FrostWire “Alexandria” (5.2.x series) is now available

The FrostWire 5.2.x series focus on better media management and a more integrated user experience.

We’ve redesigned our audio player and we’ve re-written the “Library” Tab to better suit your media management needs.

New Audio Player Controls

Everything revolves around the idea of organizing content on playlists. As 5.2.x evolves, we’ll be adding integration between FrostWire for Android and the playlists on your desktops to help you synchronize data between your Android and your computer in an easy manner. The new audio player has .flac support.

The new Library

The majority of the work of this series has gone into a brand new Library tab.

The goal of the new library for our team, is to create a media manager that fixes all of the things that are wrong with what’s out there at the moment. It’ll be a long time before we achieve this goal, but we think we have a great start with this version.

Among the things you’ll be able to do already with the FrostWire Library that you cannot with one of the most popular media players:

* Import .flac files into a playlist.
* Easy playlist cleanups. Sometimes files are deleted from disk, you can clean the removed files from your playlists in just one click.
* Share audio files (on social networks) or create torrents of these files right out of the playlist.

Now you will be able to easily search through your finished downloads, filter them by file type, and create playlists (audio playlists only supported at this point).

You will also be able to “Star” your favorite audio files and they will all go to a playlist that contains all the audio files you’ve starred.

Here’s a before and after of the Library (click the image to enlarge)

Integration between transfers, Library and iTunes

If a completed transfer contains audio files, you can create or add the audio files contained in it to a playlist (new or existing).

If you prefer to use iTunes you can send the songs manually. We’ve turned off by default automatic exporting of the finished audio downloads to iTunes.

Changelog
Here’s a list of all the enhancements and fixes since FrostWire 5.1.5 in case you want to know in detail everything that got fixed.

Thanks to everybody on the Beta Tester mailing list for the precious feedback.

frostwire (5.2.10) stable; urgency=high
  * Upload ratios will not be enforced to 30% of downloads anymore.
    Users will have free will to set the upload ratio of their preference.
  * Update autodownload now supported for mac.
  * Updates can now be distributed via both BitTorrent and HTTP.
  * HttpFetcher improvements for less resource consumption.
  * HttpFetcher now supports large HTTP file downlods (progressive download).
  * Improvements to Send File to a friend.
  * Fixes bug where some finished Downloads wouldn't "Show in Library"
  * Bug report system revised.
  
 -- FrostWire Team   Mon, 22 Nov 2011 16:34:04 -0500

frostwire (5.2.9) stable; urgency=high
  * Enhancement: Lucene full text indexing for Smart Search database to
    allow for fuzzy searches.
  * Enhancement: Lucene full text indexing for Library database allows
    better search results on Radio search and playlist search.
  * Enhancement: Audio player will start playing currently selected audio
    source if it's on a stopped state.
  * Bug Fix: Finished Downloads shows only finished downloads.
  
 -- FrostWire Team   Wed, 9 Nov 2011 12:11:10 -0500

frostwire (5.2.8) stable; urgency=high
  * Smart search updates uses less DHT resources and fixes logic bugs
    that results into faster and better search results.
  * New Internet Radio functionality on the Library. Play, Add, Remove
    and bookmark your favorite Internet Radio Stations.
  * Book/Document search now crawls for .cbr, .cbz, .cb7, .cbt and .cba
    file formats.
  * New "Show in Library" action for finished transfers. It is now the
    default action when a finished transfer has been double clicked.
  * Clicking on the currently played audio control should always take
    the user to the currently played audio file.
  * Top Library tree nodes re-arranged.
  * When downloading a single partial file, the transfer manager shows
    the proper icon based on the file type of the file being downloaded.
  * Add partial downloads, and multiple transfers that contain audio files
    to playlists right from the transfer manager.
  * The library can now be configured to scan any folder the user desires.
  * Files can be added to playlists right out of search results.
  * New explore action button on the Library tab.
  * New send to friend action button on the Library tab.
  * Faster loading of Finished Downloads.
  * Library search behaves as expected for all kinds of searches.
  * A lot of bug fixes.

 -- FrostWire Team   Mon, 7 Nov 2011 17:02:29 -0500

frostwire (5.2.3) stable; urgency=high
  * Change the order of an audio file on playlist with drag and drop.
  * Change the order of multiple audio files on a playlist with drag and drop.
  * Drop audio files and folders at a specific position inside a playlist.
  * Remembers the column and order you last set on the transfer manager
    after restart.
  * Remembers the last file type you searched for after restart.
  * New FrostWire icon compatible with Ubuntu 11.10
  * Bug fix, now if you're playing a song and you resort the playlist by
    any of the columns, the next song to be played will be the one below
    the current song in the new order.
  * Searching inside "Finished Downloads" now yields folder names as search
    results.
  * Fixes lingering popup menu issue.
  * Fixed DNS query issue affecting Linux.
 
 -- FrostWire Team   Thu, 20 Oct 2011 17:42:08 -0500

frostwire (5.2.2) stable; urgency=high
  * Library tables are now cached in memory, searches are done in the cache
    speeding up the experience considerably for users with several thousand
    files.
  * Create or add audio files to a playlist right from the Transfer manager.
  * iTunes importing after audio transfers finish turned off by default.
  * Completed transfers that contain at least one audio file can be sent
    to iTunes from the Transfer manager.
  * Audio status component recognizes an Audio Stream, from an Audio file
    from an internet stream url. Clicking on it will take you to the
    Android Tab if it's an android stream or to the Library otherwise.
  * Fixes issues with download mediator refresh.
  * Fixes out of memory error.
  * Real time UI feedback as audio files are being imported into playlist.
  * F5, Cmd+R or Ctrl+R will refresh the current Library table.
 
 -- FrostWire Team   Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:03:10 -0500

frostwire (5.2.1) stable; urgency=high
  * Play/Pause player buttons now share the same button depending on state.
  * Mac OSX threading bug when importing .m3u playlist to new playlist fixed.
  * Pressing space bar pauses/resumes currently played audio.
  * Playlist files can be sorted correctly by track number when available.
  * FLAC playback support.
  * When a playlist has finished importing files, it's shown to the user.
  * Transfer manager remembers the position of its JSplitPane.
  * Transfer manager sorts downloads by default based on their creation date.
  * Transfer manager has new column "Started On" showing the date the transfer
    first started.
  * Drag and drop issues on playlist component for Mac OSX fixed.
  * Partial download dialog table can adjust column widths, a horizontal
    scrollbar will appear if the sum of the columns is wider than the dialog.
  * When playing an audio file, if it gets deleted FROM DISK from inside
    FrostWire, the audio file will stop playing.
  * Files can be dragged to the "Starred" playlist and they will be marked
    as starred. If files are dragged from Disk, creating a new playlist
    will be offered, and all the elements on the playlist will be starred.
  * Files can be deleted from the "Starred" playlist. This will cause the
    files to be unstarred on every other playlist where they belong.
  * The tables on the library remember the last position of their scrollbars
    during the session.
  * Double clicking on a playlist name starts editing the playlist name.
  * Fixes bug where downloading an individual file in a torrent wouldn't
    be marked in the search results as downloading.
  * Fixes a memory leak when importing ID3 tags into a playlist.
  * Fixes bug where the duration of an MP3 file wasn't calculated correctly
    by MPlayer, duration is now being calculated with Java library.
  * Fixes bug where it would import torrent skipped files to iTunes.

 -- FrostWire Team   Wed, 05 Oct 2011 13:14:11 -0500

frostwire (5.2.0) stable; urgency=high

  * New Library Tab, code named "Alexandria"
  * New Audio Player controls
  * New controls to create and manage playlists
  * Drag and drop files from Finished Downloads, Audio, File explorer
    into new or existing playlists.
  * New control on status bar that shows current audio file being played
    with a "Send to friend" button. Clicking on the file name bring user
    back to where the audio file is being played.
  * Export playlists to .m3u
  * Import .m3u into new or existing playlists.
  * Filter files inside currently selected file type or playlist.
  * Audio player can randomize playback order, or repeat playlist.
  * New icons all over the application.
  * Album art is displayed when an audio file is selected on a playlist.
  * Album art can be scaled in real time with split pane.
  * Songs on playlists can be starred, Starred songs are added to "Starred"
  * Selected songs on a playlist can be deleted with the Delete key, or
    on right click Delete from playlist.
  * Playlists can be renamed.
  * Playlists can be deleted.
  * When songs that have been deleted from disk are attempted to be played
    they will be highlighted in red and with an exclamation mark.
  * Right clicking on any song on a playlist > Cleanup removes all songs
    on a playlist that have been deleted physically from disk.

 -- FrostWire Team   Mon, 26 Sep 2011 18:00:00 -0500

*UPDATE*: We’ve just found out from users that Fake FrostWire Apps were on the Android market, maybe this is the reason why our app got suspended.
Once again, we’d really love to be able to talk to Google Market to help us solve the situation.

Today we found out our app has been “Suspended!” from the Android market 🙂

We are still able to upload APKs to the Android Market so we suppose that Google has suspended the current version of the app thinking that it’s not compliant with the FTC complaint that’s been all over the news recently.

In reality the current version is fully compliant with the order since around May 2011 (v.0.5.5, we’re now at v.0.6.3!!!) when we started working closely with the FTC to make the app safer.

If you’ve been using the app since before May, you probably noticed the number of files available dropped after the changes we started making around that date and now we hope you understand why the application is not as convenient as it was in the past in regards to easily making your files availables, but this is a very important trade off to safe guard the privacy of the not so tech-saavy users.

We’ll use this hiatus on the Android market to implement major architectural upgrades to our app. We’re currently working on very important things:

1. We are going to release all the code under a GPL license.
2. FrostWire for Android will be a BitTorrent client.
3. FrostWire for Android will have a kick ass media player within.

We hope to be contacted by the Google Android Market at some point, we think that we could somehow “unsuspend” the app from the market since we still have the option to “Upload APK”, we don’t know if they will allow us to update or not, we just hope to receive some form of communication from Google to see if the FTC news were the issue, we wish they had at least a communication channel to solve the situation as soon as we have the next version of the app.

We have been hard at work coding for over a year, releasing over 60 builds of the app trying to provide a file sharing solution for well over 1,170,000 Android devices, based on a lot of community feedback and more recently under the microscope of a Federal Government Agency, to have our App suspended without a single written notice or explanation. We really hope our friends at Google Android Market can get back to us soon.

In the meantime, you can still get the FrostWire Android installer through our official website.
http://frostwire.com/android
This installer is fully compliant with the FTC order, and you will have opt-in, absolute control of the files you share or not from your phone.

Thanks.

Update: 10 days later, Elemint’s Brain Food has been downloaded over 77,000 times, and going!. Spread the word

Download Album
Following the successful release of Poet Tree featured FrostWire and on FrostClick, Elemint is visiting our pages yet again. This time his work comes in the shape of 13 great hip hop tracks ready to tickle even the most refined of musical senses.

Freshly released Brain Food builds up on artist’s earlier albums by introducing a more diverse (and engaging) array of sounds, all while maintaining his carefully crafted lyrics and dynamic vocals that never disappoint. Listening to the LP guarantees the discovery of ‘playlist ready’ favorites so be sure to grab your very own copy today!
Continue reading “Elemint’s Brain Food, free ONLY on FrostWire” →

Thanks to your feedback, we added some new features that will allow you to integrate better with the new FrostWire library as well as with iTunes.

Now when a transfer has finished, if it contains any audio files, 2 new options are available on right click:

FrostWire will no longer by default automatically send audio files to iTunes, now you get to do it only if you want, many users were complaining about the default process which was creating duplicate listings inside iTunes, This way you have more control.

You can also send files to iTunes from the Library.

Also, there’s that second option there to add to playlist, straight from your finished download. You’ll be able to add to a new playlist or to append the new audio files to an existing playlist.

There’s a lot more fixes we did for this beta release, here is the full changelog:

frostwire (5.2.2) stable; urgency=high
  * Library tables are now cached in memory, searches are done in the cache
    speeding up the experience considerably for users with several thousand
    files.
  * Create or add audio files to a playlist right from the Transfer manager.
  * iTunes importing after audio transfers finish turned off by default.
  * Completed transfers that contain at least one audio file can be sent
    to iTunes from the Transfer manager.
  * Audio status component recognizes an Audio Stream, from an Audio file
    from an internet stream url. Clicking on it will take you to the
    Android Tab if it's an android stream or to the Library otherwise.
  * Fixes issues with download mediator refresh.
  * Fixes out of memory error.
  * Real time UI feedback as audio files are being imported into playlist.
  * F5, Cmd+R or Ctrl+R will refresh the current Library table.
 
 -- FrostWire Team   Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:03:10 -0500

Download Album

Testing out new waters in their latest EP,  London native John Purcell from Azoora, has teamed up with the sweet voiced Montreal siren, Graciellita, for this new compilation.

Apart, is the 7th EP released under the band’s name. The record incorporates the resident electronic, trip hop sound of Azoora with the angelic voiced singer’s lovely and fresh vocals.

There’s an atmosphere of softness as well as one of brooding intensity present in this 5-track compilation. With beautiful piano accompaniments, lush loops and catchy beats floating in the cuts; the record is an easy candidate for your favorites list. Continue reading “Azoora feat. Graciellita: Apart – great release from UK trip-hop group” →