Music Recommendations necimal

Suggests similar artists based on the currently playing song.


Music Recommendations



Description

Music Recommendations searches for similar artists (powered by Last.fm), and provides links to these artists in your library.

Comments, feature requests, bug reports welcome :)

Translations also welcome (just post translated strings as comments below).

The source is on Google Code, feel free to use it or learn from it.




Release Notes

  • Support for latest Songbird versions.
  • Use encodeURIComponent() instead of escape() for better handling of international artist names.



Images

(1)
  • Music-recommendations_thumbnail
 

Comments

(168)


GeekShadow
GeekShadow

Cool !

almost 5 years ago
smirky
smirky

awesome add-on! very simple and to the point... Thanks!

(the links seem to open in the current browser tab, maybe make an option for opening a new one as well?)

almost 5 years ago
topdownjimmy
topdownjimmy

Look forward to trying this. Definitely expect to get some utility from it -- a simple and valuable idea. Can't wait for in-library recommendations. Thanks for your work!

almost 5 years ago
komi
komi

Nice!

almost 5 years ago
necimal
necimal

Merci

I will try and work on the library integration as soon as possible!

@smirky: I did that to follow the interface of other links in songbird (eg. the bookmarks in the left sidebar). I do intend to add middle/ctrl click support for opening in a new tab.. not sure if there is an easy way to do this or if I have to do it manually.

over 4 years ago
vladak
vladak

It'd nice to have more intelligent matching - e.g. not only band name but also album name (to prevent name collisions for bands with the same name).

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

Unfortunately, that's a caveat of Last.fm. I'm pretty sure they are working on separating artists with the same name, but it's not an easy task to automate. But for now, that's all the info that we can get from them.

over 4 years ago
Slate8
Slate8

Great addon! Would be cool if artists clicked would open the last.fm page in a new tab rather than the existing one, but minor detail... good work!

over 4 years ago
neoproducciones
neoproducciones

Media Library integration will rock it!

over 4 years ago
reDust
reDust

The only gripe I can come up with is that the "Powered by Audioscrobbler" image has some nasty artifacts.

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

Yeah, I need to dig around the last.fm site for a better one. That was the only one I came up with with a good colour scheme, so maybe I will have to edit one. If you do come across a good 'powered by audioscrobbler' image, i'd love to hear about it!

over 4 years ago
alest
alest

Greate work!
Could you please make text selectable? And it lacks scroll bar, vertical especially.

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

Sure, will try to do selectable text & a scroll bar in the next version, still trying to figure out how to select artists etc from the library. Hopefully have a new version in the next few weeks!
Thx for support :)

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

Ok, I managed a scroll bar, and made a 'powered by audioscrobbler' logo without horrible jpeg artifacts. Selectable text seems to be unnecessarily difficult.. Also, the library integration is underway, just wanted to get a version out compatible with Songbird 1.0 =)

over 4 years ago
gabeforprez
gabeforprez

well now, how would i go about pointing you to a good 'powered by audioscrobbler' image?

try this:
tinypic.com/2luut8j.png

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

Haha classic! Where on earth did you find that?

over 4 years ago
smirky
smirky

Just thinking aloud... it would be super cool if the name of the current artist playing (at the top of the sidebar) was a link to their Last.fm page ...

thanks again!!

over 4 years ago
necimal
necimal

@smirky: you read my mind! That is included in the new version I just uploaded, and I hadn't even read your comment!

over 4 years ago
gabeforprez
gabeforprez

:D I got very bored one night and made it in illustrator. enjoy

over 4 years ago
grampybone
grampybone

I like this, but I think it could be a lot better. I think that the ideal would be that it could function like the last.fm "similar artist" radio but feeding off of your library instead of last.fm - i.e., being able to find an artist (Radiohead for example) and instantly making a temporary playlist comprised of Radiohead and their (x) most similar artists. (Or perhaps instead of having a set number of similar artists, using whatever is at a given last.fm similarity rating)

If that was extended to last.fm's tags, this would be an unstoppable add-on. If I could pick a tag (post-punk, for example) and have the addon pull a list of artists in my library that have that tag and then make a playlist based on it, I would die.

over 4 years ago
Blaise
Blaise

I'd like to echo grampybone's comment about generating a playlist of similar artists.

It would make this plugin much stronger if as a user you could pick an artist that you like the sound of and have this plugin recommend a temporary playlist of similar artists.

I'd use it all the time.

over 4 years ago
pankrusheff
pankrusheff

Jast added ru-RU translation on BabelZilla.

over 4 years ago
grampybone
grampybone

Just some followup thoughts - the problem with having a big library sometimes is trying to find music to please other people who might be listening too. Last.fm is nice because I can tell someone to name a band/genre that they like and then not have to worry about having death metal or something pop up on my shuffled library and having to skip tracks until I find something we both like.

over 4 years ago
SonnyJim
SonnyJim

I am loving this add-on so much, it just speeds up making playlists!
What would be fantastic is if we could expand this add-on to include the actual creation of playlists (if at all possible), much like the current new toy in iTunes (you know the one I mean).
Wouldn't that be lovely? :D

over 4 years ago
allvoxman
allvoxman

COOL!!!

over 4 years ago
washboardplayer
washboardplayer

Very cool add-on although I currnelty have lyricsMaster in my left hand pane leaving nowhere for this add-on to go.

My I suggest that you offer alternative layouts that can use the middle pane as an option as well. I mocked up a few layouts myself to give you an idea of what I thought may be possible.


A version containing artist and suggestions


A lightweight version containing only similar artists


An alternate version with a column based design

I would also love to have the option to disable the web links as I generally only wish to search my own library, rather than redirect to the web.

Nonetheless, its a really clever little add-on that i hope more people will pay attention to.

over 4 years ago
nytel
nytel

I hate how this plugin has to go to the internet to retrieve this information before playing the damn song. Sometimes the internet does go right a way and it takes a few songs for the song to play. Ridiculous guys...

over 4 years ago
Corwin
Corwin

This looks really cook, but now that I installed it how do I make it work? Is there a man page anywhere? Is it broke on 64 bit Linux?

over 4 years ago
Corwin
Corwin

Ok, it works on 64bit Linux, but it doesn't make a lot of sense. Can't I make it work in a tab? Right now it overwrites the album navigation. Also I don't think it will work right for me as it can't figure out what track is playing as Songbird has no clue how to read a cue file. I think I'm just going to have to go back to xmms as it supports cue files correctly. Any chance for a xmms version of this plugin?

over 4 years ago
newmario
newmario

hi all !

how does this work ?, i have installed the plugin, but in the preferences i can click on the configuration button from "music recommendations" and also in the player i see nothing and no window or so pops up with similar artists ? also there is nothing overwritten on the lyrics tab....

i use ubuntu linux 32bit and the newest songbird (1.xx)

over 4 years ago
MichaelMH
MichaelMH

Hi, I think a nice addition would be having the ability to right click the artists names, then on the menu have "search for on SkreemR" and "search for on The Hype Machine"

and awesome program btw

over 4 years ago
blutt
blutt

newmario..
it works on ubuntu linux 32bit and the newest songbird (1.xx)
u just have to select the right display pane to make it visible
Nice work here btw

over 4 years ago
Seb
Seb

Thanks for your great addon !

Is that a way to select what information is view/not view in your panel ?

over 4 years ago
well-being
well-being

It's awesome add-on!!!!
bat it don't work if artist name was written by 2byte character(example :Japanese).

over 4 years ago
topdownjimmy
topdownjimmy

Thanks for developing this add-on, it's a good start. The only trouble is that it's rare for any of the top five Last.fm matches to an artist to actually be in my library.

I think it would be far more useful if the add-on took all the "similar artists" available from Last.fm's API (currently 20, I think)...then also found all 20 similar artists for those artists...then took anything from my library by those 400 artists and put them into a playlist called "Last.fm Similar," for instance.

over 4 years ago
ruipenunes
ruipenunes

Hi Necimal!

I just wanted to say I really love this add-on. There's only a couple of things I miss:

1. Like someone's mentioned it would be great if it could be used to produce playlists (for instance, working with the Now Playing List add-on to queue the recommendations);

2. Just like MichaelMH mentioned above, it would also be great if we could use it to immediately search a song in skreemr, tagoo, hypemachine or other...

Please consider these suggestions and keep up your excellent work!

Thanks!

over 4 years ago
trgz
trgz

Thought this was a bug in Songbird isteslf bug but having uninstalled it (and deleted all the reg settings profiles etc) it came back when I installed your 'Music Recommendations' sidebar add-on. Here's the prob:
Currently hearing track two of disc (1 album filtered) yet speaker icon is against track 1.
Track 1 seems to be skipped with track 2 playing instead - when track 2 ends it's simply repeated once but then moves onto track 3 the next time. Track 1 will play if double-clicked on.
It seems to happen when listening to one album and then changing the filtering to another - play a track, fast forward towards the end, quickly filter for another (different) album, and then wait for the track to finish and the new album to start playing (you should hear track 2 of the new album). I can replicate it without any trouble - I reckon I could even make a video with FRAPS if you want!
Running Build 860 on Windows XP SP3 but I can also mimic it on Linux machine (Build 860 too). Not album or artist specific. Removing 'Music Recommendations' add-on resolves problem.

over 4 years ago
daveo
daveo

Can you please include an option for font color or display style as lyrics master has? The rubber ducky style in lyrics master is very nice. I can't see your current style with my feather (sparkle).

Thanks for all the work you have done so far!

over 4 years ago
vladak
vladak

This plugin seems to be having problems with diacritics, e.g. playing Icelandic band Múm (http://www.last.fm/music/m%C3%BAm/+wiki) yields just empty tab.

over 4 years ago
Hiromacu
Hiromacu

Hi necimal!

First! I really like this add-on! Very good idea and very useful. :)

But I have a problem:
I prefer to use the middle bottom display pane for this add-on, because the right display pane is the best for read lyrics (LyricMaster).

But every time when I want to see the Music Recommendations in the middle bottom display pane, the status bar is disappear and the display pane covers the whole content display pane!
http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/3585/sbmr02.png
I have to resize the display pane to see the content display pane and the status bar.
http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/9193/sbmr03.png
This is OK, once!
But when I hide the display pane and if I want to see later again, it covers the whole content display pane again! Very annoying!!

Could you make this add-on to memorize the size of the middle bottom display pane what I used last time?

And a little color issue:
When I hover the mouse cursor over the recent played artist or a similar artist from the library, the highlight colors are very bad on YABS feather (light gray on lightener gray)!
http://img187.imageshack.us/img187/1839/sbmr04.png
http://img187.imageshack.us/img187/363/sbmr05.png

Could you do something to make this add-on more compatible with YABS feather?

Thanks! ;)

ps: I could use the right click feature too to search text or copy text as well. :P

about 4 years ago
noteviljoe
noteviljoe

Nice add-on.

I'd like to ad my name, though, to the pple calling for it to be extended so that it could automatically create a play list.

If this could be made to work a few things I'd like to see would be:
1. After each song finished it would play on to the next nearest song in your library
2. It would keep track of songs played so that no song was repeated
3. It would keep track of the artists of the last x (maybe 10?) songs played so as not to just keep repeating the same artists over and over.
4. If no similar song exists in library then it should then play a random song of the same genre
5. If no song existed in library of the same genre then it should play any random song

This feature would be great for parties when you can't be bothered to set up a playlist - just select a song with the kind of vibe your after and let it go.

about 4 years ago
sjuganga
sjuganga

Something weird happened to my music recommendations-addon the other day. It just doesn´t look right anymore. All of the text is on a single line, so i have to scroll for a mile to read it all. I have tried to re-install the addon several times, but it doesn´t work. Has this happened to anyone else? And does someone here knows how to fix it? http://img264.imageshack.us/img264/2919/38538692.png

about 4 years ago
pr3mut05
pr3mut05

Can i change the language in german?

about 4 years ago
atreiu
atreiu

The layout is messed up: The description is in one single line, and there are no Images for the "similar artists":
http://i43.tinypic.com/2eznwyf.png
http://i41.tinypic.com/11kkvnt.png

Songbird 1.1.1, XP SP3.

about 4 years ago
Hiromacu
Hiromacu

Special letter problem!
Music Recommendations can't show artists with special letter!
For example: Lesiëm.

about 4 years ago
GruvyPunk
GruvyPunk

Hi, this is a great extension but I would like to have it on the bottom pane like some others have shown in screen shots. I can't figure out how to set that up. Can anyone help?

Thanks!

about 4 years ago
Hiromacu
Hiromacu

@GruvyPunk: Before Songbird 1.1 (before Music Recommendations 1.0) I used this extension on the bottom pane, but now it appears only on the right pane. So I stopped to use it, because there are too much stuffs on the right pane. Actually at the moment I have only mashTape extension on the bottom pan. I don't understand why. The bottom pane so useless. All pane extensions use the right pane. :-/

about 4 years ago
Neon_Knight
Neon_Knight

I have a problem with this. I can only click on the bottom "similar artists", and I can't read how many tracks I have of each one - only the very tops of the letters actually show, because the boundary around each selection is too small.

This is very disappointing, because for a long time this was working fine, updated my Ubuntu to 8.10 and now it's all messed up, and looks so un-neat that I can't bear to have it running anymore ..

about 4 years ago
mark32
mark32

Nice add-on! I’m with those who are requesting this have an option in the settings to have it oriented for the bottom pane instead of the right pane. I prefer the this add-on’s simple look to mash tape, but there are too many other extensions that use the right pane exclusively right now. Thanks for developing this!

about 4 years ago
wasframed
wasframed

I've got the same issue as atreiu above. Used to work fine and loved it! Now, it's unusable :(

about 4 years ago
Speed
Speed

Pretty impressive. I like it. : )

about 4 years ago
Fexnwu
Fexnwu

Very good feature! Used it for ten minutes and already found two new interesting bands!
Great!
But (there's always a 'but' isn't there?) I noticed that whenever I use an artists-tag that has Kanjis in it I get no recommendations at all.
Although last.fm has no problems with a search for ... say: 天野月子
Now is it a bug, or me being stupid?

I'm using Ubuntu 9.04

about 4 years ago
Orfeo
Orfeo

Don't Work for me, i need make something more?.

Win Xp
Versión: Songbird 1.1.2, Build 1042

almost 4 years ago
Orfeo
Orfeo

I'm sorry the program its ok, just could not find where the option to view the recommendations... :P

almost 4 years ago
Anirudh
Anirudh

Kool..

I have just downoaded songbird on my mac.. and i had been serching something like this add-onn.. The itunes genius Sucks...
Thanks

P.S I also have the issue regarding if there is no recommendations then it shud just play the next song so some customizable action or something like that.

almost 4 years ago
Maineman
Maineman

Is there an ETA for a version that works with Songbird 1.2? Just upgraded and sadly my favorite add-on does not work. I hate to uninstall and go back to the prior version if it's coming soon.

almost 4 years ago
dc0c25
dc0c25

there is a way to get the add-on to work with the betas :)

(1) download "music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi"

(2) open it with your zip/rar unpacker

(3) unpack "install.rdf"

(4) search for the line

<em:maxversion>1.2.0a</em:maxversion>

and replace it with

<em:maxversion>1.3.0</em:maxversion>

(5) save your edited "install.rdf" and replace it with the original one located in "open music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi".

(6) install the add-on in songbird

almost 4 years ago
Fexnwu
Fexnwu

@ dc0c25
Thank you very much.
Just installed Songbird 1.2 (not beta) and your tip worked out great!

almost 4 years ago
HaveNoFear
HaveNoFear

@ dc0c25

I did exactly what you said and I still get the message "Music Recommendations 1.0.0 could not be installed because it is not compatible with Songbird 1.2.0".
Any ideas why? :(

almost 4 years ago
SnailCZ
SnailCZ

Download compatible version with Songbird 1.2.0:

http://files.getdropbox.com/u/605980/music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi

The way to get the add-on work from dc0c25 is good but linux is case sensitive... maxversion is wrong, maxVersion is good ;-)

almost 4 years ago
cameraman
cameraman

That new Music Recommendations only goes on the bottom pane, whereas the old one went on the right pane, now I can't use mashtape :(

almost 4 years ago
SnailCZ
SnailCZ

@cameraman I Will send you updated add-on that goes on the right pane.

almost 4 years ago
flaco
flaco

@cameraman Here is a version compatible with Songbird 1.2.0 and that can go in the right panel : http://files.getdropbox.com/u/158415/music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi

almost 4 years ago
vladak
vladak

Anyone knows what happened to this add-on ? It used to be my favorite but is not supported in 1.2 and has missing been for a long time. I don't want to the hack above or download the add-on from untrusted source. Is the author still working on it ?

over 3 years ago
flaco
flaco

I have updated the extension so it works with the newly released Songbird 1.4b3.
Here is the link:
http://files.getdropbox.com/u/158415/music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi

@vladak: Just download it, really, it's safe. I have just edited the install.rdf file:

<em:maxversion>1.4.*</em:maxversion>
<songbird:suggestedcontentgroups>contentpane;sidebar</songbird:suggestedcontentgroups>

over 3 years ago
andreas.f
andreas.f

@sjuganga, @atreiu, @wasframed: These layout problems were probably due to a conflict with my add-on Spotbird Artist Browser. This is fixed in the latest version, so now you can use both add-ons. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.

over 3 years ago
isabelleok
isabelleok

how come I cant download it. The "Install" button is in gray....help

over 3 years ago
Luffier
Luffier

As "dc0c25" says (for install):

(1) download "music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi"

(2) open it with your zip/rar unpacker

(3) unpack "install.rdf"

(4) search for the line

<em:maxversion>1.2.0a</em:maxversion>

and replace it with

<em:maxversion>1.4.0</em:maxversion>

(5) save your edited "install.rdf" and replace it with the original one located in "open music-recommendations-1.0.0.xpi".

(6) install the add-on in songbird

And I add this (to view the info in your language):

1) Go to the following line:

var requestUri = "http://ws.audioscrobbler.com/2.0/artist/info.xml?artist=" + escape(artistName);

2) Delete the ";" and add this :

 + "&lang=XX";

Where XX is your lenguage (e.g. ES)

3) It would like it (for Spanish):

var requestUri = "http://ws.audioscrobbler.com/2.0/artist/info.xml?artist=" + escape(artistName) + "&lang=es";

Bye.

over 3 years ago
andreas.f
andreas.f

While you are at it, I would also change "escape" in the code to "encodeURIComponent". This way artist names with special characters in them like é and ä work too, which they do not with "escape".

over 3 years ago
steffyhome
steffyhome

Hei,
Can someone help me with the source code of this add-on? I am suppose to build a similar thing for a school project and it will be really helpful. I tried the link on google code but there was no file.
Thanks,Bye.

over 3 years ago
JohnM
JohnM

steffyhome, the addon is the source, rename the xpi to a zip and unzip it.

over 3 years ago
necimal
necimal

Ok uploaded a new version with support for the latest version of Songbird. Also use encodeURIComponent(), cheers for the suggestion andreas.f.

almost 3 years ago
three.14
three.14

Maybe it's just the music that I'm listening to, but it seems that mainly it offers suggestions that are associated acts, bands that the members have been a part of or side-projects.

Is anybody else seeing that?

almost 3 years ago
benjibenji
benjibenji

@three.14 : that's a limitation of last.fm. Let's say you listen to Artist A, so last.fm sees what other people listen to Artist A and looks at what other artists are being played by these fans. Lets say fans of A generally also listen to Band B so last.fm recommends Artist B to fans of Artist A even if they don't sound anything alike. Side projects are often recommended because that's what alot of fans of A will also listen to. Clear as mud?

over 2 years ago



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Average Rating:
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Comments: 168

Last Updated: almost 3 years ago
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