Program to allow Printing of Songs

I’ve noticed several posts regarding printing of the songs that users have on their Beat Buddy. The solutions were less than perfect imho (: It frustrated me too and so I wrote a program to provide printing of my songs.

So many people have shared so much on this forum, that I’m happy to share it. But, before I provide a public link, I’d like to have a couple of people test it to make sure it works on their machines with no issues. I’ve used it for quite some time without any issues, but would like to have at least a couple of testers. Basically, if you can backup your BB workspace and can navigate to your BB Songs directory ( I think it’s a hidden directory) - then you’d be a great tester (:

Message me and I’ll provide a dropbox link for it.

Here is a screen shot of the program and then the sample output. It’s pretty simple. You can export it to an html file (what I use - viewable via Edge, Chrome, etc) or text or csv.

Program Screen Example

8 Likes

Sounds like a great idea - I would be interested (wolfgang.franke@btinternet.com).

Cheers,
Wolfgang

Yep, happy to try it here…(windows 10 1903)

Cheers Joe - working fine here - all 3 formats (csv, htlm & txt) with html being easiest on the eye :slightly_smiling_face:.

Wolf

Awesome. Thanks so much for testing it and giving me feedback on it. Yeah, html is my fav too (:slight_smile:
I added the other formats, because people have different needs so who knows.

Let me know if you run into questions or things later.
I appreciate it very much!

Hey Joe, yep too easy! Works nicely…just to confirm Windows 10 - 1903. It comes up with a warning about the software but you just over-ride that!

Nice work, thanks much :slight_smile:

Great.

Big thanks to TheWolf2103 and pax-eterna for helping out on the testing. I’ll post the Download link at the end of this message.

If you’d like to use it -

  1. It should work with Windows 7 and higher, but I’ve only tested Windows 10. If it starts up, it will probably work (:

  2. *** Make sure you have a backup of your Beat Buddy workspace.

  3. Download the “ASW_BB_BeatsRecap.zip” file from the download link. Save it to a folder somewhere on your Windows based computer.

  4. Unzip the file.

  5. Read the “Help File.txt” for more information.

  6. Run the exe file - “ASW_BB_BeatsRecap.exe”. You should see the screen already posted in this thread.

  7. Find your current Beat Buddy ‘Songs’ directory. This is in the Beat Buddy Workspace folder which can vary depending on your installation of Beat Buddy Manage. The directories are hidden I think.

  8. Pick a target for your output - as in your desktop.

  9. Run it and then assuming you did html output - just drag that output file into Windows Edge or Google Chrome, etc to display it.

4 Likes

It’s kinda cool seeing all the songs (and kits used) listed in such a neat way! Great little app! For me, makes it really easy to quickly scan for possible beats for any new song I am thinking of.

Cheers Joe - it is a great little app - thanks so much & pleasure to help you testing - anytime.

Wolf

@Joe_southern WOW!!! This app is amazing!!! You have created that? I tested this myself, and it works perfect in Windows 10! Terrific job! :slight_smile:

May we use this app on our site? And/or modify the programming of it if need be (for example, to help bypass that warning or adapt it to other OSs)? I am not sure if/when it will be implemented or incorporated, but I wanted to ask your permission first ahead of time before I pass this on to our development team.

@DavidPackouz take a look at this!!

Awesome app - I’ve been looking for something like this for awhile. Very cool! Thanks so much - this will help me immensely! Worked perfectly fine on my Windows 10.

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Hey fellow users - thanks for the compliments. I’m glad some people are finding it useful.

@BeatBuddy_Support sure go ahead - it was all me and I’m happy to have other people use it. But, they should always have a backup of their Beat Buddy Workspace area (: It would be nice to get credit for it.

The Windows message when you run the program is because it’s downloaded from the internet. It should only occur the first time it’s run. Click the ‘More Info’ on the Windows warning box and then it should allow you to run it.

The actual cause of the message is that I haven’t ‘signed’ the file which requires me to purchase a ‘signing-certificate’. I used to have a signing-certificate but don’t distribute software commercially for the most part anymore so I haven’t renewed it due to the cost. I may at some point again, but haven’t yet. Hence the message. Sorry ): I could fix it but it would require an involved installation on the user’s machine that I don’t really want to do. More simple is better.

If people have suggestions, enhancements, I’d certainly consider it.

I did think about that it would be neat to say for example I only want to print folders that started with say “Sunday” for example like “Sunday Set 1, Sunday Set 2, etc”. (For now you could just export from my program to csv (or text), open in Excel or Calc (or notepad) and then just pick the ones you want). Or better still a box in my program that showed all of the folders and then you click which one(s) you want to print.

If I was going to go that far though, then I think I’d want to make it to where you could copy the songs in those folders into a new set as people have been asking for that functionality in the forums. I can see how neat that would be.

So, say I wanted to make a new song folder Sunday Set 1 in keeping with the above example. Then I could go and drag (copy not move) some songs from various folders into that new folder. Yes, they’d exist in two different places which is the idea. Presently iirc you have to export the song and then you can reimport it which is kind of laborious.

I’ve looked into doing that and it’s not that complicated, but really these features would be much better served by being incorporated into the BB Manager. But, I’ve run software departments before so I know though how there isn’t just an ‘easy’ button to implement something. We’ll see - maybe I’ll look further at that.

Anyway, let me know if it’s being useful to you, ideas or better unique ways you are using it. I used to love watching people use some software I’d done in ways I just hadn’t imagined (: It’s like using the lower Midi numbers for bass and organ parts. Someone had their thinking cap on for that one. Or the whole songs on there start to end vs intro, verse, etc. Interesting stuff.

Joe

1 Like

Great idea. Shame it doesn’t run on a Mac.

2 Likes

Works awesome. Thank you very much.

Enhancement ? perhaps filter on "RocK’.

New Version !! (@BeatBuddy_Support take note - since you were interested in the prior version)

I’d like to thank everyone for the positive feed back on my program. I’m glad it’s useful fellow musicians. As such, I’ve made an update. Basically the update gives you the ability to print certain song folders or print songs that use a particular drum set (rather than all items). So, basically, as requested (@Reathpd), choose Rock and all songs with Rock as the drum set will be exported.

Operation is pretty much the same as before, but if you only want certain song folders to print - first - press the ‘Populate Song Folders’ button and then select the folder or folders (Control Select) you want. Then, in the Selection - Part B area - choose ‘Folders Selected’ and then use the Process button.

For songs that use a particular drum set, first - press the ‘Populate Drum Sets’ button and then select the drum set or sets (Control Select) you want. Then, in the Selection - Part B area - choose ‘Drums Selected’ and then use the Process button.

Processing using the selection of certain song folders or drumsets will run slightly slower than a normal processing, so be a little patient. For me - the original process would take maybe 3 seconds for 900 songs. Doing a selection if might run 8 seconds for example. The program will tell you when processing is done.

Output, as before can go to a text file, csv, or my fav - html…

This works with the current BB Manager - it ‘may’ not with future ones if they change the structure of the layout in more than a cursory manner.

As always, make sure you have a backup of your BB Manager workspace. Here is a new screen shot of the program - output format is as shown before (unless of course you limit the selection).

If you downloaded the first version - you can download the new version to a new folder (or delete the original folder) - extract it and run the file ASW_BB_BeatsRecap.exe. You’ll still get the message explained earlier because it’s been downloaded from the internet. I think it just occurs once.

The download link is the same (but I’m listing it again) - it’s actually in the same folder as the first link. I’ve left the first version in there for now - this one - the zip file has the suffix V2.

I doubt I’ll do anything else on this unless there’s some problem with it. Shoot me a message letting me know how it’s working for you if you get a chance. Nice to hear it’s being put to use.

Joe

Here is the link and you want the _V2 zip file - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9jpmkwmaeuu7zek/AADb-hnXvV4yK0uyotv78pbEa?dl=0

Folder(s) Selection

Drum Selection

Drum Selection output

4 Likes

Brilliant, thanks!

Terrific tool. Thank you.

Peter

Works very well. Thank you

Peter

Will check it out, thank you! :slight_smile:

Hi Joe_southern

Thank you, your program works great
(not sure why the BBM programmers decided to hide project files though)

Could you add another function to also show which MIDI files each song uses?
I think that info is stored in the .BBS files & not the .csv files

That would be very useful for folks that have 100s of songs & make changes/improvements to a particular “beat” & would like to have that change in all songs that use it (without combing thru their songs, looking to see which songs use it)

Great work!