I’m happy to announce the release of the SoundBridge Remote Control Yahoo! Widget 1.0. This new Yahoo! Widget (formerly Konfabulator Widgets) gives users of the Roku SoundBridge M1000/M1001 control of basic SoundBridge functions from their desktop. Functions include volume control, play/pause and next/previous song selection, power, and an optional "now playing" window.

Download from the official Yahoo! Widgets page at http://www.widgetgallery.com/view.php?widget=39187

There are some things to keep in mind with this initial release:

1) You need the free Yahoo! Widget Engine to use this and other Yahoo! Widgets. Download the Engine from http://widgets.yahoo.com/
2) I developed this widget on Windows, but it “should” work with Mac OS X. If a Mac user or two would like to give it a try and let me know if it works as expected, I’d really appreciate it!
3) All testing of the widget is with the latest beta version of the SoundBridge software, currently 2.5.133, but it should work with the original, non-beta software. Again, it would be great if someone could try the widget with the official software release and let me know if it behaves.
4) My goal is to keep the widget small and simple, so I provide what I consider to be the essential buttons. I will entertain suggestions for adding, removing or replacing one or two buttons, however.


Enjoy!
Paul

Looks great Paul! Thanks for sharing it with us.

Hi

This is great.
will a future release be able to show album cover art???

thanks
KO

oegreik wrote:

This is great.
will a future release be able to show album cover art???

Thanks. I'll add your request to the list!
Paul

Version 1.1 of my SoundBridge Remote Control Yahoo! Widget is now available from the official Yahoo! Widgets page at

http://www.widgetgallery.com/view.php?widget=39187

New features include:
1) Optional album artwork display
2) Minimized view option
3) Basic keyboard control:
* Arrow keys on the keyboard match the corresponding arrow buttons on the SoundBridge remote.
* Home key - Takes you to the SoundBridge "Home" menu.
* End key - Exit
* Spacebar - Select

There are some quirks in the keyboard control. If the keyboard control does not seem to be working, click anywhere on the widget's background and try again.

Enjoy!

Paul

Being able to see the Roku display on the widget would compliment the keyboard control (especially when you can't see the soundbridge from the computer).

Great widget nonetheless!

o1konobi wrote:

Being able to see the Roku display on the widget would compliment the keyboard control (especially when you can't see the soundbridge from the computer).

Great widget nonetheless!

This is an excellent suggestion. Once I figure out how to get the GetDisplayData call to cooperate, I'll give it a try.

Thanks
Paul

Paul, the widget looks outstanding. I like the art...but because I am dialup i have to be on to look at the art. Is it possible to have it download to a folder and use the one in the folder if present.

Thanks

mashjones wrote:

Paul, the widget looks outstanding. I like the art...but because I am dialup i have to be on to look at the art. Is it possible to have it download to a folder and use the one in the folder if present.

mashjones:
I considered this option early in the project, but there are a couple of issues:

1) I believe that the licensing agreement from Amazon prevents me from storing the artwork locally for longer than a certain number of days.

2) I wanted to keep the widget simple, so I decided to avoid maintaining a cache.

Regardless, this is a reasonable suggestion. I'll review the licensing agreement and consider this as an option for a future release.

Paul

I didn't realize this, good catch if so. There is a very sporty Itunes control widget that gets its artwork from amazon and caches it in a directory. It will also insert it into itunes for you as well. If you want I can research which widget it was and contact the author to see if he considered the same issue you have considered.

Thanks

PaulH wrote:

I developed this widget on Windows, but it “should” work with Mac OS X. If a Mac user or two would like to give it a try and let me know if it works as expected, I’d really appreciate it!

Couldn't find my remote control this morning (kids!). Since there's a Mac in the vicinity, I did a Google search for "Soundbridge Widget" and ended up here. However, I haven't seen any other comments from Mac users so I thought I'd give it a shot.

The Soundbridge widget wasn't even recognized until I changed the extension to ".wdgt". After that, I double-clicked on it, and got an error dialog saying "The file 'SoundBridge Remote.wdgt' is not a valid widget and you cannot install it."

It appears that other Mac widgets are actually packages containing lots of files which make up the widget. Your .widget file is doesn't appear to be such a package.

Probably due to naming confusion (with the word "widget"), it seems that most people assume it's "just" a matter of re-packaging things into a Mac widget, but this (http://lists.apple.com/archives/Dashboard-dev/2006/Jun/msg00038.html) posting seems to indicate that it's more complicated than that.

I might look into doing a Mac port if you're open to sharing the code, but I've never done a Mac Widget before so it would probably be faster/easier for someone who's already made one...

lemketron wrote:

The Soundbridge widget wasn't even recognized until I changed the extension to ".wdgt". After that, I double-clicked on it, and got an error dialog saying "The file 'SoundBridge Remote.wdgt' is not a valid widget and you cannot install it."

It sounds like you are trying to use this widget with Dashboard, as Dashboard uses the .wdgt extension. Note that this is a Yahoo! Widget Engine widget. Dashboard and Yahoo! widgets are not interchangeable.

You must have installed the free Yahoo! Widget engine first in order to use this and other Yahoo! widgets. Download the Engine from http://widgets.yahoo.com/ There shouldn't be any need to rename the widget to get it to work.

Having said that, there are some differences in the packaging between Mac and Windows that I have not yet personally tested. There is a new Yahoo! Widgets developer's tool to help with the packaging process that I will be using with the next release of my widget. (Release date TBD.)

PaulH wrote:

It sounds like you are trying to use this widget with Dashboard, as Dashboard uses the .wdgt extension. Note that this is a Yahoo! Widget Engine widget. Dashboard and Yahoo! widgets are not interchangeable.

Ah, I missed the point that there is a Mac version of Yahoo Widgets. Great. Yet another app that needs to be (first installed, and) running all the time...

Having said that, there are some differences in the packaging between Mac and Windows that I have not yet personally tested. There is a new Yahoo! Widgets developer's tool to help with the packaging process that I will be using with the next release of my widget. (Release date TBD.)

OK, even after installing the Mac version of Yahoo Widgets, there still seems to be something wrong. The Soundbridge widget asked me for the IP address of the Soundbridge, and I entered the IP address but it keeps popping up the dialog asking me for it again. I confirmed the address is correct, by copy/pasting it into a browser which worked just fine.

BTW, I don't know if you have access to Rendezvous (ZeroConf) service discovery from inside the widget code, but if you did, you would be able to simply display a popup of available Soundbridge units on my network.

Anyway, it looks cool, and I look forward to testing any newer verisons on the Mac as soon as they're available.

lemketron wrote:

OK, even after installing the Mac version of Yahoo Widgets, there still seems to be something wrong. The Soundbridge widget asked me for the IP address of the Soundbridge, and I entered the IP address but it keeps popping up the dialog asking me for it again. I confirmed the address is correct, by copy/pasting it into a browser which worked just fine.

I've seen this problem reported by some other users. Make sure that you have the latest SoundBridge software, currently version 2.5.171. This was released just a few weeks ago. Of course you'll need to find that Roku remote control to do the update. Software and upgrade info is available at the Roku home page http://www.rokulabs.com/

BTW, I don't know if you have access to Rendezvous (ZeroConf) service discovery from inside the widget code, but if you did, you would be able to simply display a popup of available Soundbridge units on my network.

Thanks for the tip. Windows has something similar called Universal Plug 'n' Play (UPnP). Working with it is like having a barrel of bricks fall on your head. But conceptually, a device discovery service would help make setup a little more user-friendly.

PaulH wrote:

BTW, I don't know if you have access to Rendezvous (ZeroConf) service discovery from inside the widget code, but if you did, you would be able to simply display a popup of available Soundbridge units on my network.

Thanks for the tip. Windows has something similar called Universal Plug 'n' Play (UPnP). Working with it is like having a barrel of bricks fall on your head. But conceptually, a device discovery service would help make setup a little more user-friendly.

Actually, ZeroConf (actually, the latest name for it is Bonjour) is available for Windows too. It's similar to, but different from, UPNP. I don't know if Roku supports UPNP but it definitely does advertise itself with Bonjour (aka ZeroConf or Rendezvous). It is visible in IE or Safari if Bounour bookmarks are enabled -- you don't even have to know its IP address. You just select it from the list of Bonjour web servers. It's very slick.

More info here: http://developer.apple.com/networking/bonjour/