Update 2 – Last.fm/Spotify mashup
by leon on March 2, 2009
Here is the video of the mashup in action. I’m thinking up a new idea using the Last.fm api that will hopefully work better. As this was just a proof of concept it won’t be released any time soon.
Update to Mashup
by leon on March 2, 2009
So it seems my server got overloaded due to the excessive api calls my lastest mashup was making to the last.fm server.
This did work fine when I had it running locally, I may post a video of it in action instead of the demo. In the meantime I am thinking of another tool. The other day I worked out how much my iTunes collection was worth based on 79p/track. The figure was over £18k!! Maybe a little tool to work out your last.fm value based on your plays would be fun, if I was feeling cheeky this could be linked to how popular each artist was. It may even be nice to plot these against your friends in a share index style way. Pretty much anything is possible with the api so when I have a few spare minutes I will give it a try.
Another Last.fm/Spotify mashup
by leon on March 1, 2009
A month or so ago I hacked the last.fm for wordpress plugin to allow for integration with Spotify. The basic idea was that the plugin would pull in your recently played tracks and then allow users to open those tracks directly within Spotify by clicking on a green note.
A had a spare two hours this morning so decided to see what I could make in that time.
This new mash-up is a little different. You give it your Last.fm username and it will go and find your top artists. It then uses this to find the top tags for each of those artists. It then orders the tags by the amount of times they occur across your top artists and displays the result to you in a slider window. The images are pulled from Last.fm and they are for the top artist for each tag. The image resolution is based on the quality of the image on the Last.fm servers.
I used the Last.fm PHP API available from here as the basis for the mashup. There were quite a few sample scripts and I hacked a some of these together to get the functionality required. The slider part came from here.
You can view it by heading here and putting in your username. Please be patient as it takes a while to load everything in. Update! This keeps crashing my server so I will post a video of a locally run version.
I can’t wait for Spotify to release their own API as there would be the possibility to generate Spotify playlist based on your ‘loved’ tracks on Last.fm for example.
Google Apps Status Dashboard
by leon on February 27, 2009
After changing my domain hosting to Dreamhost, I also set up Google Apps for my Mail and Calendar services. So far the service has been brilliant and I didn’t seem to notice any problems after Google’s recent outage. In response to the downtime Google has launched an App Status Dashboard so that users can see if their services are up and running correctly.
Take a look at it here.
Last.fm/Spotify WordPress Widget
by leon on January 6, 2009
I have created the WordPress widget that displays recent tracks from last.fm with the ability to open the tracks in Spotify.
Read more and check it out here - http://thisisleon.co.uk/plugins/
Hope you like it.
Any feedback add them to the comments – enjoy
Add Spotify to WordPress
by leon on January 6, 2009
I have hacked the Last.fm for WordPress plugin from here to search Spotify. At present I don’t plan to release the plugin but will do shortly after I have tidied up the code.
You can test it out by firstly downloading Spotify from here. Then simply click on the green note icon next to the track in my sidebar (under last.fm) to launch Spotify and play the track.
An image of my Last.fm side bar
There is no API for Spotify yet but a bit of digging around in the Greasemonkey script enabled me to send the track name and artist to a search within the Spotify app. Hopefully an API will be available soon which will allow me to do a lot more with the great service.
The icon is taken from the Spotify/Last.fm greasemonkey hack.
All rights are with the original developers of the code.
Spotify – an end to illegal downloads?
by leon on January 4, 2009
A new service called Spotify aims to halt the illegal downloading of music by allowing users to stream content to their PC’s and Macs. The idea is pretty simple; rather than the user paying upfront for the music it is funded by advertising, and rather than downloading a physical copy which can be shared it is streamed.
The app is slick an works similar to iTunes in that playlists can be created. These playlists can be shared with other users as can individual tracks. In essence this is nothing more than a link as the music is not on a users machine (although music is cached and a P2P solution is used to distribute popular tracks between users to reduce the strain on the Spotify servers).
After using Spotify for a few days i’m hooked. I have listened to both old and new tracks and with the last.fm style function found new artists. In fact talking of last.fm, the app even scrobbles what you listen to. There is even a greasemonkey script that searches Spotify from the last.fm site for music you may be interested in.
There are however a number of things that may hold Spotify back from being an iTunes killer. Apart from the obvious one of having an internet connection the fact is the music is limited to a Mac or PC. As I now have an Apple TV and use public transport to commute to work the amount of time that I listen to music on my Mac is reduced. Having apps for these platforms would ensure that the service was really useful. At the moment it is a nice add-on but not a complete solution. I have heard rumours that an iPhone version is on the way.
How I came to love my Apple TV
by leon on January 4, 2009
(with a little help from my iPhone)
So I finally gave in and brought an Apple TV last month and managed to get a little discount thanks to the Thanksgiving Sale. It was a long and arduous decision; I read many blogs and really did my research as i’d heard mixed reviews about the device. I must admit that the ability to install Boxee onto it did swing my decision slightly.
The ATV out of the box is a bit pants (a bit like the iPhone) but with a few simple hacks the thing can be really good – again like the iPhone. For this reason I decided to apply the aTV hack. I even forked up the 30 quid for it. The process was simple and easy and I now have a device that will play almost any media file. I can also use my favourite FTP client Transmit to get files onto the hard drive. This is great as I don’t have to rely on iTunes to get video’s and movies onto it.
The best bit is that I have hooked it up so that I don’t even need my TV on to enjoy music. To do this I ditched the HDMI option and went for component leads. As I don’t have any HD video content the difference isn’t noticeable, plus I still get 1080i resolution over component.
The advantage of using component is that I have the video going to my TV, but the audio is sent to a set of old PC speakers. This means that I use the Remote App on my iPhone to control the ATV when the TV is turned off. Apart from being a brilliant gadget I can control the music from anywhere, and save power (and the TV screen) by not having the TV on just to get the music to come through the TV speakers.
For me this is great as I can even play on the Wii and have music all at the same time.
The next step is to get a full 5.1 surround sound system and use the digital connection for the sound output, but for now a cheap pair of 2.1 PC speakers is more than good enough.
Aspect Ratio Calculator
by leon on December 19, 2008
This is my latest Flash extension panel – Ratio Calc.
We’ve all been there, creating a video player for an application and having the task of working out the aspect ratio, or perhaps resizing images or even just trying to work out the size of the stage. This tool will do it for you with a few simple clicks and it’s free.
The aspect ratio of a shape is the ratio of its longer dimension to its shorter dimension. It may be applied to two characteristic dimensions of a three-dimensional shape, such as the ratio of the longest and shortest axis, or for symmetrical objects that are described by just two measurements, such as the length and diameter of a rod.
The tool will work out dimensions for the following common aspect ratio’s:
- 4:3
- 16:9
- 1600:1200
- 1024:768
- 800:600
- 640:480
- 760:500
The tool is simple to use and has three steps:
- Select the desired ratio and then press next
- Select which dimension you want to find
- Type in the dimension you know.
The tool will then display the dimension, simple as that!
To download the tool click on the icon below
To see a demo click here
This tool is being provided for free by Leon Barrett (me). Please distribute freely but do not sell on for any sum of money!
Custom ringtones for your iPhone
by leon on December 16, 2008
Just a quick post to show you a web service that allows you to create and download ringtones for your iPhone. Simply head to http://audiko.net and follow the instructions.
Here is one I made earlier:
http://audiko.net/ringtone/Roots+Manuva/886290/Buff+Nuff+%28Prod.+By+Toddla+T%29/en.html?fresh