of this post.

XEON vbMp3 Player in CMPS:
This is now been added to the XEON package. Full instructions on how to change the background color to match your style is also documented.


vbMp3 Player
This mp3 player is designed as a popup for your members to listen to, while browsing your website. The actual flash mp3 player is designed to read data from mp3 ID tags, or you can enter the artist and tracks manually using the XML file included. The flash player is designed not to auto-start, so you may scroll through all available tracks. All buttons function and you can also select tracks by using the scroll controls and double-clicking a track.

2 sample tracks are already included the playlist XML file {Note: The urls in the example tracks are void, you must replace these urls with your own}.

This modification should function on any vBulletin board from version 3.0 upwards, since only a small piece of javascript is used to create the popup mp3 player window, from the navbar. However, the CMPS block version has only beem tested on vBulletin 3.6 and vBadvanced CMPS 2.2. The planned major addon version will be developed for vBulletin 3.6.1 and higher, since it will require changes to database.

Configuring of tracks is all done in the XML file, do not rename this file because the flash file will fail. Mp3?s can be uploaded to the same server as your site or an external site (just change the complete URL in the XML file). So to add tracks all you need to do is edit the plylist.xml file, and enter the urls and track data (if needed).

NOTE: Using external servers may cause the player to run slower, this can be changed by altering the soundbuffer value of the song/track, in the XML file, which will override the value in the flash file.

Streaming & Sound Buffer parameters in the XML file
There are 2 parameters they may confuse some people so heres an explanation on how they work.
Both can be set in the XML file and set per mp3 track.

Streaming:
If set to 'False' will cause the player to download an entire mp3 before playing.
If set to 'True' will play the mp3 track as soon as the 'soundbuffer' value is reached.

Sound Buffer:
This parameter controls the number of seconds before the mp3 will start to play, obviously it will only work if 'streaming' is set to 'True'.

Using other mp3 Players:
The coding used on this modification can be used with many other free or commercial based mp3 players around the internet, with slight alterations. Please note that the other full integrated version will only work with the players we release, due to the call routines used within the player.


UPDATES:
[high]06/10/06:[/high] + XEON vbMp3 Player released This is a high-quality design, all graphics are vectors, and created in Flash 8.0, all embedding code has been updated for this player. The package contains various versions of the player, and 5 example populated playlists.
[high]01/10/06:[/high] + vbPlayer 1.01 added: Player with AutoStart and Shuffle(randomize tracks) disabled. Some minimal code optimized. Requires either the vbMp3 player download or CMPS vbMp3 Player for additional files to function.
Pop up code updated to show link only to registered members.
+ Alternative vbPlayer added: (autoStart Enabled) requires main download to function. If updating from previous version, you may need to clear your browser cache, before the new version will show. Same vbMp3 player just autoStart enabled.


Click INSTALL to receive notifications of updates of this modification.

vbMp3 Player Installation:
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Requires uploading of 3 files and 1 template edit.

Upload the following files to your forum ?ROOT?

vbPlayer.swf
plylist.xml
ipod.htm



Template Edit:
==============
AdminCP -> Styles & Templates -> Navigation / Breadcrumb Templates -> navbar

Find:

<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="calendar.php$session[sessionurl_q]">$vbphrase[calendar]</a></td>

After add:

<!-- vbMp3 Player Start -->
<if condition="$show['member']">
<script type="text/javascript">
<!--

function OpeniPod(){
iPod = window.open('ipod.htm','iPod','directories=no,height=430,width=190,location=no,menubar=no,resizable=no,status=no,toolbar=no')

return false;
}

-->
</script>
<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="#" onclick="return OpeniPod()">vbPlayer</a></td>
</if>
<!-- vbMp3 Player End -->

End of template edits.
================

How to Enable all visitors to see vbMp3 Player
To Enable all visitors to see this link, remove the following code from the above code:

<if condition="$show['member']">

and this

</if>

Enjoy!

Known Issues:
=============
Always have more than one track in the playlist available or the flash file will fail (excludes the new Xeon player).
Place no more than 50 tracks in playlist (excludes the new Xeon player).


Future planned release details
Change name of mp3 player to vBmp3 Pro Player.

AdminCP

• Use of AdminCP to populate flash player via using the vBulletin product plugin system.
• Playlist urls and track details stored in database as opposed to the current XML file.
• Allow playlist to show thumbnails of tracks being played, if available.
• Create multiple playlists to populate flash player.
• Playlist will include stream variable and buffer enable/disable per track.
• Usergroup permissions for use. Good for lowering bandwidth consumption if hosting your own mp3's.
• Allow admin to set if player should popup or use Flash 'float' in page (requires flash button on player).
• Allow admin to set autoStart variable (effectively lowering bandwidth upon false page loads).
• Allow admin to set default variables.
• Allow admin to enable/disable tracks without deleting.
• Possibility to allow users to add tracks to a favorite list.
• Ability to color match the player to the webmasters style.
• Admin can set color 'tint' of player via RGB or hex values, default will be silver.
• Color 'tint' of buttons.

Enhanced Flash Player

• Fix player to use more than 50 tracks per playlist.
• Pre-loader for slower connections.
• Controls for volume, pan(balance), etc.
• Control to enable/disable 'shuffle' of tracks.
• Use buttons to view available playlists.
• Use image slide to view images of tracks if available.
• Incorporate equalizer.
• New player to be created wider to fit CMPS when used in center block.
• Old players will be backward compatible.

DEMO:
=====
Please note the demonstration for this modification is no longer available.

In Development:
2 new skinned players - Both of which are shown below. Both players will have more features than the present skin, and other updated files. Your input is always appreciated, to further enhance this modification.

SCREENSHOTS:
Screenshots below show both the popup and CMPS block versions (see post below for CMPS version).
The other screenshots are players in development (not yet available), enhanced to use the center column of the CMPS.

[Chicago_VLNU_4s]

very nice and clean hack! works great!

[TheBlackPoet]

good job man!! bravo...AGAIN....

[ubblite]

Thanks for the CMPS addition.

This might have been mentioned already… I smell video integration with this hack in a future release.

[syrus.xl]

Originally Posted by ubblite

Thanks for the CMPS addition.

This might have been mentioned already… I smell video integration with this hack in a future release.

Video is one thing I haven't even thought of, yet it's very easy to integrate video using flash. The players aren't that hard to code either - I did take an interest in Crist with his AnyMedia product, and was hoping to see his source fla which he promised me when he released the 3.6 version. But I've not seen him online in ages. Shame nice mod as well.

I have played around with Flash Video before, mainly because the compression of the format is quite good and there is free convertors around, to allow streaming of flash video. But whether I'll take that road is another matter. Use of places like google and youtube video in forums is a good idea as long as the security is good, to protect the use of people posting malicious code. A re-direct in flash used to be quite easy to accomplish, which is why Flash player 9.0 was introduced not so long ago, allowing authors to add a new parameter to stop such code from causing problems.

Maybe in the future, we'll see!

[Jericho2004]

Can you check and see if my player plays for you? http://www.gamingregime.com

It won't play for me. I've been to a couple of other people's sites and it doesn't play either. But, when I go to your demo site of the cmps block, it works fine. Maybe it's file lodge, idk. I am using IE7 on one computer and IE6 on another. It does the same thing on both computers.

[syrus.xl]

Originally Posted by Jericho2004

Can you check and see if my player plays for you? http://www.gamingregime.com

It won't play for me. I've been to a couple of other people's sites and it doesn't play either. But, when I go to your demo site of the cmps block, it works fine. Maybe it's file lodge, idk. I am using IE7 on one computer and IE6 on another. It does the same thing on both computers.

It really depends where you host your files, the examples I put on www.filelodge.com - but there are others sites. Normally, at peak times the server load on some these sites can cause the mp3's to load very slowly, sometimes even minutes. Many people use http://www.myfilehut.com as an alternative source, I haven't used this one myself, but some people have said its better than file lodge for streaming.

The reason my demo works quicky on my site is because I've got them stored on a very fast server, which I use mainly for testing purposes, of large files.

Try alternatives, you'll probably find one thats better than file lodge.

[Draygonia]

The only real problem with it is the huge picture used to represent the player, is there a way I can make my own and change that? I could contribute to the project by making skins if you would like, i am not too bad at photoshop.

[syrus.xl]

Originally Posted by Draygonia

The only real problem with it is the huge picture used to represent the player, is there a way I can make my own and change that? I could contribute to the project by making skins if you would like, i am not too bad at photoshop.

Hi Draygonia,

The skin isn't easy to change on this version, because of the way I designed it. Initially, it was just a player I designed for use on myspace.com profiles, but I never released it.

It could be changed, but many parts of it would need to be changed, currently is uses 36 movie clips, and quite a lot of actionscript to position the MC's from a top-left registration point - this makes it harder even just to resize.

The easiest way would be to just start a new player, and use all the actionscript I used in this version, and keeping all instances correctly named.

It only uses one image, which is set on a background layer as a movie clip, and part of the display screen has been masked in Flash. All the small buttons are designed in Flash, mainly to keep the file size to a minimum.

You are more than welcome to design a skin, using Adobe PhotoShop - all I would ask is that you either save the document as a PSD or export the graphics with a transparent alpha background in a PNG format. All button images really need transparent backgrounds, and normally 3 states depending on the function of the button. Saving images in any other format means they would all need to be masked in Flash, and that is a tedious job.

The next version I have planned will all be done in flash, which will create a very light-weight player, even with adding new functions.

ATB

[Draygonia]

Well, I can only make the skin, and even that is hard, I know nothing of flash or coding yet. But I can probably figure out how to make some cool skins

[G_Man]

*clicks install*

Going to wait for some updates before actually installing this. Most of the AdminCp changes you have listed would make this much more usuable.

I think you have a potential HotM here. Cheers.