About lrcShow-II
Download and install
Should know
Work flow
About settings
Rule of mate local lrc file
Fast setting bar
Dealy and forward the lrc
Lrc editor
Display mode
Shortcut
Other functions
About encoder
About lrc strategy
About lrcShow-II:
lrcShow-II is a Amarok script, different from others, this script use independent GUI (qt) to show lrc of current track. It is written by python, and dependent on pyqt3. From version 0.6.0, it also support pyqt4. When script start, it could auto check pyqt version in your system. Now lrcShow-II would use pyqt3 if you have both pyqts' libraries.
lrcShow-II is distribute with GPL-v2.0, welcome to modify and redistribute and other behaviors under GPL-v2.0. Please read the license of GPL-v2.0 for details.
Download and install:
You could donwload lrcShow-II from www.kde-apps.org or from Amarok's script manager. Just install "lrcShow-II.amarokscript.tar.bz2" via Amarok's script manager.
Should know:
You should ensure your system has >=python-2.4 and pyqt. This script need artist and title information from Amarok, please ensure every track's tag in amarok is correct.
Pyqt4 version still has many bugs, I advise you'd better use pyqt3 version now.
Work flow:
lrcShow-II use qt's property to highlight the current lyric, not traditional method (for example every 0.1 second to mate the current lyric), therefore it just need little cpu usage (almost 0), and very accuraty. But the method has a big fault: if you change the progress of current song for example drag the progess bar of Amarok, it can not to follow :(
When script start to work, first it use dcop function to get the artist and title information, then search local lrc file path (default is $HOME, you should set it at first), if has, show it and scroll in GUI, otherwise it search on internet.
About settings:
lrcShow-II allow users to use local lrc file, you should set it first via right click menu, default is $HOME.
Users could deside whether auto download, also via right click menu. If you set it to No, and this lrc file local do not have but could be searched, you also have a choise to just download this time but would not switch to auto download.
As your like, you could change color settings of GUI.
Rule of mate local lrc file:
It seems no standard rule of naming lrc file, it is a difficult. lrcShow-II define only just the name of lrc file includes artist and title information, it could be mated, like "artist - title.lrc" is accepted. lrcShow-II would name the lrc file from net as this way. It's important!
Fast setting bar:
For convenience, lrcShow-II offer a fast setting bar for users, you could double click the GUI to show/hide it. Users could set delay/forward lrc , save offset to file, ST interconversion (just Simplified/Traditional Chinese need) and show lrc editor by fast setting bar. Pyqt4 version add the Amarok control buttons.
Dealy and forward the lrc
Not every lrc file performant well, you could use fast setting bar or menu to delay or farward lrc (0.2 sec every time). If the lrc file is on your local, you could save the offset to file easily.
Lrc editor:
lrcShow-II offer users a mini lrc editor. If the lrc is on local, lrc editor would load the lrc to itself to modify, otherwise just write a head of lrc file in it, then you could paste the plain lyrics into edit box, use button of F5 to insert current time tag.
Display mode:
lrcShow-II has three display mode for users.
As default, the GUI just like a normal dialog, you could change the size (can not too small), back to other window and so on.
You could choose fullscreen mode, it's wonderfull. But thers is a problem, when you quit the fullscreen mode to normal, the GUI would be as wider as desktop, you should adjust it.
the last display mode is OSD mode, under this mode, GUI has no title bar, can not be resized and always on the top of other windows.
Shortcut:
A few shortcuts are given by lrcShow-II, "-" to dealy "+" to forward, "Esc" to back to normal display mode if you under fullscreen mode or OSD mode.
In pyqt4 version, some shortcuts are added: E-open lrc editor; O-OSD mod: F-fullscreen mod. After 0.6.1, pyqt4 and pyqt3 have the same shortcuts setting.
Other functions:
lrcShow-II support http proxy, users could via menu to set, the format is http://www.xxx.yyy.com:80 or http://60.60.60.60:80, if you left it empty, it means you do not need any proxy at all.
Now there are three search engines could be chosen: baidu, sogou and ttplayer, you could switch them via menu.
About encoder:
Here, two encoders are needed, first is local lrc file's encoder, you could set it via menu. other is the encoder of lrc from web, now only baidu and sogou search engine are available, so this encoder is always GB18030. If your local lrc file's encoder is just like iso-88591 or others and you want to donwload, a encoder error would ocurr, because some characters can not be encoded. In this case, I recommend you close to auto download.
In fact, I spend long time to find one lrc search engine for English and one for Traditional Chinese users, but faild. If you have some good idea, please mail me.
After version 0.5.0, reading encoder and writing encoder are not the same, because lrcShow-II could auto detect the local lrc file's encoder. Therefore, you need not to care about what the local lrc file's encoder was used, but you still need to set the writing encoder (default is UTF8), it would effect saving lrc file, including every saving action such as saving offset to file.
About lrc strategy:
After version 0.5.0, lrcShow-II bring "lrc strategy" concept for users, and it would be convenient to users. Now thers is five strategies: "do not use strategy", "do not search local", "do not search web", "do nothing at all" and remeber the correct lrc when current track searchs more than one lrc on local. Default every track use "do not use strategy". When lrcShow-II searchs more than one lrcs on local and shows the choose dialog, users could choose the correct one, if the same time users choose "remeber this action", it means you use a strategy. On choose local lrc dialog, there are two strategies: remeber the correct one and "do not search local".
Users could set the strategy via menu. If the current track exists a strategy, it could shows the current strategy, users could cancel the strategy in this dialog. If the current track do not has any strategy ( in fact, it means this track use "do not use strategy" strategy), users could choose one.
All of the strategy infomation is recorded in a new database file (~/.kde/share/apps/amarok/scripts-data/lrcShow-II.db), the data in this database is binary. Be careful: all data is encoded by users' locale, if you change the locale, please delete the database.
Give a example to explain how powful the strategy is. One track has no local lrc, the search engines just search a incorrect one, users could choose "do not search web" or "do nothing at all" to avoid this problem.