Creating a music grid in The Grid 2

The Grid 2's music player workspace lets you play CDs and music saved on your computer.  Let's see how this works.

The music player workspace

The music player is a workspace in The Grid 2.  For communication, your workspace is normally a Text Chat, Text Chat + Messages or Symbol Chat: in other words it is your sentence bar.  The Grid 2 allows you to use other workspaces such as Email, SMS and Internet.  There is also one for playing music.

Grids that play music

The best way to use the music player is on a grid that is designed for it.  Most of the users have music grids included - have a look at these to see what the music player can do.  You will also find some different music player grid designs on the grid sharing website http://grids.sensorysoftware.com.

Create a new grid

So... we're going to make a music player grid. First you need to make a new grid:

• Locate an empty cell to jump to your music player.
• Press F11 to enter Edit Mode.
• Click on the cell to select it.
• Select Jump to... from the bar on the left
• Click the New Grid button in the top corner.
• Type 'Music Player' or similar as the name of the new grid.
• Click Ok.
• Select your new grid and click Ok.
• Press F11 again to stop editing (save your changes when asked).

You now have a cell that links to a new, blank grid for a music player.  Click on the cell to open the music player grid.

Set up the workspace on your new grid 

Next we want to set up the music player grid.  Press F11 to enter Edit Mode.

The first task is to get a nice big workspace, and make sure that it is displaying the Music Player workspace.

• Resize the workspace to a large, square area (with space for some buttons nearby).

• Click on the Grid Settings link in the bar on the left.
• Select the Commands tab and click on the Grid Startup Commands button.
• Click on Add a command.
• Select the Music Player category and select the Music Player command.

The workspace will now be changed to Music Player every time you jump to this grid.  We also want to ensure that when we leave the grid after selecting some music, the workspace changes back to our preffered workspace for communication.

• Select the Jump back cell (if you don't have one then you need to create one).
• Double-click on the cell to edit it, and then click on Add a command.
• Add the Default Workspace command (it is in the Change workspace category).

Great!  Now when we jump away from the grid it will change back to our default workspace (the one that is active when the user starts).

Add some music player controls

Next we want to add some cells to the grid to control the music player.

• Select a blank cell, and double-click to edit it.
• Click on Add a command.
• Select the Music Player category.
• Choose the Play CD command for the cell.
• Make another cell with the Play command, another for Stop and one for Next.

You now have a basic CD player! Press F11 to stop editing (save your changes), and pop a music CD in the computer's CD drive.

Click on the Play CD command to get a track listing for the CD, and then you Play, Stop and Next to play the music.

Getting the track names

You may notice that the track names are "Track 1", "Track 2", etc.  In order to get the actual track names displayed you need to open Windows Media Player.  If you are connected to the Internet, Media Player will get the CD track names automatically - if not, you can enter the track names.  Once you have renamed them The Grid 2 will connect to Media Player to get the track names automatically.

Storing music on your computer

You can also store music on your computer so that you do not need a CD (and you can select from a much larger range of music).

Use Windows Media Player to Rip a music CD to your computer (see the Windows Media Player help if you are unsure how to do this).  You can then see the music in The Grid 2 if you use the List all music, List albums or List artists commands.  The Grid 2 automatically connects to Windows Media Player to access your music library.

 

Useful Links 

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/knowledgecenter/howto/mp10/default.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/knowledgecenter/howtocenter.aspx