UPnP Search and MinimServer 0.8.1

[DavidHB]

Firstly, a big thank you to Simon for implementing UPnP Search in version 0.8.1. When he first announced that this would be a new feature, there was a pretty enthusiastic response, but I don't think that anyone has mentioned the capability since 0.8.1 was released. Perhaps that is because there's not a lot to mention; as far as I can see, at the server end UPnP Search just works. I have enough experience in programming to know that things that just work usually represent a significant achievement, for which the programmer, in the nature of things, rarely receives the thanks that are due.

I'd like to know what experience other users have had with UPnP Search on MinimServer. The user guide says only that

"If your control point supports UPnP Search, you can use your control point to do full-text searches of the contents of your MinimServer library."

I have tried this with Bubble DS, foobar2000/foo_upnp and UPnPlayer, and it works (with the expected differences between control points) with all of them. However, it does appear that control points impose significant limitations on what can be done with the search capability. The following results are from Bubble DS, which has what I consider to be the most useful and user friendly search output of the applications I have tried (I imagine that Bubble UPnP would produce the same output).

If I use a search string that gets a large number of hits (I used 'sym' with a mainly classical collection), Bubble DS gives me results categorised into 5 lists: 'Albums: title', 'Albums: artist', 'Artists', 'Tracks: title' and 'Albums: artist'. Each of these can seemingly be the start point of a browse tree, though usually the filter effect of the search will mean that the tree is quite limited in scope (if only only album has matching results, only that album, and not the lists, will be shown); there are other differences from the ordinary browse tree, for instance the 'Complete Album' option does not appear.

It appears that the search is done only on the album, track title and artist fields, and I have not identified any syntax to search particular fields (e.g. composer = "Bach"). From statements in the Bubble DS release notes, I gather that these are limitations of Bubble; I don't know whether they are also, in any way, limitations of MinimServer. The on line product description of Asset UPnP (which I have tried in the past, but don't use) suggests that it can support searches on a wider range of fields, but presumably this is also limited by control point capabilities.

The capabilities I have described are a very useful addition to my system, but it would be nice if the search could be extended to cover all indexed fields. Do others have any views or experience they wish to share?

David