shuffle playback

[slazman999]

Is there a way to make the shuffle playback more random? I have noticed it plays the same artist twice before it moves on. I have 1075 songs with a variation of about 70 different artists.

[Nunzio390]

CTRL+P for Winamp Preferences > General Preferences > Playlist
Move the slider under "Shuffle Morph Rate" all the way to the right.

But for TRUE random play (where absolutely nothing will be repeated), use the Random playback feature instead of Shuffle...

Playlist > MISC button > Sort > Randomize List

In addition to the above, read this post by JonnyMac.

[duntkno]

slaz is right, terrible shuffle, maybe in the upcoming release they changed the way, songs get shuffled?

[Nunzio390]

Originally posted by duntkno
slaz is right, terrible shuffle, maybe in the upcoming release they changed the way, songs get shuffled?

I think not. It'll probably stay this way, as it's always been.

Shuffling is doing its job.
Randomizing is doing its job.

With shuffling, there is always a chance of repeat play.
With randomizing, there is never a chance of repeat play.

Just choose one or the other, depending on what your preferences are.

[duntkno]

oooo i didnt know that, i thought with shuffling each track had to play once in the playlist, and then it would end.

its just disappointing when i have more then 500 artists, and among the first 10 songs played, 3 of those are from one of those artists.

[JonnyMac]

Try DrO's Playlist File Remover plug-in. It can remove an item/file from a playlist after played, thus removing the chance the file will by played again. (Playlist File Remover Discussion Thread)

[chephy]

Originally posted by Nunzio390

Shuffling is doing its job.
Randomizing is doing its job.

With shuffling, there is always a chance of repeat play.
With randomizing, there is never a chance of repeat play. [/B]

No, Winamp shuffling is NOT doing its job properly. Yes, with shuffling there is a chance of a repeat play. However, a good shuffler will pick tracks truly randomly. Winamp's shuffle doesn't. When I load 9,000 songs into Winamp, and within the first 100 I get a song that gets played 3 times... that's not random. Winamp's shuffle feature tends to heavily overplay some portions of the playlist, and completely ignore others. It badly needs to be fixed.

[Nunzio390]

OK. Let's look at what shuffling really is in the true sense. A perfect "example" would be shuffling a deck of cards. It's entirely the "luck of the draw". There's always a chance that each time you shuffle, the same card/cards may/may not come up again. And Winamp's shuffle does the same thing. You never know what will come up again. So, just like you said -- "get a song that gets played 3 times" -- you can get the same card in the deck that appears 3 times (or more - or less). So there is no such thing as a "a good shuffler" when you truly shuffle (as a shuffler of a deck of cards does). Again, it's the "luck of the draw". Hence, the same with Winamp's "shuffler".

Now, let's talk about "randomizing" with Winamp and compare it with a deck of cards...

Take that same deck of cards, and pick out one at a time, and then toss it/them aside. That/those card(s) can never be found again in the deck (until you gather up all the discarded cards and start all over again).

So, once again, if you are not happy with shuffling, then randomize instead! ...

Playlist > MISC button > Sort > Randomize List

And if you are still confusing shuffling with randomizing, then if it makes you feel better, consider the randomize feature in Winamp your shuffle feature. Your problem/issue is solved/moot!

[Nunzio390]

And, if you still want to use shuffle in Winamp with no chance of a song repeating, do as JonnyMac indicated in his post above...

Use DrO's Playlist File Remover

You can use it while shuffle is enabled. A song/media file entry in your playlist will never be repeated (as in randomizing), because it will be immediately removed from the playlist.

[JonnyMac]

Something else worth mentioning is DrO's Time Restore & Autoplay plug-in. Which has a "Randomise Winamp's playlist on load" option. That option will randomize the default/current playlist each time Winamp is started.

[Nunzio390]

Originally posted by JonnyMac
Something else worth mentioning is DrO's Time Restore & Autoplay plug-in.

Another very good option, JM!

DrO...
Ahhh, what can I say about Darren and his plugins, other than perhaps this? ...

Keep those amazing plugins coming, O Magical Genie of Winamp plugins / enhancement!!

Forums member: "Hello. Can somebody make this or do that for Winamp?"
DrO: "Hmmm. I don't see why not."

DrO: "Your wish has been granted!"

[chephy]

Originally posted by Nunzio390
[B]OK. Let's look at what shuffling really is in the true sense. A perfect "example" would be shuffling a deck of cards. It's entirely the "luck of the draw". There's always a chance that each time you shuffle, the same card/cards may/may not come up again. And Winamp's shuffle does the same thing. You never know what will come up again.

Look, I get everything you're saying. The issue is not that songs repeat sometimes. I know they are supposed to occasionally repeat with a shuffle. The trouble is that the songs are NOT picked randomly. They are not luck of the draw, so to speak. To use the card analogy, suppose that each time you shuffle a red card ends up being on top. It's okay once, it's okay twice, it's okay three times, and even five times, and even ten (though the odds of with truly random shufflings are getting really small). However, if you shuffled the deck a thousand times and every time a red card was on top, and never a black one, then you are not shuffling properly.

That's how Winamp is. It's not shuffling properly. Suppose I have 50 songs. A proper shuffle might do something like this:

song 25
song 39
song 4
song 3
song 14
song 25
song 17
song 17
song 42

However, Winamp does something more like this:

song 11
song 15
song 15
song 15
song 11
song 2
song 15
song 3
song 11
song 15

I've exaggerated it here, but only to make a point. Some folders are very heavily overrepresented, and some are almost never heard. I have enough experience with Winamp shuffle to make statistically significant observations here.

[Nunzio390]

OK. I just read your reply and I get everything you're saying too.

Well, here's a solution, and everybody should be happy (I think)...

DrO's Time Restore & Autoplay (as was also mentioned in earlier posts above).

You can leave Shuffle "off" in Winamp and in DrO's plugin configuration, checkmark "Randomise Winamp's playlist on load". If you want to start Winamp with a random song, then also checkmark "Select a random file to play on startup" for good measure.

When Winamp starts with whatever playlist you choose, you have a perfect combination of shuffling and randomizing!
___________________________________________

Or... if you don't mind files being "removed" from your playlist as they play (as you keep Winamp running and switch between playlists), then, as JM suggested above, use DrO's Playlist File Remover.

Either way (or with a combination of both), problem solved! Everybody's happy! Happy Winamping!

[Marco=W=]

Mmh, looks like I'm reviving a dead thread, however...
I usually load the entire ML (only 1,000+ songs).

I know that shuffle+repeat leads to a certain amount of repetition of songs, I'm aware of this and don't care.

The real problem is when repetition is off.
Songs of course are not repeated but is incredible how are the same tracks played. It seems that Winamp knows my tastes and proposes me for first always the same songs, the same albums, the same artists.
Of course play count logging is disabled, and now I can't understand what's the cause.

How can the shuffling algorithm be flawed this way?

Any suggestion?

M

[Nunzio390]

Although I mentioned this in my first reply in this thread (many many months ago), have you tried increasing the shuffle morph rate?

Screenshot...

[Nunzio390]

And there's also this approach...

Originally posted by DrO
or you can click in the playlist, select all items (ctrl+a) and then shift+r and then playback the playlist as wanted (assumes you've got gen_jumpex/jtfe installed). is how i do random without messing with the playlist order

[! AA !]

Originally posted by Nunzio390
CTRL+P for Winamp Preferences > General Preferences > Playlist
Move the slider under "Shuffle Morph Rate" all the way to the right.

But for TRUE random play (where absolutely nothing will be repeated), use the Random playback feature instead of Shuffle...

Playlist > MISC button > Sort > Randomize List

In addition to the above, read this post by JonnyMac.

Thanks for your post

[skevar7]

Completely agreed. Shuffle in winamp is broken very badly. I have 10000 songs in my playlist, and shuffle repeats some of them over and over, while other songs are never played (and I have shuffle morph rate at max level!)

It's unbelievable random numbers can repeat so frequently.
Maybe, winamp doesn't initialize random seed number properly?

[Sawg]

No it isn't Something random has no history. In a truly random series the last choice has the exact same chance as coming up as any other choice.

If that is unsatisfactory for you, try some of the other suggestions above like randomizing the playlist and letting it play straight though, or using the plugin to remove played tracks.

[skevar7]

Originally posted by Sawg
If that is unsatisfactory for you, try some of the other suggestions above like randomizing the playlist and letting it play straight though, or using the plugin to remove played tracks.

You contradict yourself Randomizing playlist is completely equal to using shuffle - if we assume that shuffle really uses random numbers and does it correctly.
And I don't want to tamper with my playlist. What's really necessary is to fix this feature at last - as was requested numerous times.

[osmosis]

Okay, let me explain this for everyone: Winamp doesn't generate a randomized series (ie. doesn't take all the numbers in a range and randomize them) it just takes a range of numbers (# of playlist items) and then picks a completely random number from it.

Perhaps Winamp *should* switch to generating a randomized series from your playlist to avoid repetitions as I believe that's what other media players - and I think even my old Sony discman(!) and other cd players - do so I assume that's what people are expecting.

Randomized series -> run through the series -> regenerate would be the process. Someone ambitious might be able to write a plugin that hijacks the shuffle function and does it this way, or maybe the devs could code this as an optional 2nd method of the shuffle function operating..

Just my 2c.

[skevar7]

Originally posted by osmosis
it just takes a range of numbers (# of playlist items) and then picks a completely random number from it.

It's unlikely. "Shuffle morph rate" parameter doesn't have any sense in this algorithm.

I can try to write smarter shuffle plugin, but I'm not familiar to Winamp API. Could anyone suggest start direction - what's needed to intercept next song selection?

[lowezno]

Hi,

Came across this thread with similar problems whithin the suffle option. I would like to leave my experience and suggestions here:

* In my case (v5.56) shuffling around a +300 sing list does not really repeat songs, or at least I'm not aware of it.

* But the "Shuffle morph rate" parameter does not work for me, because it jumps across songs from the beginning to the end when I select the left-most "slow" mode.

* When I'm building a playlist, I start playing the first songs also in shuffle mode (I always use this mode) but as I add more songs these won't be played because they were not there when I initially pressed play. It would be nice if the algoritm could read the (new growing) list each time is about to change the song.

* I think the random function (the one you're recomending here) may be only useful If you want (for any reason) to shuffle your songs and save that order to file.I do want shuffle play but do not want to change/save the original order if I add songs to the list. I think I used it no more than 3 times since winamp first saw the light many years ago (yeah, I'm that old )

* I also payed close attetion about people complained here and the patient and polite answers they got from you, even if they were repeated many times which leads to something obvious for me here:

Read this again and you'll realize that people are really asking for something!! Don't get mazed with differences between random and shuffle, or encourage on the use of third party plugins (which could be great but are not built within winamp and so discouraging fast deploys on new systems). Take all this as a suggestion (which indeed it is) and change the way this function works:

"When I used shuffle function I would like ...
... that all the songs on my list get played only once until I specify to repeat it/them
... that I can add songs live (while it plays) and they get into the shuffled play
... that I do not want to manually random my list because songs are mood-type ordered, just in case I do not want to shuffle them (yeah, my particular case)
... that I do not want to manually random my list because everytime I add a song into a specific part of my list (see above) I do save the list
... that if I select to slow morph suffle rate, then songs do not jump from beggining to end of the list and so forth"


In just few words: please take this as a suggestion; people think shuffle as it was on their (mine) old discmans but in a much more smart fashion.

Regards,

©bROTHER

[dusty-2011]

Alright, first of all, sorry for bumping an old thread. But I have a different solution for this problem then what has been suggested before; so in this case I think it's ok to bump the thread.

In order to make Winamp's shuffle more random, LOWER the shuffle morph rate (Preferences -> Playlist -> slider for shuffle morph rate, move it to the left). I have a playlist of about 400 songs, and with the shuffle morph rate to the far right Winamp would simply repeat the same 20 songs over and over again (and once in a while a different song, like once every 10 songs). I have now lowered the shuffle morph rate to about 1/3 of the slider, which leads to a much greater variety of songs being played. The shuffle is not truly random, since about 50 of my favorite songs are played slightly more often than the others, but it is much closer to a true random shuffle than before.

So I suggest you play around with the shuffle morph rate and settle on a rate which feels right. If you want a truly random shuffle than you should randomize the list, but if you can settle for a slightly biased shuffle than a low shuffle morph rate is likely to do the trick.

[lowezno]

"Different solution"? I see nothing different that has not been discussed above, specially the last post which is my own and clearly you did not read.

Really don't know if this has evolved in these two years. My list has grown much bigger and it's harder to become aware of these old limitations. But in the meantime winamp failed in some other scenarios, like emulating the itunes Genius option, which is the cause some of we are moving after so namy years to the Apple player. Nothings lasts forever, specially if you rest on your own laurels.

Regards.

[MrSinatra]

if shuffle/random took playcount into account, then i think that would be a huge improvment. also, if you could schedule a clock, such that you could arrange when a track would play from a smartview, you could get some variety that way as well. finally, an "artist spread" feature would also be good.

[dusty-2011]

@ Lowezno: I did read your post. I've read every post in this thread and also in several other threads about the shuffle algorithm. In your post you just mentioned that the Slow Shuffle Morph rate does not work for you. It does work for me, in the sense that on average Winamp selects songs which are closer in the list. Of course Winamp still switches from the top of the list to the bottom sometimes, which in my opinion is desired behaviour, because otherwise the shuffling algorithm would become too biased towards songs close in the list. With the current behaviour of a slow shuffle morph rate, the shuffling algorithm is slightly biased towards songs close in the list. And as a side-effect, this leads to a greater variety of songs being played.
With a high shuffle morph rate, Winamp will always scan the entire list for selecting a song, and then in about 80-90% of the time Winamp selects one of your favourite songs. Which leads to your less favourite songs being played never or almost never. When you introduce an additional bias to the shuffle algorithm, in the form of a slow shuffle morph rate, this leads to a greater variety of songs being played. In essence, you force Winamp to on average selects songs which are closer in the list, and now Winamp will also play your less favourite songs more often.

With the shuffle morph rate to the far left, Winamp selects songs close by in the list about 70-80% of the times. So the morph rate option works.

I can also comment on another feature which you requested:
that all the songs on my list get played only once until I specify to repeat it/themThis feature is already present in Winamp. Right next to the button you press for toggling whether to shuffle or not is a button you press for toggling whether to repeat songs or not. Press this 'song repeating' button and songs will never be repeated, until the playlist has been fully played. You have to use the song repeating button in conjunction with the shuffle button.
The song repeating button however does not solve the problem of the favourite songs being selected first all the time, as mentioned previously in this thread. That's where my new solution comes in. Lower the shuffle morph rate, and you will hear the songs in a different order then you're used to, instead of your favourite songs always being played first. This solution is new because previously everyone adviced to increase the shuffle morph rate, which clearly leads to undesired behaviour of Winamp, in the sense that your favourite songs are always played first. Therefore I propose to lower the shuffle morph rate.

[dusty-2011]

Originally Posted by dusty-2011

I can also comment on another feature which you requested:
that all the songs on my list get played only once until I specify to repeat it/themThis feature is already present in Winamp. Right next to the button you press for toggling whether to shuffle or not is a button you press for toggling whether to repeat songs or not. Press this 'song repeating' button and songs will never be repeated, until the playlist has been fully played. You have to use the song repeating button in conjunction with the shuffle button.

Please ignore this part of my message. What is written is not true. I based it on some quick testing, but on subsequent testing it proved wrong.
So, Lowezno, you are right, there is no option for specifying that songs do not get repeated until the playlist has been fully played. It would be great if this option was added to Winamp.

[zackbuffo]

I have no clue what the actual shuffle behavior should be used for? I can't imagine a scenario, in which it's intended to listen to just "some" songs repeated over and over again out of a large playlist. So it's not a question of definition what exactly shuffle or random behavior is, it's just a question of usage. I'm really curious about any explanation, why it could be usefull (...not just, it's the mode I get, so I use it).

Maybe one of the devs can explain what's the idea behind the actual shuffle mode?

Personaly I want to hear all songs I put in the playlist with an equal amount of plays. I like all the songs I put in a playlist...

[DrO]

Press this 'song repeating' button and songs will never be repeated, until the playlist has been fully played. You have to use the song repeating button in conjunction with the shuffle button.

that is how repeat works when shuffle is on as long as there are no subsequent changes made to the playlist (i.e. overriding what is playing or moving items) then it should follow that (and has over the number of tests i've done on it over the years).

shuffle is just randomising the list and then playing from that, so the morph rate is meant to control how much of a variance there is between the actual playlist order and what gets produced. then playback just works through the list until it gets to the end and if repeat is on then it re-does the list and goes from there.

-daz

[bdog]

I'l re-bump this thread. I think the real issue here is indeed the difference between random and shuffle. It SHOULD be quite simple. But i think winamp has it backwards. Shuffle sould play everything in a playlist 1 time in a random order. Random should just play them indiscriminately regardless of repetition. But it seems the way to get a true shuffle of ur playlist is to randomize it then hit play. Seems bass akwards to me!

[DrO]

Winamp only does shuffle and that does work in the manner which you've just said shuffle is meant to be. that list will however change if things get added / altered in the playlist which i think is part of the key issue of when people start getting 'duplicates' as just playing through the playlist without mesing with it won't repeat files.

i think the main issue here is that people want shuffle to be random and for that random to actually be less random i.e. does more to separate out similar artists (which then isn't random but controlled).

-daz

[Reginald0]

Hi DrO!

Sorry to revive an old thread, but I came across this forum and I think your Playlist File Remover plugin is almost perfect to solve this old and annoying shuffle problem, except for one small detail:

There's an option to add removed files to the end of the current playlist if shuffle mode is off, which is great, but it would be perfect with an option to disable file removal if shuffle mode is off, since most of users just use file removal when shuffle mode is on, so with an option like this, the toggle could be automatic depending on the user preference.
I really hope you could implement this feature, first because I think you're one of the best plugin developers around, and also because this shuffle weakness annoy us winamp users for many years ago, so I think most of us consider your plugin the best workaround available.

Thanks in advance,

Reginald0