8. Using Ampwifi

Once Ampwifi connects to the Winamp® server it will display information about the currently playing song and the current playlist. Ampwifi also allows you to browse and search your music library. It uses a simple interface divided into four distinct tabs: Now Playing, Playlist, Music Library and Search. Note that you may only see the first three tabs because the Search tab is hidden until you perform a search. See the search section for more details.

Now Playing

The Now Playing tab displays information about the currently playing song. This is also where you can issue playback commands such as play, pause or advance to the next track. The song information is refreshed from Winamp® according to the Refresh interval setting. Below is a complete description of what is displayed and what you can do on the Now Playing tab.

  • Song information

    • Artist
    		 Artist
    		Title
    Album
    		 Album

  • Song position

    • Position seek bar - The seek bar moves from left to right as the song plays. You can change the song position at any time by pressing the draggable thumb and sliding it around.
    • kbps - Located on the left side of the position seek bar, kbps stands for kilo bits per second, and this indicates the sample bitrate of the media (higher is better). For songs with a variable bitrate (VBR), this value may jump around.
    • Chronograph - Located on the right side of the position seek bar, the chronograph displays the current song position and the song's total time in minutes & seconds. Note that when sliding the position seek bar, the chronograph displays the time of where the seek bar thumb is located.

  • Media buttons

These are the basic playback buttons:
   Play
Pause. Long press to stop playback.
  Next track in playlist.
   Previous track in playlist.
   Fastforward five seconds.
   Rewind five seconds.
 
    There are also two simple toggle buttons:
  Repeat
  Shuffle

    The volume/mute button has multiple roles. Pressing it toggles mute. Long pressing brings up a volume seek bar. And the icon indicates the remote Winamp®  volume level:

      Mute 
       Low
      Medium 
       High

    Pressing the volume buttons on your Android device while Ampwifi is running changes Winamp® 's playback volume.


Playlist

The Playlist tab allows you to view and rearrange the current playlist on Winamp®. For each item in the playlist you'll see the song title and optionally the full path where it resides on your PC (as set by the Show file name setting). The song currenly played is shown in bold and appears brighter than all other songs. The playlist is refreshed from Winamp® according to the Refresh interval setting.


Each song title listed in the playlist is next to a grabber icon. You can use this to rearrange the order of the playlist or to remove a song from the playlist. In either case, press and hold the grabber to detach the song title from the playlist and have it follow your gestures. You can then rearrange the playlist order by moving the song up or down and releasing it where you would like it. To remove the song from the playlist, swipe the song towards the right edge of your device until it fades away.

Pressing a song title will play that song right away. Long pressing a song title will bring up the following context menu:

  • Play now - Plays the selected song right away.
  • Remove from playlist - Removes the song from the playlist.
  • Move to top - Moves the song to the top of the playlist.
  • Move to bottom - Moves the song to the bottom of the playlist.
  • Stream to device - Streams the file to your device. For details, click here.


Music library

The Music library tab allows you to browse your entire music library and add songs to the current playlist. This does NOT use Winamp's media library but instead uses AjaxAMP's media library replacement. Folders have their title in bold, appear brighter than song titles and end with a slash.

Pressing on a folder name will set that folder as the current folder and reload the Music library tab to show the files in that folder. To return to the parent folder you can press back button. Another way is to press the top most row (0...) which is always a pair of dots (in Windows/DOS the ".." means "parent folder"). Alternatively, you can select the Parent (..) menu option. If you're at the top most folder you will not see the row (0...) nor will the Parent (..) menu be available.

Pressing a song title will enqueue the song to the end of the playlist. Long pressing a song OR a folder will bring up the following context menu:

  • Play now - Clears the playlist, adds the file or folder to the playlist and begings playing right away.
  • Enqueue next - Inserts the file or folder into the playlist immediately after the song currently playing.
  • Enqueue at end - Adds the file or folder to the end of the playlist.
  • Stream to device - Streams the file to your device. For details, click here.

NOTE: The above context menu applies not only to songs but to entire folders, including the parent folder; the top most row (0...).

Caution: Adding a folder to the playlist adds ALL subfolders as well, so you should be careful with this feature. When adding the top most row (0...), the current folder will be added to the playlist, including any subfolders.


Search

The Search tab allows you to search AjaxAMP's media library. This tab may not always be visisble, but you can always get to this tab by either pressing the search button on your device or by selecting the Search menu option.

To perform a search simply enter a word or phrase in the edit box and press either the return key or the search button. The search results will be listed below. Folders have their title in bold, appear brighter than song titles and end with a slash.

Your searches can use the asterix (*) as a wild card character. For example, if you were to search for l*ve you'd see results with love, live or leave.

Press a song title to add that song to the playlist. Press a folder to switch to the Music library tab to view the contents of that folder. Long pressing either a song or a folder will bring up the same context menu as in the Music library tab.

Once done with search you can hide the Search tab by clearing the search text field and then either press the search button or select the search menu option.

NOTE: There is a bug in AjaxAMP that may cause it to crash if you search for a phrase with a large number of matches (in the thousands). Searching for words like "the" or "and" are discouraged. If AjaxAMP does crash, you may need to restart Winamp®. Unfortunately I am unable to correct this bug as I don't have access to the code.