Can Windows do this?

[D-Dan]

I've had a young friend around today because he managed to trash his Windows installation (again), and after three failed attempts at re-installing, I introduced him to the world of Ubuntu and installed that instead.

I made sure I set him up with media players, codecs etc. and in the process, I discovered a feature of Ubuntu I didn't know existed. Specifically, if you hover the mouse obver a music file - it plays it. No need for WMP, Winamp etc - it just plays while you hover.

I love this feature - does anyone know if something similar even exists for Windows?

Steve

[Lance]

There is certainly nothing built into Windows, and as far as I can quickly google, there isn't any third party solution either.

Sounds unique to ubunto 

[kinmel]

Of course not 

Nautilus is used to preview the music, in recent Ubuntu versions the option is set on by default and in older versions it is set off.

You can turn the feature on or off  ....

Open your music files folder and..................

In the Menu bar select Edit > Preferences then the Preview tab.

In there you will find Sound Files and you can select  3 default options -

Always
Local Files Only
Never

You can also preview text, in the same settings tab.

[D-Dan]

What a shame - maybe I should start programming again and write one myself.

[Rik]

We're waiting.

[Glenn]

OK 15 minutes has past - Is it ready yet?

[Rik]

 

[D-Dan]

Well - I have to start programming again first - then I have to learn the APIs for explorer and WMP.

May take another 10 minutes

[Rik]

Make that five and you've got the job.

[D-Dan]

LOL - I figured out how to play the music - but not how to find out if the mouse is over it in the first place.

Did I say minutes - I meant weeks

[Rik]

I can wait.

[Glenn]

You don't work for MS then, it would be years.

[Rik]

And that would only produce an intermediate program, the full one would follow later with a different name.

[Inactive]

Followed by Service Pack 1..then 2.....then.....

[Rik]

... oblivion.

[Lance]

And that would only produce an intermediate program, the full one would follow later with a different name.

You mean like Vista and then Windows 7? 

[Rik]

How well you know me, Lance.

[D-Dan]

Well - I've started the research - expect calls for beta testers around new year

[Rik]

OK.

[D-Dan]

Well - I've tried - but it seems a vital part of my cunning plan is simply not possible unless I write a full shell extension first.

However, I do have an MP3 player that is a tiny 21k in size. OK - it either plays or stops. No fancy effects, no pause, one tune at a time - but even so - 21k for a Windows program. That's tiny.

If anyone wants it - IM me. NB - doesn't work on Vista. Seems that Microsoft's backwards compatible flagship OS isn't that backwards compatible, after all.

Steve

Edit. Don't IM me - get it from http://roken.www.idnet.com/MP3Player.exe

2nd edit - I should really think my posts through. Requires DirectX to be installed. Let me know if you like it

3rd edit - told you I should think things through. Instructions:-

Click Play to play an MP3 (filerequester opens)
Click Stop to stop it playing
Click Quit to quit the player

Let me know if it's too complicated.

Steve

[kinmel]

that works just fine 

[D-Dan]

TY - the plan was to have no interface at all. It was going to play MP3s on mouseover the icon - but trapping the mouseover event and extracting the filename and path is the seemingly impossible bit - so possibly the tinyist MP3 player in the modern world is my gift to you

Steve

[Lance]

Could you capture the mouseover using the same method as windows uses for tooltip or say dbpoweramp for displaying the details of the file in explorer?

[Sebby]

Good thinking, Lance!

[D-Dan]

Well - if you can find detail of how - I'm listening. the Windows API doesn't offer it