The Scorpion Jukebox, or simply called The Scorpion, is an application
that allows the user to select music from a locally stored music collection,
put it in a playlist and start playing it. When looking at the feature list,
it can be seen that the Scorpion differs from other applications in many aspects.
The Scorpion's music selection is based on showing
album covers in an extremely flexible way, instead of just displaying
an enormously large list of directories and files. Scorpion uses DirectX
to be able to achieve a user interface with a natural look and feel that
does not suffer from jerky moving images and slow screen updates. It has
very fast response and it is very easy to work with. The Scorpion can
be completely controlled using a touchscreen, using a mouse and by the
keyboard using just ONE finger, to be able to perform the required tasks
as fast as possible so that we can do what
we are supposed to be doing: "LISTENING TO OUR MUSIC !"
Online Video Manual ..
This short YouTube video helps you get acquinted with the Scorpion Jukebox.
It shows you how to Browse though your music collection, select music albums,
and add the requested song into the playlist. The available modes to are shown
to be able to Search for artist, set the Volume levels and add Ratings to the
desired songs.
When watching this video, operating the scorpion jukebox is very easy, and
most important of all, it may convince you how easy it is to control this player
with the keyboard or using your touchscreen.
The video is based on player version 2.x.
Remote Control .. NEW !!
Here is an example of the Remote Control on my HTC Diamond Touch. Is has a resolution
of 480x640 so the cover is shown razor sharp on the screen. Since the screen is touch sensitive,
it always possible to change volume, or change a song rating with 2 button pushes.
It communicates through WiFi, so bitmap updates are quite fast.
Here we can see the Volume Mode, where we can lower or raise the volume level.
More help ..
click on images to enlarge
Directory Structure example ..
Features of The Scorpion...
Extremely Smooth Scrolling.
All images that are shown to the user, come and go as you have never seen before. Your album-covers and album info like artist, song names and song ratings are printed on panels. Each panel appears on the screen in such a pleasant way, that it is a delight to browse through all your music albums twice a day. Optimum scrolling is achieved when your monitor is set to 100 Hz, so that ALL moving panels are updated 100 times a second. To give the moving panels a natural look while they move, each panel is following a trajectory that uses 2nd order speed profiles.
Tear Free Scrolling.
To get an even better look and feel of the scrolling panels, each screen update is synchronized to your monitor's refresh rate so that moving images look razor sharp and clear, even during fast moves. Maybe this doesn't sound that important, but once you have experienced the difference between an application with 'normal' scrolling compared to 'tear-free'-scrolling you will be easily convinced. The Scorpion allows Tear Free Scrolling in fullscreen and EVEN in non-full screen modes. (which is very rare !)
Touchscreen Design.
One of the key features of the Scorpion is that it can be entirely operated using a Touchscreen. It is NOT however, an application that uses a mouse, and thus can be operated using a touchscreen. The Scorpion has been designed in such a way, that minimum screen touches are required to perform the required tasks.
Mobile Phone Remote Control.
If you are in the possession of a windows mobile phone that support WiFi, you can control the player from a lazy chair. The Remote Control shows the currently placed cover, title, artist, song, rating and volume level.
One Finger Keyboard operation.
Another key features of the Scorpion is that is can be completely controlled using the keyboard and using ONE finger only !. The reason for this design choice is very easy. Using the One Finger Keyboard Control (OFKC), the user can operate the jukebox as easy and as fast as possible. Let me give you a few examples:
The telephone rings, while you are holding a beer (or a baby) in one hand and the music needs to be paused immediately. Instead of grabbing a mouse, moving it to get the monitor from the sleep mode and clicking the stop or pause button, the scorpion stops by simply touching the space-bar.
The doorbell rings, and again while holding your beer, the music's volume level must be reduced to an acceptable level. While a normal application requires the user to grab the mouse, move it to a slider, and (while holding the button) move it to a different position, the Scorpion ONLY requires you to touch TWO keys, namely V and 5. This will bring the volume smoothly down to 50%.
Automatic Album Cover lookup.
All directories in your music folder are scanned for music and album covers. As soon as no cover was found, it is retrieved via internet and placed inside the corresponding directory. The name of the new cover is labelled 'SkCover', so
that the covers can easily be removed again. If the user owns a wideband internet connection, looking up 500 covers takes
no more than 2 minutes.
Super Volume Control.
Indeed, the coolest volume control available. Typing V + 2 brings the volume level to 20%. Typing V + 8 again, causes the volume to quickly fade from the current volume level of 20% to an increased level of 80%.
Super Rating Control
What we can do with the Volume, we can also do with rating the song that is currently playing. If you like the song, give it a rating of '80%' by typing the expected R + 8. To be able to rate songs of any type (mp3, ape etc) and to allow the user to have the ability to easily change it, the ratings are written in a text file that is placed inside the music directory.
Parallax Album Browser
The Cover Browser makes finding a music album as fun as listening to its songs. How does it work?
When the user presses the B key. The 'Browse' mode is entered and a panel smoothly appears. The panel shows 6 of your music covers that start with the letter A. According to your song ratings, the best cd you have that starts with the letter A is displayed first. Using the left and right arrow keys, more albums starting with the letter A and presented on panels that move in a horizontal direction. The last album on the far right is probably not your best album.
When the up and down arrow keys are pressed, the panels are moving in a vertical direction. Each time an arrow key is pressed, the next letter in the alphabet is shown. Since the response of the Scorpion is extremely fast, the user can scroll through a very large cd-archive in a split second. Selecting your music album has never been easier.
Dynamic Album Search
To allow the user to quickly find an album, the keys a-z can be used to find the correct album. For example typing 'ge' will quickly show a panel with the album covers: {Genesis-Cd1, Genesis-Cd2, Gents, George Michael, Gene Pitney-Cd1 & Gene Pitney-Cd2}. The panels are sorted and updated on the fly, so that the user only has to type as minimum as possible.
