feature requests

[Kazbah]

New user here, very impressed with the capability and versatility of the App.  Here's my wishlist

Web Interface

• Could you expose the incoming Program Change Field
• Batch Export.. yes I would like the round-trip contrary to popular belief batch is a lot more efficient than tap-dancing. Would be nice is CSV file format be supported also
  

In the App

• Dropbox/iCloud Drive (and/or other cloud solution ..read Synology/Qnap NAS) support for Documents, Recording, Presets. ITunes File Sharing is such a pain.
• There is an option to render Word documents White on Black background .. could this setting be expanded to apply to PDF files also.. not a biggie but would add more polish
  
• Faster device discovery when initiating Device Linking

[arlo]

Could you expose the incoming Program Change Field

Yes, I will put that on my to do list.

Batch Export.. yes I would like the round-trip contrary to popular belief batch is a lot more efficient than tap-dancing. Would be nice is CSV file format be supported also

I think that round-trip export/import for the purpose of editing data would be very error-prone. I would rather spend time making targeted improvements to the web interface than attempting to support that workflow.

Dropbox/iCloud Drive (and/or other cloud solution ..read Synology/Qnap NAS) support for Documents, Recording, Presets. ITunes File Sharing is such a pain.

You can add document and recording files from Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, etc. Personally I think it is easier to add them through the web interface.

There is an option to render Word documents White on Black background .. could this setting be expanded to apply to PDF files also.. not a biggie but would add more polish

That feature does not invert the display of Word documents; it only changes the background color for Word documents that you have inverted yourself. The Android version of the app can invert the PDF colors, but the iOS framework for displaying PDF files doesn't have any capability of modifying the display.

Faster device discovery when initiating Device Linking

That is on my wish list. Meanwhile, you can enter a device ID directly rather than searching for devices, as described here:

http://www.bandhelper.com/tutorials/linking_devices.html

[Kazbah]

Yes, I will put that on my to do list.

Thank you

I think that round-trip export/import for the purpose of editing data would be very error-prone. I would rather spend time making targeted improvements to the web interface than attempting to support that workflow.

If you can find another way to easily spot a MIDI Song Number or Incoming Program Change conflict I would be most grateful

You can add document and recording files from Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, etc. Personally I think it is easier to add them through the web interface.

Fair enough, the tought never occured to me since I was using the app on the iPad that I could use the web interface on it too. And from it I have access to my NAS ... VERY VERY HAPPY CAMPER

That feature does not invert the display of Word documents; it only changes the background color for Word documents that you have inverted yourself. The Android version of the app can invert the PDF colors, but the iOS framework for displaying PDF files doesn't have any capability of modifying the display.

*Prays to Apple*

That is on my wish list. Meanwhile, you can enter a device ID directly rather than searching for devices, as described here:

http://www.bandhelper.com/tutorials/linking_devices.html

Thanks again for al the good work and for taking the time to respond

[arlo]

If you can find another way to easily spot a MIDI Song Number or Incoming Program Change conflict I would be most grateful

Can you describe the problem in more detail?

[Kazbah]

When moving songs around sets, one could easily end up with 2 songs having either the same Incoming Program Change assigned to them. One has to zoom in into each song to try to find where that conflict comes from.

Adding MIDI Song Number and Incoming Program Change to Set List View/Song List in the web interface would enable us to easily spot mistakes and conflict.

For instance, if you have backing tracks playable by Sweet MIDI Player (btw thanks for the quick tutorial post on that ), having the MIDI Song Number in Set List View would enable me to quickly validate that my setup is correctly set (without having to zoom in and out of each song to retrieve the Song Number).. 

[arlo]

I'm still not sure what you mean, but you should assign a MIDI song number or an incoming MIDI program change number permanently to each song; you should not change them depending on the position of the song in each set list.

If you want to select songs by their position in the set list, you can set Settings > Remote Control > MIDI Program Messages > Program Change to Song Number in Show, and then you don't have to set incoming program change numbers at all.

[pheldal]

Faster device discovery when initiating Device Linking

Discovery would be near instant if every Bandhelper instance would act as an IP broadcast receiver/responder, but this is only when all devices are inter-connected on the same subnet. To implement p2p communications gets much worse when nodes are connected to separate networks (different providers) with dynamically assigned addresses and possibly even network roadblocks (NAT/firewall/filters) that prevent direct communications. This would require some form of server-assisted messaging. The LAN-model with all clients hooked up to a local WiFi network makes inter-device-communication much simpler, but has challenges with server synchronisation. Bandhelper-clients may be unable to connect to the central server if the local WiFi subnet is disconnected from the internet. Neither iOS nor Android work reliably with WAN (3G/4G) and LAN (WiFi) active simultaneously. 3G/4G is also very unreliable in many locations so I would have liked a two-tier server model where Bandhelper clients would connect and sync to a local server if one is found on the attached LAN before falling back to the central server. The local server could be a server application running for example on a laptop that gets synchronised to the central server later, but it could also be that one of the Bandhelper clients within the given account temporarily act as a server when the central server is unreachable.

A  proper solution to all of this, except from the simple broadcast messaging to detect "neighbour" Bandhelper clients on a LAN, is a huge development task.

[arlo]

Database syncing has always required an Internet connection and device linking has always required that devices be on the same local network. I think that is a reasonable limitation and don't imagine changing that.

[arlo]

Could you expose the incoming Program Change Field

This is now available for editing on the song edit page of the web interface.

[Kazbah]

Thanks Arlo

[arlo]

Faster device discovery when initiating Device Linking

I just released new app versions with a more efficient device discovery function. More info is here:

http://forum.arlomedia.com/index.php/topic,1600.0.html

[Kazbah]

Thanks again

[arlo]

There is an option to render Word documents White on Black background .. could this setting be expanded to apply to PDF files also.. not a biggie but would add more polish

In iOS 13, you can now turn on Settings > Appearance > Invert PDF Colors. Unfortunately, this option will only display single-page documents. I hope to expand it to include multi-page documents in the future.

All of today's changes are listed here:

http://www.bandhelper.com/support/release_notes.html