Topic: Winamp Visualisations in XMPlay (xmp-wavis rev.7, source code)

[Barna]

Hi All

Here's an update to the previous multi-functionality plugin winamp_svp.
An XMPlay DSP plugin which functions as the wrapper for Winamp visualisation plugins - very much like the Winamp DSP wrapper.

As you can see from the screenshot below, it is nicely integrated into XMplay and it even allows to run multiple visualisation plugins at the same time.



Download: https://github.com/schellingb/xmp-wavis/releases/latest
Read the included xmp-wavis.txt for all features, notes and version history.

As mentioned in the readme text file, besides adding quite a few features, it is missing one feature from the old plugin: The disabling of info bubbles while visualisations are displayed is not available. Means you'll see volume changes and song changes in tray even when full screen visualisation is active. Maybe that can be fixed in a future version.

If you're missing the other half, the cover art image plugin, check the topic for xmp-coverart.

Of course, as always, feedback of any kind would be more than appreciated.

Greetings from Tokyo,
Bernhard

Edit: 0.9.1 added, frees up memory and stops buffering when no wrapped vis plugin is active
Edit: 0.9.3 added, unicode support for MilkDrop 2.0e (playlist and song title)
Edit: 0.9.4 added, better in-plugin playlist support (updated feature requires XMPlay 3.4.2.77 or higher)
Edit: rev.5 added, better response for some in-plugin play control commands
Edit: rev.7 added, open source and moved to GitHub

[piovrauz]

I approve (hahaha, like you should care) about the splitting in 2 of the plugin.
But now some requests arises...

1. I'd like to have back the disabling of info bubbles while visualisations are displayed, after all I was one of the pusher of this ability... pwetty please, it's very annoying to see them...

2. Since the wrapper is in the DSP section, the VIS are no more on the VIS menu with other built-in or native ones. Is it possible to fix this?

3. Nothing for now XD, I just checked a bit around an found those 2 things. BTW seems a little faster to me, maybe my box didn't liked the cover code?

Keep Up the good work, this is a plugin that has a bright future

[dypsis]

It is the first time that I have messed with Winamp Visualisations. How do I get the Milkdrop plugin files, for example?

[piovrauz]

U can get them from a winamp install, in the plugin dir

[Barna]

How do I get the Milkdrop plugin files, for example?

Yeah, as piovrauz mentioned, the two most popular ones are the ones included in the Winamp distribution. Current Milkdrop and AVS versions aren't available standalone. Old versions of MilkDrop (less advanced but much faster startup) can be downloaded from http://www.nullsoft.com/free/milkdrop/ (The plugin installer only extracts itself into a directory where a file named 'winamp.exe' exists).

More plugins are available on winamp.com in the plugins/visuals section. As with the old MilkDrop version they can only be extracted into a winamp.exe-directory (or extract the installer with UniExtract!).

1. I'd like to have back the disabling of info bubbles while visualisations are displayed, after all I was one of the pusher of this ability... pwetty please, it's very annoying to see them...

Well I didn't remove that feature on purpose, it's just that it is currently only available for sonique vis plugins.
I don't think a stand-alone 'disable bubbles' vis plugin would make sense, but I could write you one :-)

2. Since the wrapper is in the DSP section, the VIS are no more on the VIS menu with other built-in or native ones. Is it possible to fix this?

Hmm, at least not with the current DSP SDK way. Ian once mentioned something like an open SDK for real XMPlay Vis plugins (not sonique plugins like winamp_svp was before).
Also like the MIDI plugin, which adds a visualisation, it should/could be possible for other plugins. But at the moment it's not open to the public to do that as far as I know.

3. Nothing for now XD, I just checked a bit around an found those 2 things. BTW seems a little faster to me, maybe my box didn't liked the cover code?

Well the way it works internally is verrry much different :-) As DSP sample processing works quite different the plugin now buffers data and is able to send it more precisely and better timed to the plugin. I'm not sure if the over all performance is better, but at least the data the plugin gets is more like what it does expect I think.

Keep Up the good work, this is a plugin that has a bright future

Thanks!!

[dypsis]

U can get them from a winamp install, in the plugin dir

Thanks piovrauz and Barna.
Unfortunately, the Milkdrop vis and others require a number of files to run it, and I am not sure what ones it requires. And I would rather have a standalone vis rather than linking to a Winamp installation. If anyone knows the files required, then that would be helpful.

[Barna]

MilkDrop 2 needs the following files in a directory: vis_milk2.dll, nscrt.dll and a subdirectory called "Milkdrop2". Inside the Milkdrop2 subdirectory there are 3 more subdirectories called presets, data and textures. MilkDrop 2 displays visuals Depending on the content of them.

MilkDrop 1 just needs vis_milk.dll and a subdirectory next to it called "MilkDrop" with .milk presets inside.

[dypsis]

MilkDrop 2 needs the following files in a directory: vis_milk2.dll, nscrt.dll and a subdirectory called "Milkdrop2". Inside the Milkdrop2 subdirectory there are 3 more subdirectories called presets, data and textures. MilkDrop 2 displays visuals Depending on the content of them.

MilkDrop 1 just needs vis_milk.dll and a subdirectory next to it called "MilkDrop" with .milk presets inside.

Thanks for that Barna. 

[Ian @ un4seen]

1. I'd like to have back the disabling of info bubbles while visualisations are displayed, after all I was one of the pusher of this ability... pwetty please, it's very annoying to see them...

As Barna mentioned, that ability is only available to vis plugins, but I have now added an option and shortcut to manually disable bubbles...

   www.un4seen.com/stuff/xmplay.exe

2. Since the wrapper is in the DSP section, the VIS are no more on the VIS menu with other built-in or native ones. Is it possible to fix this?

Hmm, at least not with the current DSP SDK way. Ian once mentioned something like an open SDK for real XMPlay Vis plugins (not sonique plugins like winamp_svp was before).
Also like the MIDI plugin, which adds a visualisation, it should/could be possible for other plugins. But at the moment it's not open to the public to do that as far as I know.

The native vis system is only available to input plugins. Currently, the MIDI and AHX plugins make use of it. I guess a native vis plugin system could be something for 3.5

Btw, nice work on the plugins!

[piovrauz]

1. Thanks for the bubble option. Haven't tested but I'll do later.

2. A native vis plugin system? sounds great it'll be really nice.

btw, is it possible to add shortcuts to control DSP (this winamp vis wrapper I mean) to the main interface? something like open/close/go to next(if multiple are set)? thanks.

[Barna]

There is already one shortcut currently ''Winamp Visualisation on/off''.
You can use that one to switch between two if you have two set up and only one running :-)
I'll think about adding more.

[piovrauz]

Thanks, I totally missed it. I even checked too, ...
About adding shortcuts: toggling between wa plugin, or even better istances of the wrapper would be really nice.
Another thing... the keys doesn't control the wa wrapped plugin like it was before, what's up?

[Barna]

Is it always reproducible? all keys or just certain ones?
I at least once checked all keys from MilkDrop during development once. But yesterday or so keys once weren't working, but just seconds later they worked again, so I thought it was just some random issue... Will check again later tonight.

[piovrauz]

well, yesterday I checked at home and were some keys only, today at work I found F1, F2, and such works, but L (lock) and others doesn't. milkdrop2 and geiss2 obviously

btw, I have two wrapper set in the DSP tab, one with geiss2 and one with mildrop2: if I open/close using the shortcut (ctrl+w) it opens one of them, then the other, instead of closing

[Barna]

hmm, if I activate Status in Geiss with F4 I can see L working fine. All other inputs are working as well.

Actually, for vis plugins that manage their own window the wrapper doesn't even control input. Vis plugins with their own window managment have their own icons (like Geiss 2 and MilkDrop, unlike AVS who depends on the host application doing windows stuff -> gets XMPlay icon).
Inputs resulting in commands (like pause/play/next/prev song or volume control) are forwarded to XMPlay by the wrapper. These work as well here.

And the shortcut just stops all wrapped plugins that are running, and starts all stopped ones. So the 'faked' switching only works when previously to pressing the shortcut one is already running.

[piovrauz]

well, another thing (I'll test keys later, to be sure): when I close the wrapped plugin windows, the wrapped plugin remains active... using a lot of resources... any way to prevent this?

[Barna]

hmm, here's an update which stops buffering of data and frees its used memory when no wrapped vis plugin is active.
But that alone should not take too many resources, maybe a plugin was still hanging somehow? If it is closed and still says (on) in the config, we might have further problems... Also I think MilkDrop 1.04e may have a memory leak problem... So starting and stopping that often can result in a few megabytes being eaten up by the XMPlay process.

Download: http://www.nukular.ch/xmp-wavis_0.9.1.zip

[piovrauz]

The thing is, like you said, it is closed and still says (on) in the config, and eats cpu.
It's not about starting and stopping I suppose, didn't do that. checking with the new one later.

[piovrauz]

backu from vacation. seems to work now, on/off and cpu accordling.

[dbz]

Hi all, this is my first post on this forum. I've been using XMPlay for a while now and I like most everything about it except for it's limited visuals. Rather than using winamp (Bloat), or some other mammoth program to get good visuals - I've been using a little program called Visual Plugin Player (VPP) from this website http://home.hvc.rr.com/afflatus/vpp.htm
It's kinda quick and dirty, but it does an amazing job at what it does - and that is, let you use all kinds of visuals (twisted pixel, milkdrop, geiss, avs, etc...). The interface is anything but pretty though. Anyways... I've been wishing for a long time that XMPlay would be able to do this. So when I discovered this post, well you can imagine my excitement.
Needless to say, I read through the forum here, downloaded the files and gave it a go. Much to my chagrin I can't seem to get it up and running (even after reading the read-me file). I've gotten as far as being able to see the visual plugins listed on the Winamp VIS wrapper window. That's where I think it breaks down somewhere.
I select one of the plugins from the list, click on the Start button to activate it (supposedly), but nothing happens. Once I close this window the DSP Options Screen shows Winamp VIS wrapper with the plugin I selected but it says "(off)" after the plugin. For the life of me I can't seem to turn it on or activate it. I made sure to download the latest version of XMPlay, and even updated my vis_avs.dll to version 2.81d as in the screenshot. When I click on the Config button it accesses the dll's as it should, but when I hit Start nothing seems to be going on. The only thing I think it might be now is that I don't have the vis_nsfs.dll - could that be it? I tried downloading it off the net but couldn't find it. And I don't want to have to install winamp just to get it. If you could help me in any way it would be greatly appreciated - as I'm at a total loss as to what's going on.

[gnozal]

Hi,
when I am using xmp-wavis 0.9.1 with milkdrop 2.0e in playlist mode [P], I only see numbers "1. 2. 3. etc".
I also use Foobar2000, and when I use foo_vis_shpeck with milkdrop 2.0e in playlist mode, I see the module titles "1. Title1 2. Title2 etc".
So my question is : am I missing some setup parameter or is this feature currently unsupported in xmp-wavis ?
Thanks !

[Barna]

Sorry for not replying for a while.

Here's 0.9.3 which supports the unicode play list MilkDrop 2.0e requests. It also properly sets its song title so MilkDrop 2.0e gets the full unicode song title. Hooray :-)

Yeah, 0.9.2 was in there somewhere. But I somehow forgot to post it here. 0.9.2 introduces support for Windows 98 (and other 9x based ones I guess).

Download: http://www.nukular.ch/xmp-wavis_0.9.3.zip

[gnozal]

Thanks for the update.
Now the MilkDrop 2.0e playlist displays the song titles.
Unfortunately, I have another problem : when I browse through the playlist, I can't play the song under the cursor with [Enter]. XMplay doesn't load / play the song.
It only works once, if you enter the playlist while XMPlay isn't playing any song. Then you can start a song with [Enter] ; it doesn't work a second time.

[Barna]

It works here with XMPlay 3.4.2.76.
Please try with the newest bleeding edge XMPlay release from http://www.un4seen.com/stuff/xmplay.exe

[gnozal]

Hi,
I already use this XMPlay build.

EDIT : I could get it work, but only if the extended playlist [F5] or the library [F6] are active !
If the information panel is closed, or if it is open but with [F1]/[F2]/[F3]/[F4], [Enter] doesn't work in the Milkdrop playlist.
Weird ...

Another thing I noticed : when I press [Enter] in the Milkdrop playlist, I see the XMPlay playlist [F5] scrolling (slowly) to the selected song, and the playback only starts when the scrolling has reached the selected song.