Scheduler Enhancements / Improvements / Bug Fixes / Wish List - add yours

[arw01]

Got to double dip the vote for pjlink so I can control my projector.. No idea how I am going to get video on the projector yet, one piece at a time

 

[keithsw1111]

Got to double dip the vote for pjlink so I can control my projector.. No idea how I am going to get video on the projector yet, one piece at a time

Will be writing this tonight. Video playing is working already. You just tell XLights where you want the video displayed. You can also play multiple videos at once or the same video on multiple projectors.

 

[CaptainMurdoch]

If we are going to mess with the scheduler code it needs to be the best player on the planet.

This is the first I have heard of dropping Windows support, are you really serious or just joking?

 

[Gilrock]

If we are going to mess with the scheduler code it needs to be the best player on the planet.

This is the first I have heard of dropping Windows support, are you really serious or just joking?

Sorry you lost me. I didn't even mention Windows.

 

[damona]

This is more of a FFP item.

Their are dynamic features in xlights esp. with matrix's like count down times. It would be nice if FFP supported this. e.g. Give the FFP a virtual universe to use to trigger events.

 

[arw01]

Got to double dip the vote for pjlink so I can control my projector.. No idea how I am going to get video on the projector yet, one piece at a time

Will be writing this tonight. Video playing is working already. You just tell XLights where you want the video displayed. You can also play multiple videos at once or the same video on multiple projectors.

It's more of a logistical issue, e.g. my pc that I would likely play from his in a basement and the projector is in the attic..

Might be time to pick up one of those mini itx pc's or find a wireless video sender so I can send a "monitor" on my play pc to the projector in the attic.

 

[the grinch]

Myself personally am extremely thankful to the developers of xlights havent had any issues whatsoever and really don't have anything too add to a wishlist ! im not really a computer smart person and I was able to produce an awesome show with little effort also able to understand what I was actually doing . Haven't upgraded to latest version yet as didn't want too risk just before xmas but certainly will now and have studied some of the new features and mind blowing too say at the least ! To be able to access your fpp and configure from xlights plus controllers and other improvement s wow gotta be happy with that ! we are truly blessed


THANKS XLIGHTS TEAM YOU ROCK ,!

 

[CaptainMurdoch]

If we are going to mess with the scheduler code it needs to be the best player on the planet.

This is the first I have heard of dropping Windows support, are you really serious or just joking?

Sorry you lost me. I didn't even mention Windows.

Bad Linux user joke on my part.

 

[CaptainMurdoch]

This is more of a FFP item.

Their are dynamic features in xlights esp. with matrix's like count down times. It would be nice if FFP supported this. e.g. Give the FFP a virtual universe to use to trigger events.

I don't want to hijack the thread so I will say if you are looking for FPP enhancements or questions start a new thread here or on the FalconChristmas.com site, but I will say that FPP does already support dynamic countdowns and dynamic text on a matrix as well as multiple ways to trigger events including via channel data.

I think it is great that the xLights scheduled and player is getting some focus, I don't expect everyone to use or want to use FPP and see lots of ways which both programs benefit each other. The vixen guys want to integrate with FPP better as well.

Keith, are you looking at adding FPP MultiSync ability to xLights so xLights could take the place of a FPP master?

 

[Gilrock]

If we are going to mess with the scheduler code it needs to be the best player on the planet.

This is the first I have heard of dropping Windows support, are you really serious or just joking?

Sorry you lost me. I didn't even mention Windows.

Bad Linux user joke on my part.

Ok I see what you did there. Actually if you've followed my comments you know I've always resisted us spending time on the xLights player but we do seem to have a ton of users begging for it.

 

[keithsw1111]

Keith, are you looking at adding FPP MultiSync ability to xLights so xLights could take the place of a FPP master?

I will likely add both slave and master. Haven't started that yet. Most of the rest of the playlist and player functionality is working though and is on GitHub including the web client.

 

[keithsw1111]

Ok I see what you did there. Actually if you've followed my comments you know I've always resisted us spending time on the xLights player but we do seem to have a ton of users begging for it.

I know and to be honest when I started it was just that I wanted the scheduler tabs gone that made me want to separate it. As I started thinking about it I realised we could do a lot more. While I like fpp as a player its scheduler isn't great. And there is a lot more the XLights player could do and as you say there are still lots of people who want it.

 

[i13]

I'll also add myself to the list of xLights users who still run the show with a PC as of 2016. Not sure if I'll have a 2017 display.

xLights did what I wanted and I like how it lets you choose a playlist and play it without scheduling. It has its limitations but I suppose that's what FPP is for. For example, I had to make a second copy of a sequence because I wanted it to come up twice in the looping playlist. Neither the xLights or Vixen schedulers allow much other than looping shows. Maccas23 has a static display for most of the night and only runs musical sequences at set times. He had to make a very long playlist with several static sequences and fiddled with the duration of one of them until it happened to reach the music in the playlist when he wanted it to.

There's also this popup window that requires an extra click and therefore a few more seconds every time I want to play a playlist for viewers - see the attachment. Could these options be placed in the empty space on the right in the main xLights window behind it so the popup isn't needed?

This is an old version of xLights so things might have changed a little bit. Once I start sequencing, I don't update for the rest of the year unless a feature that I want is added or fixed.

I want to say a big thank you to the xLights developers. It's such an amazing sequencer and it's extremely generous of you to offer it for free. You also have a strong presence on ACL and offer support for xLights users. The things that I point out here are only tiny details and I successfully worked around them; it's ok if I need to continue to do so.

If the scheduler and playlists get removed then I'd just stay with an older version of xLights that still has them.

 

[CaptainMurdoch]

While I like fpp as a player its scheduler isn't great.

This has me curious. What kinds of things will you be adding to the xLights scheduler that FPP doesn't support?

I think FPP's biggest scheduling weakness is the inability to cross midnight boundaries but that probably won't get resolved until I rewrite the scheduler after I am done rewriting the playlist and player code which I am working on now for v2.0.

There are a ot of things I see as player/playlist enhancements which some might consider as scheduler changes. I have a lot of playlist enhancements in mind for v2.x, including the ability to direct playback of a media or sequence file to a single host. The desire for v2.0 playlist rewrite is just to replace existing functionality with some new playlist entry types being added in during the rewrite. New playlist features will include branching based on things like clock time, loop count, and in the future even external inputs. V2.0 will also have the ability to control the volume from within a playlist, run scripts directly, and run effects directly.

Feel free to borrow/copy any ideas that you think are a good fit in xLights.

The MultiSync compatibility will be a good enhancement. It's a totally off the wall idea, but theoretically before 2018, a person could have a show played by a combination of xLights/FPP/Vixen3 since the Vixen3 guys are also looking at adding MultiSync capability as are some hardware controllers such as the F16v2/3 and also the ESPixelStick and the Open Source controller being worked on on one of the other sites.

 

[OzAz]

a +1 to be able to cross midnight boundary