(2013-09-06, 23:32)pkscuot Wrote: Um, not really.

In theory the override slideshow option shouldn't keep the bio from showing correctly, and I just checked the code to make sure. By deleting the addon_data folder for AS, you mostly reset it to factory default. AS is complicated enough now that it is possible that some set of settings are somehow conflicting, or that the upgrade from 1.5.3 to 1.5.4 just didn't go well for you.

Anyway, I'm glad stuff is working for you.

BTW, the actual order of searching for the MBID is:

1- ask XBMC
2- check for the .nfo file
3- ask MusicBrainz (via the logic I provided before)

That way once an artist MBID has been found and cached, AS doesn't have to ever ask for it again. If AS doesn't find one, after a couple of weeks it will try again. Retrying every time slows things down and is hard on the MusicBrainz server.

1. Is there no way to get the MBID from the ID tags embedded in the track that is being played, if it does exist [the MBID tag]? Can XBMC handle that to AS, can't it?
   
2. If AS clearly mishandles the name of the artist and no MBID match is being done, why not having AS getting the artist's MBID from XBMC in first place before asking for the artist name?
   
3. I believe AS could even get the MBID by just checking the tags in the local track being played, right?
   

(2013-09-10, 13:07)McMuzz4 Wrote: Hi pkscuot,

Your statement is very untrue - your information was actually very, very helpful and drove me find motivation to explore to discover a solution and create a patch!!

tl;dr: For some reason Spotimc doesn't like the many repeated JSON requests to the API (though i'm not sure why it only stutters beginning from playback of the second song) - I've posted my solution below.

long version:
After studying the debug log I determined that the pausing occurs exactly when the info is logged "CSoftAEStream::GetFrame - Underrun". Each time this occurred was shortly after a JSON query from artist slideshow that you mentioned. After a bit of googling i discovered that audio stutting + JSON queries could be related to a possible bug with Linux and AudioEngine: http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=147822 where large amounts of JSON queries cause stuttering. I'm still at a loss why the stuttering occurs only after the first song finishes - but anyway..

So I perform some testing:

My first test was I edited the Artist Slideshow python script to allow the first song play through then sleep the artist slideshow script when the second song starts for 10 to 40 seconds, just before the JSON request. This didn't result in anything positive it began stuttering/skipping when AS script finished sleeping.

My second test was to detect if a Spotify stream is playing and pause every second before the JSON query. This resulted in a little less stuttering, so i continued to adjusting until i found a sweet spot at 10 seconds to stop the songs stuttering/skipping. But this was frustrating because while it solved the problem it prevented AS from functioning nice and quickly and took a very long time for artist information to populate, sometimes not until a few songs of playback.

My third test which I have put below is my solution - it will detect if a new song is playing that is a Spotify stream, and if so it will perform the JSON call once and store the response value in a variable. It will then use the stored JSON response to query artist information and not won't call the JSON API again until a different song starts playing

My patch consists of the following, I made changes to two functions:

(btw I'm sure it could be done better I've never used python before - also sorry but I've never contributed to code before so apologies if I should be doing this differently)

(2013-09-10, 16:10)capfuturo Wrote: Is there no way to get the MBID from the ID tags embedded in the track that is being played, if it does exist [the MBID tag]? Can XBMC handle that to AS, can't it?

Quote:If AS clearly mishandles the name of the artist and no MBID match is being done, why not having AS getting the artist's MBID from XBMC in first place before asking for the artist name?

Quote:[*]I believe AS could even get the MBID by just checking the tags in the local track being played, right?

(2013-09-10, 13:07)McMuzz4 Wrote: My third test which I have put below is my solution - it will detect if a new song is playing that is a Spotify stream, and if so it will perform the JSON call once and store the response value in a variable. It will then use the stored JSON response to query artist information and not won't call the JSON API again until a different song starts playing

(2013-09-11, 03:13)pkscuot Wrote: I like your idea of caching the JSON response not just for SpotifyMC, but generally. I really don't need to make JSON calls every time. I've updated AS using your code as a starting point so that it only makes one JSON call at the beginning and then uses the cached response until a different file is playing.

Here's the 1.5.5.001 beta with those fixes. I've tested it only to make sure it doesn't crash and that it behaves the same as 1.5.4 for normal uses.

Let me know how this works for you.

(2013-09-11, 15:15)McMuzz4 Wrote: That's Awesome! I've downloaded and played some tunes and its 100% with full bio's and images and silky AS goodness, and no skipping!

The link landed me a 404 in git so I downloaded the master zip which seems right.

Thanks for adding this to your script it's great to have this all functioning again, and I've learned a bunch o' stuff along the way and to see it transformed is amazing.

(2013-09-12, 01:28)capfuturo Wrote: I erased everything as you suggested and installed the new version 1.5.5 (master from Github). AS returned the full bio from theAudioDB for the artist 'Marillion' on first play which made me think "Oh, finally this is fixed'. I went into the userdata–> add-on_data–> script.artistslideshow–> artistsinformation–> 52991789 and found multiple NFO files and amongst them there were a theaudiodbartistbio.nfo and a musicbrainz.nfo, both containing data. I check the MBID within the musicbrainz.nfo and it matches the artists actually; does this mean XBMC handled that MBID to AS and then AS wrote the file? I thought XBMC 12.2 isn't doing that yet.

(2013-09-12, 03:16)capfuturo Wrote: Please find debug log here (AS brought back only last.fm truncated bios for the three artists)

(2013-09-12, 07:03)Martijn Wrote: At least for gotham if there's an mbid tag in the mp3 xbmc will take it and put it in db.
Also consider if you found the right id with AS upload it to the db using jsonrpc so you don't have to use the search next time

(2013-09-12, 01:28)capfuturo Wrote: The lastfmartistsbio.nfo has the full bio in it but what AS shows on the view when I play the artists is something totally truncated that makes no sense. It actually cuts the bio right where it finds an url within the lastfmartistsbio.nfo, which leads me to think there is an issue somewhere handling bios with links in them, since the text for the bio within the NFO should be plain text, stripped from all its url links useful only when one is browsing last.fm. Please see the following two examples:

For Marillion:
AS shows: "Marillion are a rock band formed in Aylesbury, England. Their 30-year career is marked by two distinctive phases; the early years fronted by "
lastfmartistsbio.nfo created by AS here

For Bob Marley:
AS shows on slideshow (which is totally nonsense): "Bob Marley and The Weilers were a raggae band created in 1974 by on drums and bass respectively... "
lasfmartistbio.nfo created by AS here

(2013-09-12, 07:03)Martijn Wrote: At least for gotham if there's an mbid tag in the mp3 xbmc will take it and put it in db.
Also consider if you found the right id with AS upload it to the db using jsonrpc so you don't have to use the search next time