Hey Songbird Watchers,
So, we’ve been pulling all-night work sessions in anticipation of user preview release before we dispersed for the holidays. Unfortunately, we’re not ready yet. Indeed, we have a few more weeks of work before show-and-tell.
We do, however, have a holiday gift for you. I’ve updated the Songbird screenshots with the latest skin Rubber Ducky and some previously unseen features.
Enjoy the rest of the year! See y’all in 2006.
79 Comments
SubscribeNice screenshots. To bad we can not hold the Songbird in our hands today, but for me, that´s not a problem, because i know that if you say it still needs some work, it has a good reason.
Cmon guys. I was SOOO excited that the release would be out in time for me to play with it over the holiday, but now you’ve just let my hopes down.
Why can’t you guys just release whatever you have? We understand if it’s a little rusty and buggy. Even if it’s nearly unusable, it would be better than nothing. And you would have some fellow colleagues to help join in on the work. (That’s what open source is all about!)
I guess this qualifies Songbird for the Vaporware of the Year award. Hope you do better next year.
oops, that hurt!
Thanks for respecting the project enough to delay when needed. That URL slurper looks amazing!
Wasn’t there something about “preview release on thursday” earlies this week despite the still unresolved transparency bug?
this sucks so hard that i immediately lost all in songbird
While I’m sad that I can’t have it now, I trust that you know what your doing and will eventually make a release.
What is the point of this software? It looks exactly like iTunes, which is already free, what makes this any better than Rhythmbox?
You’ll want to simplify your UI, it’s too noisy. For instance you don’t need those little icons next to the names in the left panel. They only distract. I think you’d do better to concentrate on making it have more features than Itunes (eg not being bound to the music store) but a similarly simple interface.
Happy new year… Sonbird delayed? The irony is unsettling, anyway…
I know what’s happening. You’re pulling a Mozilla on us. You have wat could easily meet the requirements of a 0.1 preview release, but you keep making it better and better, getting out bug. We don’t want a bug free 0.5 right now, we want a buggy, dirty 0.1!
The night before the release, you suddenly discovered that you still have a few more weeks of work? Doesn’t sound very convincing to me.
After Link Textthis post where you guys took the time to explain to everyone that we shouldn’t expect much of the preview release, now there no longer will be a preview release until a couple of weeks? This sucks.
I see “NaN” on the status bar.
Bad calculation
I think they’ve planted a hidden message in the second screen shot: See the title of mp3 nr 7 in the list at the bottom.
Until I’ve had a look it will be hard to be certain… but I don’t really like the screen-shots much…
Cheers
J.
I am not sure why everyone is being so harsh on these guys? Do you all work for media player companies or something? I can’t wait to be part of this thing and if it is going to do what they are sort of saying it is, then i will be dropping all other players pretty quick. Got to love the URL Slurper! Best feature yet.
cheers,
raff
agreed.
Most of us know that the “preview release” was a knee-jerk reaction to people no longer blogging about Songbird and link-whoring it to death.
A week ago they would have known that the preview release would be delayed by *weeks* and they wouldn’t have promised a preview release in just under a week’s time then.
I suspect they have a pretty ui and a barely functional media player, and need the few weeks to add actual functionality to it.
No biggy.
Who cares if you’re convinced or not? like who are you?
I hope this comment is not meant seriously? Songbird has an integrated browser and it´s open source. You may compile it yourself and put iTunes in the garbage then…
akaRAff, i totally agree with you.
i heard ‘url slurper is cool’ twice here.
what is a url slurper ?
is it that search feature where we can right click the song and search for it in google,odeo,etc?
and i hope there is an option to close the left panel
Didn’t they say they’re basing it off VLC? They’re not implementing a new player from scratch.
I imagine that trying to combine VLC with Gecko code is causing all sorts of interesting bugs, though. ^_^
It’s people whingeing like this that discourage developers from continuing their open source projects. You all sound like a bunch of spoilt children not getting their way. I’m dissapointed I’m not going to be able to play with Songbird over Christmas. But I’ll get over… you should too!
It’s Flock all over again. They’ll show screens and screens and screens, everyone will get hyped up, then they’ll release a preview and everyone will blog about it for a few hours, the shine will fade, and it’ll drop off the radar.
Flock cloned FireFox, and turned out to be a lame replacement with gimmick features that only looked good on paper.
Songbird cloned iTunes, and…you get the picture.
I’m still waiting, but now I’m not nearly 1/4 as excited.
so everyone says it looks like itunes, and I agree. But I dont care coz itunes interface works, and it works well. So why not take a proven model and use it. Personally I am glad, coz itunes is the best out there but apple wont open it up as much as these guys here. They are taking the icing from the cake and using it for they’re own stuff. Good. What I’m looking for is a cross-platform media player that can work together. I liked itunes music sharing coz I have all my music on my mac but can listen to it on my lappy anywhere in the household. Whether these guys take it further or that far even is not clear but they give the community the chance to do it themselves. I cant wait for the extensions to start rolling out and see how far songbird can be taken. Best of all its going on linux which means finally a decent player for linux! Yeah I know there is amarok and xmms but they arent that good (amarok is decent, but it has so many lil annoying features that make it suck). Let me know if you guys need any help on the player.
Flock didnt really bring anything usefully to the table. It was Firefox with more bugs a some code to easily edit blogs. People didnt need this feature. Everyone needs a media player, exspecially one that cross platform with a good layout. My hat is off to the Songbird crew.
I guess it was hard for you taking those reading comprehension tests.
Well, if I understand correctly from the previous posts it’s not about searching for a song. It’s about going to a page and importing all the song links on that page into a playlist automatically.
And how exactly does being able to compile it yourself really matter? If that is all that open source brings to the table I must be missing something. In all seriousness, I contribute to a few projects, and use tons of OSS, but it’s not because I can compile them, it’s because they are useful and have value. Just the fact that it is open source doesn’t make it good, useful, or even have any utility at all. Zealotry is not good enough in the real world.
And how at all does being able to compile it make me able to put iTunes in the garbage? I don’t see this handling my ITMS purchases, at the very least, which would be needed for just about anyone to even think of throwing out iTunes. For an OSX user this app is pretty useless, since I highly doubt there is going to be any compatibility with any other iLife apps. So I am going to toss out a very useful, very compatible application that enables me to purchase music for something that I can simply compile? Oooo I can browse Odea, who cares.
I don’t really want to discourage anyone, but how exactly is this really going to be of use? If Linux support is it, why not just support a project like Rhythmbox? I don’t want to be a hater, but maybe the marketing behind this just isn’t that obvious.
I keep poping back to this projeect and looking hpw its getting so far I am impressed really can’t wait until theres a public user preview!
Tom | http://www.tomwrote.info
I just read about you on CNet and think it’s great that you are working on this new software.
As a hardcore Mac fan, I can understand the controversy over your interface looking so much like iTunes. But I realize this is just the development stage and not the final product.
I am a big supporter for open source projects. Despite my love for Apple, I do not use Safari or Mail as my default programs. I actually use Firefox and Thunderbird because I think they are superior products.
Open source competition is good. I know that projects like these rarely become the dominant force in the market, but this isn’t a popularity content anyway. It’s about making better free alternatives.
Good luck guys.
As a hardcore WinAMP fan I am very excited about this new player. I have been following you guys progress for a couple of weeks now and im sorta dissapionted about the delay but no biggie. I was wondering if you are going to implementthe code form WinAMP that allows you to use the AOL music librarys. This would be awesome and cliché my decision to change to songbird. Also the shoutcast wire function would be cool.
keep oin this great work..
love
mmerry xmas
ooh…vaporware…
So when you guys are finished are you also going to release the source code so that programmers like me can look it over and see if there are any bugs that you might have overlooked and just to see your creativity at work? I hope you do and I am looking foward to more awesome open source programs! THUNDERBIRD, SUNBIRD, and FIREFOX rock my socks clean off!
Sincerely
Will
What a blatant – BLATANT – Rip-Off.
Get an Original Idea why don’t ya MS wannabe.
Everybody should check out MyTunesLive. You can upload your MP3 through a web based interface and then access your playlist form any wired computer.
Microsoft wannabe? Since when has microsoft had a decent audio player?
I have yet to find a player that could do what I wanted in Linux, Rythmbox with Gstreamer couold handle my iTune Lib. but couldn’t compare, and I don’t want to install 2600 KDE libs to use amaroK in my Gnome desktop. Please Songbird team, I’m counting on you to be the first, not realplayer, cross-platform Media Player, Don’t let me down…
WTF cares about OS X users
Everyone, think to yoursleves for a minute. Look into your hand and look at the ipod sitting there. Yes, you were focred to purchase it from Apple, but that is because they produced a groundbreaking product. Why stray from the real thing? This product is an itunes ripoff from those who wish to be “anti-apple”. Well I hold strong with the company that has made me appreciate the computer again, Apple.
I have more faith in Apple in providing a good solid product, as naturally most other companies just cannot come close in any aspect. This might be useful on linux — might have some users on Windows, doubt many… on Mac, not a chance against iTunes.
Don’t get me wrong: it’s always good if there is more open source software out there, but why not just use amarok? It’s an open source media library, which can connect to podcasts, ipods and other mp3-players. As far as I know Songbird has the advantages that it can access music-stores and websites and it’s not Linux-only – advantages that don’t bother me, cause I have a web browser and use Linux. So why not just write plugins for amarok and bring it to other OS’s?
So where the fuck is the CVS or SVN respository if this is all “open source?” I wanna test it, and possibly contribute if I like it. Don’t be a dumbshit and start a website before you make something availible.
Nobody has heard of you and you start your image off by dissing on the competition with someone that doesnt’ even make sense. Of course this is after copying their interface which just goes to show you have absolutely no imagination or creative skills and that the only way you have any chance of competiting is by stealing their ideas and trying to open source it. Guess what? I’m calling for a boycott of your program in all the programming communities I’m involved in. Bad luck to you.
hahahah what a joke.
hey look it’s a black version of itunes. rofl
The non alpha release of songbird is now available here. http://www.apple.com/itunes
Happy Holidays
you’re an idiot.
check out all the apple fanboys crawling around here like flies on shit. why don’t you fuckheads piss off and play with your resource hog of doom that is itunes. fucking dolts.
Perhaps becauses itunes is a pos SYSTEM RESOURCE HOG. So maybe Mac users are fine and dandy with it, but on Windows, even with a gig of ram and extra services disabled, itunes is an bumbling resource hog that wants exclusive processor and memory access during functions. downloading a podcast should not keep peaking cpu % and eating so much ram. that and the latest gen of the ipod broke winamp ipod interface and ephpod, both of which performed unbelievable better than itunes. now im forced to use itunes and deal with the wait and sluggish system performance.
who the fuck are you exactly. there’s not a single open source project that lets any old idiot have an account to their cvs tree.
AHAAAHAA. omg, what a dork. Not the dreaded John boycott in all the John communities of programmatation.
So, the OSS community supports COMPLETELY RIPPING OFF ANOTHER APP’S INTERFACE, DOWN TO THE EXACT WIDGET PLACEMENTS.
Congrats, guys!
For christ’s sake, I can’t believe idiots like you can even use a computer. Just because a program has a UI that is skinned slightly like another program doesn’t make it the same. Under the hood, it’s coded totally differently. It’s not like they stole anyone’s source code and renamed the program.
This is the problem with you monolithic computer users. Your branded and brainwashed into thinking that only one company can provide useful software, and that everyone else are ripoff artists.
Besides, how can you coherently say that something is a ripoff before you’ve even used it? You can’t. Yes sir, you are a moron.
not all mac users are ok with itunes, i hate that pos, been using audion and later cog in osx because i cant stand being forced to use itunes and it’s slowness.
er.. yes there is. they certainly don’t let you WRITE to it, but almost every project on Sourceforge has public READ CVS, dumbass.
LOL
Apple is original? where exactly did the idea of widgets come from again? rofl, 2 for being a fag.
OMG a similar ui whatwill the apple fan boys/girls do… they cant get past the ui and focus on the functionality..call pppl thieves etc what a crock
You pushed the “post” button. You violated the one-click patent. I bet your browser displayed a progress bar while posting that statement. That’s also patented. You mean to use the http protocol to interact with other humans, also patented. So you are violating at least three patents making that statement. You sir are a “thief” what a joke…
NeXT had widgets long before the competition. We just didn’t broadcast the shit out of them and focused on more powerful tools like Distributed Objects/Portable Distributed Objects, IB/PB, AppKit/FoundationKit, EOF/WebObjects, etc.
Songbird includes an “music store” of free music???
If these is afirmative, songird is better than itunes
I want to say a web page integrated in the program (simlar with http://www.purevolume.com).
I don’t speakenglish very well
That skin is called Rubber Ducky? More like “Blackbird”. Unless you’re trying to be ironic. Still though, wtf??
Have to say that the blatant ripoff of the iTunes look/feel (and thus the functionality) is absolutely apalling. I enjoy my Mac greatly, but also am a huge fan of OpenBSD, NetBSD and Solaris (Sorry Linux Fan boys) which I have running on various hardware lying around the house.
Were iTunes a Microsoft product (thank god it isn’t, because it would be unstable and worthless) and you made an exact replica of the industry leading software (iTunes in this case), I would condemn you as well.
This is one time that I hope Apple would take your sorry asses to court and get an injunction preventing you from distributing what is arguably a lookalike product of lesser quality that could indeed be confused with iTunes by the consumer.
In this case (and afew others that I won’t mention here) the F/OSS community is in the wrong.
First, I’d like to say that these idiots who diss your app are all stupid. Reasoning, this software is by NO MEANS a copy off of iTunes. The URL slurper is a GREAT idea, never before seen in any mp3 player I know of.
Second, I am a little dissapointed that you didn’t get it out before the holidays, but I know it’ll just make it even better. I was also wondering whether there is a way that you can tap into the iTunes music library. I assume there isn’t but that would be TOTALLY amazing.
Listen asshole – it’s lawyer-happy idiots like you that make the US a stinking social mess. You’re the type of asshole that gets in a fender-bender and claims they can’t get out cause they got whiplash. 5 hours later the fire department saws your sorry ass out of the car and airlifts you to a hospital, costing us tax payers 50 grand and all so you can file a lawsuit against some granny.
You stupid retard. I hope you get run over by a bus.
Exactly, but that skin that looks like iTunes! omg, the lawsuits apple can file, omg it behaves nothing like iTunes, has different features and isn’t locked into a single mp3 player and a single music store, but the look the look, sue sue.
Fuck all you iTunes buttboys.
NOPE.
Everything in the left-pane is _HARDCODED_ because that side of the API isn’t designed yet.
Except the playlists. Lots of different types of playlists. Yay for playlists
The public source repository is hiding somewhere in January or February. I can’t seem to remember where I misplaced it….
Or, wait, you’re rude….
NO CODE FOR YOU!!!
You’re right, everyone needs a media player. Eveyone who buys an iPod has one. Everyone who buys a Windows computer has one. This is going to be great for the 2.5% of the population that cares that iTunes is a resource hog or wants to manage music downloads from multiple place, or is a rabid anti Apple, anti Microsoft, whatever…
This will be as popular as the $300 Linux Desktops at Wal*Mart. Ya, everyone wants one of those for Gradnma.
Would be cool if there will be the possibility to show what you are playing in IM programs like Windows Media Player do in MSN messenger.
I believe that due to the fact that they used some of the Mozilla (Gecko) code, that they have to release the source code under the GPL. They could of course charge for the program, but the would have to release the source in order to stay compliant with the GPL code that was used in Songbird.
KDE only requires one major library package, if I am correct. It’s kdelibs.
Mozilla foundation software is not under GPL. It’s under MPL which is a lot more flexible and sane.
http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/
http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/mpl-faq.html
SO your logic would be that now Tiger has nothing really new so Apple has decided to broadcast the shit out of widgets.
Looking forward to the preview release. Will the player have a windowshade mode like Winamp? This is probably the main reason I stick with Winamp because it just sits at the top of my screen across a title bar blocking nothing at all. I’d love to find a new player with a more robust, feature-filled media library, with up-to-date ID3 tag support.
Yes, something like that will be in the preview.
Sweet! Looking forward to it. Happy New Year!
Will this new player try and call the internet and try to send a list out of what you are listening and watching on the computer to microsoft the goverment or some one else that would want to get people in trouble
Guess.
Birdies! Thanx! Cool songs =)
BTW the nex christmas is coming
chistmas movies