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New to Minimserver - a few questions
02-05-2013, 18:58
Post: #1
New to Minimserver - a few questions
I’ve been trying out Minimserver on my Synology DS710+ and am using it in conjunction with a Naim NDX streamer, with n-stream iPad app as control point. (I have been comparing it to the standard Media Server that comes with the DiskStation.)

I’m gradually getting the hang of it, but have a few questions.

1. Album art:
When scrolling through the list of albums in the n-stream app there is a short delay whilst the art is retrieved. I realise that this is natural when first running minimserver/n-stream as the image cache is being generated, but this seems to happen all the time - as if the art isn't being cached.

With the DS media server this doesn’t happen as there is no delay once cached.

I don’t know whether the issue sits with n-stream or Minimserver, but any help would be appreciated.

2. Title.displayFormat:
I want to display tracklisting for albums in the format
“White Room – Cream”, so I used the tagFormat option to try and get this.

I used the syntax “Title.displayFormat={$title^$artist^^^ - }”, but the n-stream ignores it and just displays “White RoomCream”.

I also tried it using ‘/’ character with the same result. I also checked on plugplayer and the results are the same.

Can anyone help me come up with the correct syntax?

3. Refreshing Index:
When I rip a new CD and add it to my library (or make tagging data changes to existing files), is manually selecting restart in Minimwatch the only method for triggering an update to the index?

4. all.sortValue.ignoreThe
I’m trying to use the ability to ignore ‘The’, but it doesn’t appear to be working. Am I right in assuming that the n-stream is ignoring this instruction and doing its own thing?

5. Distinguishing singles from albums
I have all my CDs scanned, of which around 10% are singles, but I didn’t name or tag them specifically to make them easily identifiable.

I was wondering if there was a way to do this with Minimserver. I started thinking about perhaps using some sort of filter based on number of tracks, but that wouldn’t always work (some albvums only have a couple of tracks etc.)

The other idea that just occurred to me would be to create a custom tag and then somehow get Minimserver to read this and index accordingly.
Any guidance or thoughts appreciated.

Finally, just wanted to say thanks very much
Regards
Nick
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02-05-2013, 22:34
Post: #2
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(02-05-2013 18:58)stampie Wrote:  I’ve been trying out Minimserver on my Synology DS710+ and am using it in conjunction with a Naim NDX streamer, with n-stream iPad app as control point. (I have been comparing it to the standard Media Server that comes with the DiskStation.)

I’m gradually getting the hang of it, but have a few questions.

1. Album art:
When scrolling through the list of albums in the n-stream app there is a short delay whilst the art is retrieved. I realise that this is natural when first running minimserver/n-stream as the image cache is being generated, but this seems to happen all the time - as if the art isn't being cached.

With the DS media server this doesn’t happen as there is no delay once cached.

I don’t know whether the issue sits with n-stream or Minimserver, but any help would be appreciated.

MinimServer currently doesn't support album art resizing (to thumbnail size) or caching. Resizing is a planned enhancement for a future release. I haven't yet decided what to do about caching.

Quote:2. Title.displayFormat:
I want to display tracklisting for albums in the format
“White Room – Cream”, so I used the tagFormat option to try and get this.

I used the syntax “Title.displayFormat={$title^$artist^^^ - }”, but the n-stream ignores it and just displays “White RoomCream”.

I also tried it using ‘/’ character with the same result. I also checked on plugplayer and the results are the same.

Can anyone help me come up with the correct syntax?

Title.displayFormat={$title^$artist^ - }

This makes the ' - ' a prefix (added before the first artist) instead of a separator (added between multiple artists).

Quote:3. Refreshing Index:
When I rip a new CD and add it to my library (or make tagging data changes to existing files), is manually selecting restart in Minimwatch the only method for triggering an update to the index?

For Synology only, there is an Auto Restart package you can use. See this thread for details and a download link.

Quote:4. all.sortValue.ignoreThe
I’m trying to use the ability to ignore ‘The’, but it doesn’t appear to be working. Am I right in assuming that the n-stream is ignoring this instruction and doing its own thing?

Your assumption is correct. Other MinimServer users have reported this issue with n-stream. You could contact Naim support to see if Naim is willing to fix this.

Quote:5. Distinguishing singles from albums
I have all my CDs scanned, of which around 10% are singles, but I didn’t name or tag them specifically to make them easily identifiable.

I was wondering if there was a way to do this with Minimserver. I started thinking about perhaps using some sort of filter based on number of tracks, but that wouldn’t always work (some albvums only have a couple of tracks etc.)

The other idea that just occurred to me would be to create a custom tag and then somehow get Minimserver to read this and index accordingly.
Any guidance or thoughts appreciated.

This is the best solution. You could add a custom tag

SINGLE=name-of-single

to all your singles. To see 'Single' in the index, add Single to the indexTags list and restart MinimServer.

Quote:Finally, just wanted to say thanks very much
Regards
Nick

You're most welcome, and thanks for these questions.
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03-05-2013, 18:19 (This post was last modified: 03-05-2013 18:19 by bbrip.)
Post: #3
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(02-05-2013 22:34)simoncn Wrote:  MinimServer currently doesn't support album art resizing (to thumbnail size) or caching. Resizing is a planned enhancement for a future release. I haven't yet decided what to do about caching.

I am not sure caching of covers is a job for the Server? I would have thought its for the control point to do that. Songbook Lite is caching covers and it works extremely well (certainly for me Wink.

LUMIN on the other hand "caches" the entire audio library which is also a concept I very much like.

bbrip
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03-05-2013, 18:53 (This post was last modified: 03-05-2013 19:08 by simoncn.)
Post: #4
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(03-05-2013 18:19)bbrip Wrote:  I am not sure caching of covers is a job for the Server? I would have thought its for the control point to do that. Songbook Lite is caching covers and it works extremely well (certainly for me Wink.

LUMIN on the other hand "caches" the entire audio library which is also a concept I very much like.

bbrip

I agree, and I hope server resizing will provide enough performance improvement that server caching isn't required. We'll find out when MinimServer supports resizing....

Edit: To clarify, server-side caching (if supported) would be only for thumbnails. MinimServer always serves full-resolution images directly from the original files.
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03-05-2013, 22:20
Post: #5
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(03-05-2013 18:53)simoncn Wrote:  
(03-05-2013 18:19)bbrip Wrote:  I am not sure caching of covers is a job for the Server? I would have thought its for the control point to do that. Songbook Lite is caching covers and it works extremely well (certainly for me Wink.

LUMIN on the other hand "caches" the entire audio library which is also a concept I very much like.

bbrip

I agree, and I hope server resizing will provide enough performance improvement that server caching isn't required. We'll find out when MinimServer supports resizing....

Edit: To clarify, server-side caching (if supported) would be only for thumbnails. MinimServer always serves full-resolution images directly from the original files.

I think that if an audio server provides resizing album art to thumbnails, caching the thumbnails is unavoidable. Even though there exist fast image resampling algorithms, there is a lot of data involved. Just consider a situation when a control point requests a thousand or more items at once, each having high resolution embedded album art. Such a situation can not be handled properly with 'resizing on the fly', especially on a NAS device with little resources. This may the reason why almost every UPnP audio server which provides image resizing caches the thumbnails.

As for caching the whole library (including tags), I think that this makes the whole server/client concept with UPnP streaming obsolete. Of course, such a control point offers various possibilities, being not restricted by the UPnP protocol. However, there may arise problems with synchronizing for example. It's surely a matter of taste, but I prefer the most generic way of a good server software in combination with a good control point software, having all the nice features from both worlds.
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04-05-2013, 08:08
Post: #6
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(03-05-2013 22:20)winxi Wrote:  I think that if an audio server provides resizing album art to thumbnails, caching the thumbnails is unavoidable. Even though there exist fast image resampling algorithms, there is a lot of data involved. Just consider a situation when a control point requests a thousand or more items at once, each having high resolution embedded album art. Such a situation can not be handled properly with 'resizing on the fly', especially on a NAS device with little resources. This may the reason why almost every UPnP audio server which provides image resizing caches the thumbnails.

I can't think of a good reason for a control point to request a thousand covers at once. At most, it should request only the number of covers that can fit on the current displayed screen.

Also, if some caching is required to meet user performance requirements, I think it would be better done on the control point side. If the control point does need a thousand thumbnails very quickly, it's a lot more efficient for it to retrieve these from a local cache than to get them across the network from the server.

An interesting hybrid approach might be for the control point to display a low-res thumbnail image from its local cache to get something on the screen quickly, and simultaneously request the full-res image from the server (in cases where a large image is required). When the full-res image arrives, the control point can replace the low-res image by the high-res version.

Quote:As for caching the whole library (including tags), I think that this makes the whole server/client concept with UPnP streaming obsolete. Of course, such a control point offers various possibilities, being not restricted by the UPnP protocol. However, there may arise problems with synchronizing for example. It's surely a matter of taste, but I prefer the most generic way of a good server software in combination with a good control point software, having all the nice features from both worlds.

I agree with this in principle, but with some reservations. This approach provides good basic functionality, but the limitations of the UPnP protocol make it very difficult for it to compete with a fully integrated control point/server combination in terms of providing a first-class user experience.
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04-05-2013, 08:38
Post: #7
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(04-05-2013 08:08)simoncn Wrote:  I can't think of a good reason for a control point to request a thousand covers at once. At most, it should request only the number of covers that can fit on the current displayed screen.

Yes, I think most of the control points do so. However, if the user scrolls quickly through a large list of items, the control point may request a large number of thumbnails within a short timeframe. I remember the first time when image resizing was introduced with BubbleUPnP Server for proxied servers and connections over the internet. The first approach of resizing the images on the fly was quickly changed into an approach involving caching due to various problems with the first method.

Quote:Also, if some caching is required to meet user performance requirements, I think it would be better done on the control point side. If the control point does need a thousand thumbnails very quickly, it's a lot more efficient for it to retrieve these from a local cache than to get them across the network from the server.

I completely agree, but if a control point supports image resizing and thumbnail caching itself, there is little point in doing this at the server side, too. Server side image resizing is interesting for control points which do not support thumbnail caching, to retrieve the thumbnails from the server fast.

Quote:An interesting hybrid approach might be for the control point to display a low-res thumbnail image from its local cache to get something on the screen quickly, and simultaneously request the full-res image from the server (in cases where a large image is required). When the full-res image arrives, the control point can replace the low-res image by the high-res version.

I think that the significant purpose of thumbnails for the control point is for lists of items when browsing the library. The full sized album art is most often required just for the 'now playing' item.
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04-05-2013, 09:27
Post: #8
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(04-05-2013 08:38)winxi Wrote:  Yes, I think most of the control points do so. However, if the user scrolls quickly through a large list of items, the control point may request a large number of thumbnails within a short timeframe.

I agree that this can happen.

Quote:I completely agree, but if a control point supports image resizing and thumbnail caching itself, there is little point in doing this at the server side, too. Server side image resizing is interesting for control points which do not support thumbnail caching, to retrieve the thumbnails from the server fast.

The server needs to support thumbnail resizing for interoperability with control points that can handle only thumbnail-sized images (DLNA profiles JPEG_TN and PNG_TN). Server-side thumbnail resizing is also useful for reducing the amount of data sent across the network. Control point resizing is needed for displaying images that aren't thumbnails but don't exactly match the original image size.
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04-05-2013, 17:08
Post: #9
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
(04-05-2013 08:08)simoncn Wrote:  I agree with this in principle, but with some reservations. This approach provides good basic functionality, but the limitations of the UPnP protocol make it very difficult for it to compete with a fully integrated control point/server combination in terms of providing a first-class user experience.

I think LUMIN is a good example of a CP where a great user experience is being achieved - and the major contributing factor is that the whole library is being cached. Its not perfect yet but its so good that its the only CP that comes close to the user experience of the Meridian Sooloos system, which has the substantial downside of being a clumsy 12 kg "Pc-Monster" as compered to a 700g 4gen iPad, which has sufficient power to easily manage a cached library of 8.000-10.000 albums.

bbrip
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04-05-2013, 17:43
Post: #10
RE: New to Minimserver - a few questions
Thanks Simon; here's a quick update on how I have got on:-
1. Album Art - I don't pretend to understand the details discussed since your response, so I can only describe the behaviour I see when using different Media Servers. With the Synology Media Server I can select a device specific profile of "Default with Original Cover" and I get the full album art with no lag at all (in displaying the art) when scrolling through album list in n-Stream. I think this is particular to how n-Stream is caching, because if I use PlugPlayer as my CP, there is a lag.

However, with Minimserver it doesn't look like the images are being cached in n-Stream at all, so I guess there must be something different in how the images are sent, received and processed by n-Stream (between the Synology and Minimserver).

Don't know if this helps anyone - happy to try out more servers/CP if that would help

2. thanks - now sorted
3. Fine, thanks I just wanted to check
4. all.sortValue.ignoreThe - I thought you might find the response from Naim interesting (thanks to Naim for quick response)

Naim stated that if I enabled 'UPNP compatibility mode' then 'The' would be ignored. However, this would result in the loss of some CP functionality (mainly queuing and playlist support within n-Stream), which is not acceptable to me.

I replied asking 'Why wouldn’t Naim want to provide this option outside of compatibility mode?', to which they replied 'We don’t implement the “Ignore A and The” option – that’s implemented by the UPnP server itself. There is no setting for this that can be passed over the UPnP protocol – it’s simply a function of the UPnP server and how it sorts it’s lists."

I find this response confusing to be honest - can anyone else make sense of it?

5. Distinguishing singles - not tried this yet; I was wondering if I can exclude the Singles from the main Album list once I have done this? Any thoughts appreciated

Apols for the long post and thanks for everyone's help!

Nick
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