Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

2016-05-08 22:56:12

Hello,

Waveform seekbar works well normally, but in this one case of a file that is a full album track, 39:52 minutes in length, and with a high bit rate of 176.4 khz it fails to draw the wave.  It would be nice to be able to find the individual tracks visually.  Any reason why waveform drawing may fail?

Thanks in advance!

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #1 – 2016-05-09 07:17:08

Note that rendering the waveform takes some time and on slower machine it could be a while. I suggest enabling the incremental update in advanced preferences so you can see while it works.

I just created a 42 minutes long stereo FLAC file at 176.4 kHz and the waveform display worked fine. I use incremental update so I saw it being rendered in realtime.

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #2 – 2016-05-09 09:29:15

Thanks for the reply.  I changed the advanced preference, and I saw it draw the waveform in a little over 30 seconds.  But when I paused the playback it disappeared, and did not show up again after I resumed.  I stopped and started the track, and it started drawing the waveform again.  I switched over to another desktop to use the browser, and left foobar playing.  When I switched back to the foobar desktop, no waveform!

If I remember right it used to save the waveforms in a database, but now it seems to draw a new one every time I play a track.  Is there a way to check if the db is working?

(The preferences dialog box is of a fixed size, so the text of some preferences gets cut off at the right edge of the window.  Just a side note.)

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #3 – 2016-05-09 10:30:33

Could you please test if this happens in a clean portable installation of foobar2000 without any other non-standard component except foo_wave_seekbar?

You can see if there's entries in the database by opening it with SQLite Studio or similiar tools.

(The preferences dialog box should be properly sized unless you've messed with the system fonts. )

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #4 – 2016-05-09 11:13:04

Thanks again.  That seems like a bit too much work for me at present.  It is easier for me to live with the problem.  This installation of Foobar is inside the WINE environment of Linux Ubuntu 16.04 with MATE 3D desktop.  I have another installation on Windows 7 64bit but it is used much less often, and does not have the WS add on.

WS works well enough most of the time, even with longer files.  I tested it with a long symphony movement in 192 khz and it kept the waveform in memory after I paused the playback.  The db also seems to be working, as I tested some recently played files and the waveforms loaded instantly.  This problem seems related only to this one particular file, which is 1.5 Gb in size.  Is there a file size limit in the db perhaps that is preventing the waveform save?

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #5 – 2016-05-09 11:34:24

I played it again, and again it completed the scan and then disappeared.  I am pretty sure the problem is a failure to save in database.

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #6 – 2016-05-09 12:39:12

The analysis pass decodes the file into a fixed number of evenly sized chunks and computes one statistic per chunk in a streaming manner. The values from each chunk are stored compressed into the database. No matter the duration/samplerate of the source song, there's always around 16 KiB of data in the database.

What you're experiencing is either a failure of the database layer on your non-native OS, or a failure in the threading system I use, or a failure in the decoder used.

It would probably have helped against a few false starts if you'd mentioned Wine in the beginning. It mostly only accidentally works there.

Re: Waveform seekbar not scanning long FLAC file

Reply #7 – 2016-05-09 15:02:32

Sorry, yes, the Linux-Wine should have been mentioned.  It works so well that I forget it is running in non native environment honestly!  It sounds better than the Linux native media players.  The CPU load is a bit higher, and there are some minor annoyances.  Like drag and drop from search filter to playlist usually fails, and makes the app get jittery, CPU intensive.  Everything else works pretty much like the Windows native version. 

Thanks for your time!  WS is working fine mostly.  I can live without a waveform for this one particular album.  Luckily it is an album I listen to all the way most of the time, so fast seeking of tracks is not a critical function.