Feature request - fade all on Go/Play

[Nid]

Hi,

I supplied sound and light for a small community group play yesterday and introduced the elderly director to MP. He really liked it and agreed to try it for the play instead of iTunes that he uses regularly. He played with MP a little prior to the show so both of us felt confident that he could run the show.
During the show there were a few times where he accidently started playing the wrong track and after realizing, quickly moved to the correct cue and started playing it while the wrong cue was still playing. This resulted in both cues playing simultaneously...

I'm not sure if any of the audience (kids) actually noticed these mishaps but the director felt really bad. This had me thinking that if there was an option in the cue properties to stop (or fade) any/all playing cues when a new cue is started, this could eliminate situations like the one described.

       

[EdK]

Hi Nid,

It's easy to accidentally start the wrong cue....rather the next cue too early.  I use "End Advance" on each cue so pointer remains on the playing cue until it is done.   

If the default is set to "Start Advance", the pointer is positioned on the next cue immediatly when the current cue is started and playing.  It's too easy to accidentally press the space bar and the next cue starts playing before the first one is done.    I don't know if this is what happened to you.   

In Preferences>General you also have the "GO Retrigger" value that can be set higher than the default of 500ms (1/2 second).  This can help by delaying when MP will allow another GO command to take place if you want to keep your cues set at "Start Advance".  I find this most helpful if the computer (in particular laptop) had 'tap to click' active.  Personally, I disable "tap to click" but I've run into some laptops....in particular a low-end Lenovo...where it doesn't give you the option to disable it.

Some laptops also have touch sensitive screens.  That can get you into trouble also. I don't have that feature on my computers.  Too easy to screw things up. Sometimes I just want to touch the screen to point something out to someone and if it's a touch sensitive screen....well....you can guess what happens.

You can also check Preferences>Shortcuts and make sure you have a key assigned to "Stop All".  By default, I think the Escape key performs a Stop All.   Another alternative is to assign a key just "Stop" but the cursor (pointer) needs to be pointing to the cue you want to stop.

What I find is many people get used to doing everything using their mouse or a touch screen, etc. and it's hard to get them used to using the keyboard!!






Don't know if this is what happened in your situation. 

[Nid]

Hi EdK,

I agree with you. I too usually set all cues as EA and it works great for me and for most operators I let into MP.
I am looking for a simple (optional) solution for a playlist which needs to play the cues only one at a time, and will not allow multiple cues to play simultaneously.

Stop all works, but it is sudden and very obvious. If by starting the correct cue, the previous cue (may it be the wrong cue, or simply any cue that needs to end) will fade out - I think this can be a usable feature.

   

[David]

Fade All is a nice alternative to Stop All as you can set the fade time and shortcut key in Preferences.

Since I added the ability to fade all other in code in v175, I can look at an option to use that in conjunction with GO.

[David]

I've added an option called Go Fades All Other Cues in Preferences > Cues for release v177.

When enabled, activating GO will fade all other cues in the main cue list. Adlib cues will not be affected.

[Nid]

That's great.

Looking forward to give that poor director a corrective experience on MP..