Panucci - Portrait mode Media Player for the N900

You probably know Panucci from your N8x0 where it allows you to playback, resume and bookmark audiobooks and podcasts. Some users seem to use it as a normal audio media player, too, although the primary design goal is to support resuming for long audio tracks.

Just today I asked on maemo-developers how to get GStreamer's playbin to work on Maemo 5 when several people (thanks, guys!) pointed out that playbin2 should be used.

After that, a new package was only some UI fixing and merging of the rotation code from gPodder away. While you are eagerly waiting for the autobuilder to put Panucci into Extras-Devel, here's a short video of it in action:

Please test Panucci when it finally appears in Extras-Testing and give some feedback! And thank you to all of you who were kind enough to take the time to review the new gPodder version - it has made its way into Extras today! :) Guess the next version should allow Panucci to be selected as audio player in the preferences dialog, then.. ;)

Important: Due to the way optification works, upgrading from older versions of might break the package (application does not load). To fix this, simply uninstall and re-install the package. Both Panucci and gPodder are affected by this if you have installed an older version.

New gPodder version with automatic downloading

Thanks for all your comments on talk.m.o, Flickr and bugs.m.o and directly at the Summit. The result is a shiny new release with improved UX and automatic feed updating/downloading.

The new version is currently in Extras-Devel (promoted to -Testing, waiting for someone to confirm the promotion). Please take the time to review the new release and rate/comment it on gPodder's maemo.org/packages page.

One thing that did not make it into this release: Direct play/download/delete buttons in the episode shownotes window. I'm thinking of just popping up a list of actions when a episode is clicked and make "display shownotes" one of these actions. What do you think?

Please report bugs, discuss and rate the package. See the complete set of screenshots on Flickr.

RSS Feed Handler 2.0

We have been talking about browser integration for all RSS-based apps before, and the initial standalone adaption of Canola's feedhandler (in canola-tuning) was nice, but it was written in Python and therefore startup time was not as fast as it could get (startup time is important for the feed handler, which usually only runs for some seconds, and to the user does not look as if it is a separate application, but rather a "feature" of the browser).

If you need the performance of applications written in C combined with the comfort of higher-level languages, use Vala :) That's what I have done, and feedparser 2.0 is the feedparser re-implemented in Vala.

Done so far: Reported a Vala D-Bus bug (thanks to Jürg Billeter for fixing this very quickly), registered a garage project, committed some source code, created a package (in Extras-Devel) and created a product page on Maemo.org Downloads.

As you can see, the UI still needs much love, but at least the infrastructure and feed handling is there for Diablo and Fremantle already, and some initial links to applications are there, too (shameless plug for gPodder, which has arrived in Fremantle Extras this week - yay!).

Plans for the next release:

• Add a mechanism to register and display other RSS-based apps (the current list is hardcoded)
• Contact authors of RSS readers and ask them to add feedhandler support to their apps
• Add more web-based services (tell me the ones you would like to see)
• Wait for Fremantle Widgets support in Vala (Philipp Zabel is working on this)
• Fremantleize and Diabloize the UI
• Integration with other browsers (Tear?)

Feel free to try out the "Feed Handler" from Extras-Devel and send some feedback.

gPodder 2.0 for Maemo 5 is here

This release brings the Fremantle version up to the current upstream release (and all Fremantle-specific tweaks are now integrated upstream). gPodder 2.0 has been released last week, and the new package version includes all changes necessary to make gPodder look good on Maemo 5. Based on your feedback, the next version of gPodder will support Maemo 5 at the same day at the release for other environments (Linux, Maemo 4 and Windows).

Don't forget to send some feedback after you've tried it out:

• Bugs should be filed here
• Rate/review gPodder in Extras-Testing (when it's been promoted)
• Discuss the new release on t.m.o

Go get it from Extras-Devel and (hopefully soon) Extras-Testing! Be sure to read the upgrade instructions if you have used an earlier version of gPodder for Maemo 5 before, so you don't run into problems.

Some highlights of the new release compared to the old releases:

• Automatic screen rotation (Portrait mode)
• YouTube user channels (try for example NokiaConversations or Rocketboom)
• Filters in the AppMenu (podcast/episode list)
• Visiting URLs (should open in web browser)
• Opening audio and video files (should open in media player)

gPodder 2.0 for Diablo is here + Fremantle progress

A new version of gPodder (2.0; "Day of the Tentacle") was released a few days ago, and it has already landed in Extras for both Chinook and Diablo. I wrote about the Maemo 4 UI changes some weeks ago, and you can enjoy them all on your tablets right now.

Tuomas Kuosmanen (tigert) has suggested some UI improvements for the Fremantle version of gPodder, and I'm currently working on implementing those ideas. First of all, there's an all-new front page:

The podcast directory (which allows you to discover new podcasts) which looked ugly previously has also been "Fremantleized", and is very usable now:

I'm still thinking about the best way to implement indicators for new, downloaded and listened episodes, but at least the GtkPaned-based split view is gone now:

The episode list is also quite unspectacular, but you can use the AppMenu to unsubscribe from the podcast (splitting up the UI in so many views automatically makes the AppMenus not so filled - good move!).

You can find some more screenshots depicting the current status of the UI in this Flickr photoset, and expect a new release next week or so.

gPodder on Maemo 4 gets a facelift

I finally got around to redesign parts of the dialogs in gPodder for Maemo 4, because some dialogs were still not really finger-friendly and usable. It's still a work-in-progress, but it looks really slick already and the whole UI is completely finger-friendly.

Let me show you some highlights (gPodder 0.17.0 is the current version available in Maemo Extras and "some old version" is from April 2008):

Pretty icons and slicker UI for the main window (compared to the same window in gPodder 0.17.0 and some old version).

The updated podcast directory dialog allows easy discovery of new content (compared to the same dialog in gPodder 0.17.0 and some old version).

The new episodes dialog shows more text and has finger-friendly rows (compared to the same dialog in gPodder 0.17.0 and some old version).

You will be able to filter the episode view and only show downloaded or unplayed episodes (a new feature!).

The complete set of screenshots can be found on Flickr.

Fullscreen and portrait modes for Panucci

Summer is always nice for travelling around, especially by train, which is quite cheap here in Austria, if you have the Sommerticket. Given that, I find myself having more time for listening to podcasts, and Panucci served me well so far.

Panucci, by the way, is a resuming podcast/audiobook player for Maemo.

There were just two annoyances until recently: First, there was no fullscreen support (yeah, a no-brainer, but it simply was not implemented..). Second, the UI looked ugly when the screen was rotated to portrait mode. And I wanted to play/pause the currently-playing podcast by touching the cover art. After a day of hacking, this is the result:

You need Panucci 0.3-7 (which entered Maemo Extras today) and enable support for screen rotation on your tablet. After that you can listen to podcasts (and audiobooks/live concerts) and hold your tablet like this. If you only believe moving pictures, watch the live demo on YouTube.

As an added bonus, Panucci is now available for Fremantle, although I believe we have to wait for the PyMaemo guys to fix bug 5026 before supporting portrait mode there (if the instructions on this Wiki page are correct).