user guide

cmartincmartin Member
in Astiga app

Is there any general user guide/wiki for the Android app, or the web app? I have a number of questions which I can pose individually but if there is any kind of general guide I am happy to consult that first.

Thanks

Comments

  • CernunnosCernunnos Member

    The Android Astiga app is a fork of DSub for Subsonic. So any manual on internet of Dsub can work for Astiga app. It works like any other subsonic player.


    I think there´s no manual here to the app. The player is quite simple, What questions do you have? Maybe the community may help...

  • cmartincmartin Member

    These questions are relevant to the Android app:

    1. How does the Cache work? If I set the size to say 2000MB, does this mean I can have a 2gb cache of music stored locally that I can play without a network connection?
    2. What gets saved in the Cache? Does (perhaps) my most recently played music go into the Cache, or is there an explicit way to put specific tracks/albums into the Cache? Once the Cache is filled, can I still add new material (perhaps it will delete the oldest and replace it with the newest?), or do I need to 'Clear Cache' and then refill it?
    3. Below the Cache settings on the interface, there are 2 settings called "Songs to preload", one for WiFi, one for Mobile. How do these settings work, and what is the relationship of these settings to the Cache (if any)?

    From these questions, you would be correct in surmising that I plan to use Asitga player while travelling and would like to have a few hours or so of pre-selected music in a Cache that I can then play without a network or Mobile connection. Any suggestions about how to set this up will be appreciated.

  • CernunnosCernunnos Member
    1. Yes. That´s it. Also Astiga always cache the file to play it.
    2. Once your limit is reached, the oldest files gets cleared to download new ones. You can cache manually a file, album, etc... And even mark as permanent cache, this means it´s not deleted by the app.
    3. Songs to preload. To avoid buffer wait. While the first file is played, the rest are cached. Very usefull specially on low speed networks. My settings are, 3 files on WIFI. 10 files on mobile connection. Time enough to keep playing on the car if I get no signal.

    I use Astiga on my Android Auto. Using on the city I have no problems at all. I cache some long playlists when using for a long trip.

  • cmartincmartin Member

    Thanks for this useful info, and also in thread "Show download in menus?'. I understand it now, and have been experimenting. I seems there really is only one cache, the size of which I can specify in settings. If I never ask Asitga to save anything to permanent cache, then the temp (non-permanent) cache will slowly fill with everything I play (by default) until nearly full, then tracks will be replaced under a FIFO schema (first in, first out) as needed to store new items. If I then decide to add permanent items, and the cache (filled with only temporary items) does not have enough space, the app will 'bump' items not-flagged as permanent as needed to execute my request.

    To test, I added 3 albums to permanent cache (first items ever added to perm. cache), then went Offline. I noticed there were some albums showing which I had NOT explicitly added to perm. cache, however I recognized these as recently played albums (e.g., last week). I then noticed purple 'pins' on the album screen, but when I click on the album to look at the tracks, there were green pins (instead of purple) on some albums (the ones I saved as permanent) whereas the tracks in on temp-cached albums were purple.

    Am I interpreting these pins correctly (green vs purple)? If so, it would be a nice feature to make the album-level pins green (as well as the track-level pins) for permanently cached albums (where entire album is perm. cached) to avoid having to look in each album when planning an extended off-network trip.

  • CernunnosCernunnos Member

    Purple pin means file cached. Green pin means permanent cache.

    You can permanent cache just a file or an entire album or playlist.

    As any other app, you can let the cache grow as much as it can... Or you can control it. My cache size is set to 10gb (10240 mb) on internal storage. I have free space enough, but any way, once or twice a month I go offline and clean some albums I don't need cached.

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