Media players in Cover Display

[NormMonkey]

Hi all,
Does anyone know how to adjust which media players show up in the Cover Display media app list?

On the Cover Display if you:
* swipe in from the right and choose the play icon,
* then swipe in from the left
... you get a volume control on the right, and four media icons on the left.  The top one is Google Play Music, and the other three (on my device) are blank and greyed out.

I have DDB2, TuneIn Radio Pro, and Poweramp for my music player.

I wonder what it would take to get these apps to show up here. Does anyone know how to do this?

[Piece_Maker]

I've found some apps show up automatically on the cover but others don't - Vinyl Player from f-droid does, and my PC's media player (via KDE connect) does but that's it so far.

[NormMonkey]

Hmm.  Maybe there is just a list of "popular" apps and if you have them installed, it finds them.
Maybe we can put together a survey for Cosmo users to let PC know what media players we use?

[maki.jouni]

I think, in some video interview Janko were saying that there is now few popular players supported and Planet Computers will add later support for more apps. Can't remember exact video and how can we request what app should be added or can we even request those...

[ianisthewalrus]

Pretty sure its in here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZZ3zm3-xr8

[Piece_Maker]

If that's the case, that only 'popular' apps work, I'm surprised Vinyl does, as it's just a small little FOSS player I pulled from F-Droid  Not a 'big player' at all.  

Are we sure it's not using some sort of common API (Whatever the Android equivalent to Mpris on Linux might be)?

[NormMonkey]

If that's the case, that only 'popular' apps work, I'm surprised Vinyl does, as it's just a small little FOSS player I pulled from F-Droid  Not a 'big player' at all.

I submitted the apps I use in the smartform troubleshooting thingie that PC uses: https://app.smartsheet.com/b/form/cc92fc88e...923c419ad9321b2
Dunno if that will make any difference but it doesn't hurt.
 

Are we sure it's not using some sort of common API (Whatever the Android equivalent to Mpris on Linux might be)?

There is some sort of Android media player registration, but I don't know how it works.  All I know is that:
* When media is playing in TuneIn or PowerAmp the media controls do appear on the cover display and on my smartwatch.  DDB2 doesn't quite work for the Cover Display, although it is fine on the smartwatch.  I'll file a report about that.

* If nothing at all is playing right after a reboot and I use my smartwatch to hit "play", PowerAmp starts up and plays (could be whichever app was last playing starts up and plays?  --EDIT: it does seem to be whichever was last being used)

[iJacks]

If I understand it correctly, any application that registers as a media player within android (IE, uses the Android API to say "I'm playing X") should be displayed on the front cover.  These applications also tend to add notifications with the normal Play/Pause commands.

Interestingly, while I am pretty sure the cover screen picks these up I don't think the buttons are dynamic.  I had one program (sorry, can't remember which one) that only has Play/Pause/Next as commands - but the cover display decided to show the same Play/Pause/Next/Previous buttons.

This was on the previous firmware for the cover display though - might have been updated with the .12 update?

@NormMonkey - is DDB2 any good?  I have always used PowerAmp, though I am finding that the more recent updates have been a little off so am looking for potential replacements.

[NormMonkey]

@NormMonkey - is DDB2 any good?  I have always used PowerAmp, though I am finding that the more recent updates have been a little off so am looking for potential replacements.

It's not as shiny as PowerAmp, but I think it's pretty good.
I like that it supports ReplayGain, it's based on ffmpeg and it supports a bunch of unusual codecs including MOD, S3M and those oldies.  It has an equalizer.

Sadly, no Ogg/Opus yet, but AFAIK PowerAmp doesn't do this yet either.  Oddly enough, I think the hardware decoder supports it.  At least, termux-media-player play <file> plays my Ogg/Opus files, and I don't think termux-media-player is doing any decoding on its own.

http://ddb2.me  <-- website lists most if not all of the features (see bottom of page for Detailed Feature List)

[gymbo]

@NormMonkey - is DDB2 any good?  I have always used PowerAmp, though I am finding that the more recent updates have been a little off so am looking for potential replacements.

It's not as shiny as PowerAmp, but I think it's pretty good.
I like that it supports ReplayGain, it's based on ffmpeg and it supports a bunch of unusual codecs including MOD, S3M and those oldies.  It has an equalizer.

Sadly, no Ogg/Opus yet, but AFAIK PowerAmp doesn't do this yet either.  Oddly enough, I think the hardware decoder supports it.  At least, termux-media-player play <file> plays my Ogg/Opus files, and I don't think termux-media-player is doing any decoding on its own.

http://ddb2.me  <-- website lists most if not all of the features (see bottom of page for Detailed Feature List)

I'm using "Neutron" to play my music, mostly because it seemed like one of the better players that supports playing music by folder, which I prefer. But it seems to be quite capable, and plays mods and ogg-files too.

[klampfenfreak]

I would like to see quasarmx player working with CODI. For me its the best audio player with great audio enhancement features, lyric support and a nice interface.

[jakfish]

Folder Player Pro, my favorite, works with the cover display. Dunno if its free version does the same.

Jake

[NormMonkey]

I'm using "Neutron" to play my music, mostly because it seemed like one of the better players that supports playing music by folder, which I prefer. But it seems to be quite capable, and plays mods and ogg-files too.

Thanks for calling out Neutron @gymbo!
Looks like it might support opus!  Maybe I'll download and try it.

[Jesse from Ohio]

As mentioned above, it sounded like PC programmed in support for a handful of media apps they thought would be popular, although  I really wish they'd embrace an open standard for the CODI media display...

Seems like smart watches etc. can communicate with Android from the factory with any app that support notifications, while the CODI only has limited support.

[zottel]

There's two different things things about the media player on the cover display:

1: Is it possible at all to control what is playing right now? This seems to depend on the kind of notification used by the media player. Podcast Addict, e.g., uses a custom notification by default that shows a progress bar in the notification etc. With this notification, the cover display will show the media player when the Cosmo is closed, but without any podcast title or episode image, and it's not possible to pause it or do anything else. If you configure Podcast Addict to use the standard player notification, though (you may have to kill it from the app settings for the change to take effect), everything works perfectly on the cover display. (Except some glitches now and then when the cover display will only show the media player interface if you open it via the menu, but that's independent of the used apps, I guess.)

2: When swiping from left to right on the media player interface, there is a list of player app icons. The only ones present there for me are Spotify and Google Music. I've never used Google Music on this device, in fact it's deactivated, but the cover display still shows it. Podcast Addict is not shown. I guess that's where the app has to be on Planet's list in order to be shown there.