Monday, June 10, 2002
CEPlaylist editor - a supplement to Windows Media's editor
Posted by Ed Hansberry in "SOFTWARE" @ 04:00 AM
CEPlaylist is a play list editor that will help you organize media for use with Windows Media Player on your Pocket PC. If you keep tons of music on your Pocket PC, you will grow weary quickly of moving things on your play lists around using the Windows Media Player's built in play list editor. CEPlaylist doesn't make up for all of its deficiencies, and still doesn't have the power of a desktop play list editor, but it does come in very handy.
This is not a comprehensive review, but just a quick look at CEPlaylist's features. Creative Engineering, the creator of this app, has decided to give away 5 copies to registered members of Pocket PC Thoughts. I will hold the drawing this Thursday, so if you have not registered and would to be in the running for a copy, go to the Forums link and register. I will email you if you have won and post the winner's user id's on the front page Thursday. Select the more link to read the rest of the preview.
Figure 1: Searching your device for content<!>
This can take a few seconds, especially if you have hundreds of songs on 512MB or more of space. I also didn't have a microdrive to test against, so I don't know if searching that would be any slower or faster than my Compact Flash and SD cards. This runs at the programs startup, but can be turned off in the preferences. You can then select Tools|Rebuild Library if you add or remove media from your device.
Figure 2: Device contents
This shows you the content on your device. This is arranged by artist but you can also display by genre.
Figure 3: Existing play lists
This shows you the existing play lists on your device. One thing CEPlaylist is excellent at is combining play lists. By pressing the little musical note with the arrow it will copy the contents of selected play lists to the "Song List" tab. This is perfect for long trips, allowing you to combine multiple play lists for hours of uninterrupted listening.
Figure 4: The song list
Here I have copied the Lisa Germano and Dido play lists. Note: this is for example only. I would never recommend you listen to Lisa Germano and Dido in the same sitting.
Figure 5: Saving your new play list
Here you tap the disk icon to save your new play list. I simply called this one "Combined."
Figure 6: Open Windows Media Player
You can see the new play list in WMP. CEPlaylist makes it easy to get to WMP - just press the blue "play" arrow.
Figure 7: Media in the current play list
If you go back to the Song Library tab, you can easily see what on your device is in the current play list - it is highlighted in red. Items in blue are available to add.
Figure 8: Content by genre
Same information as Figure 7 above, displayed by genre. Notice those items in red are already a part of the current play list.
Figure 9: Searching for a specific file
You can search for a specific song, album or artist here. I simply looked for the word "here" and it found 4 songs.
Figure 10: Change track or album information
CEPlaylist also allows you to change information about a song or an album. Simply select it, press the "pencil" icon and change the info. You can change the name of the song, the name of the album or the genre it belongs to.
There are two things I wish the software did that would make it more useful
• Bulk song rearrangement - right now, it moves individual songs around like WMP does - one at a time with up/down arrows. I would like to be able to select as many songs as I wanted by dragging, similar to the way you select multiple files in File Explorer, and move them up or down en masse.
• Sorting the song list in date order. The song list tab allows you to sort a play list by song, album, artist, genre, file type, sort type (I do not know what this is - it was "1" for all of my content) or path. I would like to be able to sort by file date, right down to the second. The reason for this is the desktop version of Windows Media Player resets the time stamp as you move content over, so sorting a group of songs by date will ensure they are played in the same order as your play list on the desktop. For some of you this may not be a big deal, but for artists like Poe and Enigma, it is almost mandatory that you listen to the songs in the order on the CD since much of their work is really one 50 minute song with a few breaks. I also prefer to listen to 90% of my other CD's in their entirety and in the order the artist recorded them.
The author of this app seems to be continuously developing this app, releasing two minor updates and enhancements in the past week, so look for more enhancements in the future. You can download or purchase it at this Handango affiliate link. It has a 14 day free trial, fully functional and works on all Pocket PC and Pocket PC 2002 devices.
This is not a comprehensive review, but just a quick look at CEPlaylist's features. Creative Engineering, the creator of this app, has decided to give away 5 copies to registered members of Pocket PC Thoughts. I will hold the drawing this Thursday, so if you have not registered and would to be in the running for a copy, go to the Forums link and register. I will email you if you have won and post the winner's user id's on the front page Thursday. Select the more link to read the rest of the preview.
Figure 1: Searching your device for content<!>
This can take a few seconds, especially if you have hundreds of songs on 512MB or more of space. I also didn't have a microdrive to test against, so I don't know if searching that would be any slower or faster than my Compact Flash and SD cards. This runs at the programs startup, but can be turned off in the preferences. You can then select Tools|Rebuild Library if you add or remove media from your device.
Figure 2: Device contents
This shows you the content on your device. This is arranged by artist but you can also display by genre.
Figure 3: Existing play lists
This shows you the existing play lists on your device. One thing CEPlaylist is excellent at is combining play lists. By pressing the little musical note with the arrow it will copy the contents of selected play lists to the "Song List" tab. This is perfect for long trips, allowing you to combine multiple play lists for hours of uninterrupted listening.
Figure 4: The song list
Here I have copied the Lisa Germano and Dido play lists. Note: this is for example only. I would never recommend you listen to Lisa Germano and Dido in the same sitting.
Figure 5: Saving your new play list
Here you tap the disk icon to save your new play list. I simply called this one "Combined."
Figure 6: Open Windows Media Player
You can see the new play list in WMP. CEPlaylist makes it easy to get to WMP - just press the blue "play" arrow.
Figure 7: Media in the current play list
If you go back to the Song Library tab, you can easily see what on your device is in the current play list - it is highlighted in red. Items in blue are available to add.
Figure 8: Content by genre
Same information as Figure 7 above, displayed by genre. Notice those items in red are already a part of the current play list.
Figure 9: Searching for a specific file
You can search for a specific song, album or artist here. I simply looked for the word "here" and it found 4 songs.
Figure 10: Change track or album information
CEPlaylist also allows you to change information about a song or an album. Simply select it, press the "pencil" icon and change the info. You can change the name of the song, the name of the album or the genre it belongs to.
There are two things I wish the software did that would make it more useful
• Bulk song rearrangement - right now, it moves individual songs around like WMP does - one at a time with up/down arrows. I would like to be able to select as many songs as I wanted by dragging, similar to the way you select multiple files in File Explorer, and move them up or down en masse.
• Sorting the song list in date order. The song list tab allows you to sort a play list by song, album, artist, genre, file type, sort type (I do not know what this is - it was "1" for all of my content) or path. I would like to be able to sort by file date, right down to the second. The reason for this is the desktop version of Windows Media Player resets the time stamp as you move content over, so sorting a group of songs by date will ensure they are played in the same order as your play list on the desktop. For some of you this may not be a big deal, but for artists like Poe and Enigma, it is almost mandatory that you listen to the songs in the order on the CD since much of their work is really one 50 minute song with a few breaks. I also prefer to listen to 90% of my other CD's in their entirety and in the order the artist recorded them.
The author of this app seems to be continuously developing this app, releasing two minor updates and enhancements in the past week, so look for more enhancements in the future. You can download or purchase it at this Handango affiliate link. It has a 14 day free trial, fully functional and works on all Pocket PC and Pocket PC 2002 devices.
