This document describes how to use tRio via via the Front Panel and Remote Control. Click here for instructions on how to use the applet web front-end and here for the thin front-end.

Getting Started


Powering On and Off

To power up the unit, connect the mains supply and then press the POWER key on the front panel - as one would expect. The unit will then find and connect to the tRio server running on your Host PC.

The power button behaves slightly differently depending on whether you have successfully connected to the tRio server or not.

While Connecting:

Once Connected:

Applications

tRio currently has two applications:

  1. The music player
  2. A simple clock

You can switch between these at any time using special [player] and [clock] selections at the end of the menus.

The Player is the “default application” which is shown when you first connect and when you leave Standby Mode.

The Clock is the “standby application” and is shown when you press the Power button (briefly) to enter Standy Mode.

tRio has been designed to make it fairly easy to “plug in” other applications (obviously they’d 1st have to be written!). And so if anyone has bright ideas then let us all know.

Menus

Each “application” has a main menu that can be accessed by pressing the MENU button:

Settings

You can use the special Settings item at the bottom of all menus to alter the Receivers Volume, Balance, Contrast, Brightness and Line Volume settings.

The Line Volume setting is new in version 0.1.3 and allows you set the line out level to either fixed or variable. Warning: first turn the volume on your amplifier down before changing this setting from variable to fixed.

Warning: There is a danger that your Receiver's display might "fade" over time if you set the brightness too high. Do so at your own risk.


Playing Music


The Playback Panel

This panel lets you know what’s happening during music playback. It shows the current tune being played, the playback time, tune information, playback mode, repeat and random settings.

From this screen you can:

  • Use the PLAY, STOP and SKIP keys to control playback.
  • Press and hold down the STOP key to clear the Play Queue.
  • Press the STOP key when playback is already stopped to clear the Play Queue
  • Press the ENTER key to show the default dialog for your current Playback Mode (see below).
  • Press the MENU key to add more tunes to the Play Queue.
  • Press the REPEAT key to change the Repeat Mode (see below).
  • Turn the WHEEL to adjust the volume.
   
   

Playback Modes

As of version 0.1.3, tRio supports different playback modes which allow you to access your music collection in different ways. The following modes are available:

Queue 'n Play mode Allows you create a play queue of tunes that are then played with repeat and random options.
Jukebox mode (JReceiver only)

Allows you to browse your music collection as an expandable & collapseable tree (either by artist or by genre) and start playback at any position with flexible repeat and random options.

Radio mode Allows you to listen to SHOUTcast internet radio broadcasts
Listen mode Allows for synchronised playback between multiple players

Mode Selection

The current playback mode is shown at the bottom left of the screen. To change it, press the MENU button from the Playback Panel and choose the "mode" entry.

Only modes that are available are shown in the Mode Selection list:

  • Jukebox mode will not appear unless you using JReceiver.
  • Listen mode only appears if you have more than one Receiver.

Queue 'n Play mode

Queue 'n Play mode allows you to build a Play Queue of the tunes you'd like to play by Artist, Album, Genre or Playlist. This list can then be played with various Repeat and Random settings. Once queued, you can remove, re-order or jump directly to a particular tune using the Play Queue Dialog.

The Play Queue Dialog

Play Queue Dialog is shown when you press ENTER from the Playback Panel. It lists the tunes that are queued to be played in the playback order. The tune currently being played is indicated by a to the left of its title. Otherwise the position of the tune in the queue (1, 2, 3 etc.) is shown.

From this screen you can:

  • Press STOP to remove the highlighted entry from the Queue
  • Press the SKIP buttons to move the highlighted entry up or down in the Queue
  • Press PLAY to start playing the highlighted entry
  • Press ENTER on the special [remove all] entry to clear the Queue

Queueing Tunes

Note: The following text describes how to queue tunes By Artist. The procedure for doing this By Album, Genre and Playlist follows the same principles.

Select the By Artist entry from the Player Menu to bring up the Select By Artist screen. This lists all the Artists on your system in alphabetical order.

From here you can:

  • Press PLAY to add all the tunes for the highlighted Artist to the Play Queue in track number within album name order.
  • Press PLAY on the same Artist again (within 2 seconds) to start playback
  • Press STOP to remove all the tunes for the highlighted Artist from the Play Queue.
  • Press Enter to bring up the Tunes By Artist screen.
  • Use the NUMBER keys on the remote control to jump to the first artist beginning with each letter in turn.
  • Press FORWARDS and BACKWARDS on the remote to change the character number that the NUMBER keys apply to.
  • Press FORWARDS and BACKWARDS on the front-panel to skip to the next or previous letter of the alphabet

The Tunes By Artist screen lists all the albums (JReceiver only) and tunes for the selected artist. Tunes that are already in the Play Queue are indicated with a symbol. Albums are enclosed in [square brackets].

From here you can:

  • Press ENTER or PLAY on a tune entry to add it to Play Queue.
  • Press PLAY on the same tune again (within 2 seconds) to start playback
  • Press STOP on a tune entry to remove it from the Play Queue.
  • Press ENTER or PLAY on the special [select all tunes] entry to add them all to Play Queue in track number within album name order.
  • Press ENTER or PLAY on the [select all tunes] entry again (within 2 seconds) to start playback
  • Press STOP on the special [select all tunes] entry remove them all from the Play Queue.
  • Press ENTER or PLAY on an [album] entry to add all the tunes in that album to Play Queue in track number order.
  • Press ENTER or PLAY on the same [artist] entry again (within 2 seconds) to start playback
  • Press STOP on an [album] entry to remove all the tunes in that album from the Play Queue.

Tips:

  • Pressing and holding the STOP key clears the entire Play Queue
  • Pressing and holding the PLAY key queues the current selection, takes you back to the Playback Panel and starts playback.
  • Pressing and holding the MENU key on the front panel or pressing the CANCEL key on the remote takes you back to the Playback Panel.

Repeat and Random settings

You can set the Player into repeat mode by pressing the REPEAT key from the Playback Panel:

Two different RANDOM modes can be selected by pressing the RANDOM key:

Jukebox Mode

Jukebox mode allows you position yourself in your music collection (either By Artist or By Genre) and starts playing from there onwards. Repeat and Random settings can be used to repeat within the current tune, album, artist, genre or the entire collection.

You can choose to browse your collection either By Artist (artist->album->tune) or By Genre (genre->album->tune) from the Player Menu. This shows your collection as an expandable and collapsable tree allowing for easy navigation.

Note: this mode only works if your are using JReceiver as your music server. This is because it relies on JReceiver's XML-RPC interface.

Changing the playback position

  • Press ENTER from the Playback Panel or choose the By Artist or By Genre entries from the Player menu to view the Jukebox List.
  • Press ENTER or FWD to expand the selected item
  • Press ENTER again or BKWD to collapse the selected item
  • Press PLAY to start playing the first tune under the selected item

Repeat and Random settings

The REPEAT key can be used to repeat the current selection at various levels:

The RANDOM key can be pressed to randomly select the next track to be played within the current repeat mode.

Radio Mode

Radio Mode allows you to listen to pre-configured SHOUTcast internet radio broadcasts.

Adding & Updating Stations

First close down the tRio server and then open trio.xml in a text editor (notepad will do fine under Windows). Locate the <stations> section and add to or modify the entries contained within it.

Tip: To get the URL for a station, open http://www.shoutcast.com and use the addresses pointed to by the icons (they start with http://www.shoutcast.com/sbin/shoutcast-playlist.pls?rn= ...).

Choosing a Station

Either press the ENTER key from the Playback Panel or choose Select Station from the Player Menu.

Pressing PLAY or ENTER will then start listening to the selected station.

If another player is listening to the same station, the icon will be displayed while the players are synchronised.

Listen Mode

tRio allows you to synchonise playback between several Players by choosing the Listen To entry from the Player Menu. This lists any other Players that are connected and are not marked as having private access.

The Access Setting

You can control whether a player can be listened to via the "access" setting which is under the Player Settings menu.

  • "private" players cannot be listened to and do now show in the Listen To list
  • "protected" players can be listened to, but not controlled by other players and appear with a lock symbol in the Listen To list
  • "public" players can be listened to and controlled by any other player.

 

Controlling Playback

While you are listening to a protected player you can you can:

  • Press STOP to stop listening to the player.
  • Press ENTER to display the Listen To dialog.

While you are listening to a public player you can you can:

  • Press PLAY, STOP, FWD and SKIP to adjust playback.
  • Press ENTER to display the Listen To dialog.

 

Synchronisation status

It normally takes tRio about 5 seconds to synchronise with another player if it is already playing back music when you choose it from the Listen To list. During this time the icon is shown on the Playback panel.

If the synchronisation process fails, the icon is shown. Should this happen, press PLAY to try again.

Limitations

Variable bit-rate MP3: tRio finds it more difficult to establish synchronisation for this type of encoding.

HPNA or multi-homed hosts: if your host PC has more than one network card (e.g. both hpna and ethernet cards), tRio can only synchronise playback between Receivers attached to the same card. Receivers on other cards will not appear in the Listen To dialog.

 

Customising tRio


Naming your Players

tRio assigns a default name to each of your Rio Receivers when they connect for the 1st time. The first is named "Receiver 1", the second "Receiver 2" and so on.

To change these names, close down tRio and then open trio.xml in a text editor (e.g. notepad on Windows). Find the <units> entry in the "tRio settings" section and change the "name=" values.

For example, change:

<unit ip="192.168.1.6" type="receiver" name="Receiver 1" volume="6" brightness="52"/>

to:

<unit ip="192.168.1.6" type="receiver" name="My Receiver" volume="6" brightness="52"/>

Changing the Default Fonts

An effort was made in version 0.1.2 of tRio to find a default set of fonts that look good on all operating systems (Windows, Linux , Mac OS X etc.). If they're are still not to your liking, these defaults can be overridden.

To do this, first close down tRio and open trio.xml in a text editor. Find the <ui> element in the "User Interface settings" section and edit the <ui-font> entries. Each entry has a key which identifies a visual component followed by font attributes.

For example, to change the appearance of window titles (shown on most Dialogs) to a size of 10, bold and italic:

<ui-font key="Window.titleFont" font-name="lucida sans" font-size="10" font-bold="true" font-italic="true"/>

Common key values*

key Description Default
Window.titleFont Used to show Dialog & Menu titles lucinda sans, bold, 9pt
Label.font Used for non-enterable text lucinda sans, plain, 9pt
List.font Used for selection list entries lucinda sans, plain, 9pt
Slider.labelFont Used for the labels on the settings sliders (e.g. Volume) lucinda sans, plain, 8pt

*For the full list, see "src/trio/gui/TRioLookAndFeel.java".

Font Attributes

Attribute Description Allowable Values
font-name The name of the font to be used for the field A valid font name
font-size The size of the font to be used for the field As supported by the font-name
font-bold Whether the font should be bold or not true, false
font-italic Whether the font should be italic or not true, false

Customising the Playback Panel

The layout of the Playback Panel is defined in the trio.xml configuration file and it is possible to modify the default one or set up new ones of your own. In version 0.1 this process is not very slick, but here's a rough 'n ready guide for those of you who fancy a go.

But first some words of caution:

  1. The trio.xml file updated by the tRio server from time to time. And so you run the risk of having your changes overwritten if you edit this file while tRio is running. Also, the Player application does not reload the layouts after start-up, so you'll have to restart tRio anyway.
  2. You'd do well to leave the default "scrolling" layout untouched so that you can revert back to it if things go wrong.

From here on, these instructions will assume that tRio is not running, that your are editing the trio.xml file and that your have located the <layouts> element in the file.

Setting up a new layout

  1. Copy an existing layout entry from the <layout name= to the </layout> and insert this into the bottom of the <layouts> list (just before the </layouts> line).

  2. Change the name= and title= settings to unique values, e.g. name="mylayout" title="my layout"

  3. Modify the <field> entries in your layout

  4. Assign your layout to one or more Receivers by modifying the <unit> entries just below the <layouts>:

Field Types

Each <field> in a layout must have a type= setting which specifies what type of field it is. The following values are supported:

Field Type Description Attributes
label A non-scrolling text value value, row, col, width, height, font-name, font-size, font-bold, font-italic, align
banner A text value that slowly scrolls across the display value, row, col, width, height, font-name, font-size, font-bold, font-italic, align
line A horizontal line row, col, width, height
icon An icon image. The value must be present point to the name of a <icon> entry in the <icons> list. value, row, col, width, height

Attributes

Attribute Description Allowable Values
value

This specifies the text value for a label or banner, or the icon name for an icon.

Any special [substitution] values in the text will be replaced with an appropriate value (see below) when the panel is displayed.

Any text value including embedded [substitution] values.
row The row number (in pixels) where the top left of the field should be positioned 0 thru 63
col The column number (in pixels) where the top left of the field should be positioned 0 thru 127
width The width of the field in pixels 0 thru 127
height The height of the field in pixels 0 thru 63
font-name The name of the font to be used for the field A valid font name
font-size The size of the font to be used for the field As supported by the font-name
font-bold Whether the font should be bold or not true, false
font-italic Whether the font should be italic or not true, false
align The alignment of the text in the field left, right, center

Value Substitution

tRio replaces any special [substitution] values that are included in the value= setting for a field with appropriate values when the Playback Panel is shown. For example, <field type="label" value="[play-string]" .../> will be substituted as <field type="label" value="stopped" .../> if Playback is stopped when the Panel is displayed or refreshed.

Substitution Value Description Format / Values
[tune-name] The name of the tune currently being played. If a radio station is playing, this will typically contain the tune and artist name  
[source-name] For tunes this is the album name. For stations, this is the station name.  
[tune-info]

A string combining all the known attributes or the current tune excluding the tune-name and bit-rate.

album: xxxx, genre: yyyy, ...

[tune-info-short]

A string combining all the known attributes or the current tune excluding the tune-name and bit-rate.

Each attribute is separated by a slash, e.g. xxxx / yyyy / ...

xxxx / yyyy / ....

[play-string]

this field is no longer used in v0.1.3 and will not be supported

A string describing the current playback state. If the player is currently "Listening To" another player (synchronised playback) then the name of that player is returned.

In v0.1.1, the Play Queue position and length was appended to the play string. This has been replaced by the new [queue-level] field.

stopped / buffering / playing / paused / master-name

[play-icon] The name of the icon that depicts the current playback state. stopped / buffering / playing / paused / station / sync-inprogress / sync-failed
[play-time] The current playback time is playback is playing or paused. If playback is stopped then either the duration of the current tune or --:-- is returned.

00:00 or --:--

[queue-level] The current playback position and length of the Play Queue or spaces if empty nn / nn
[repeat-icon] The icon name depicting the current repeat setting repeat-off / repeat-one / repeat-all
[listening-to] The name of the player or radio station being listened to  

Sharing your results

If you're chuffed with your results, why don't you share them so that others can enjoy the benefit of your hard work. Posting on the Rio Forum is the preferred method for now.

Customising Icons

You can change the icons used by tRio by editing the <icon> entries in trio.xml. The entry for the wait-cursor icon looks like this:

<icon name="wait-cursor" url="/wait-cursor.gif"/>

To change this to a new icon which, for example is stored in "c:\Program Files\tRio-0.x.x\images\wait-cursor2.gif", modify the entry to look like this:

<icon name="wait-cursor" url="c:\Program Files\tRio-0.x.x\images\wait-cursor2.gif"/>

Special Considerations for Playback Layout icons

  1. If you change the size of existing icons, they may not display as you'd like them to if the width and height setting in the layouts that use them do not match your new sizes.
  2. If you'll be using the same Icons for all layouts, then you can simply edit the icons listed the <icons> list. This will affect all layouts using these icon names.
  3. If you want to use different icons for different layouts, then you can do adopt two different approaches: