option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

[kaled]

I know that this topic has been discussed in the past. Some UPNP renderers such as Denon Heos show the album artist field during playback. This is an issue when playing compilations as you don't get to see the artist name playing.
Denon claim they have implemneted the ID tags correctly so there is little chance of change from them.
Is there any possibility of having an option built into asset UPNP to be able configure mapping what ID tag fields are shown during playback. For example, a manual overide that maps the artist field to the album artist field for playback?

[GBrown]

Re: option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

So does this mean your AlbumArtist field is currently not filled in your library? Perhaps if not, the alternative would be to simply copy what your current Artist tag is to that field. This may be easier than mapping, or expecting Denon to make a change on their end.

[kaled]

Re: option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

Album artist is filled in for my library. This is only an issue with albums that 'various artists' i.e. compilations. The Heos devices for some reason default to showing the album artist field when playing back. Other UPNP servers such as Synology Audio Station, or PLEX correctly show the artist, rather than album artist on playback. I'm not saying the mapping of these servers is correct, the Heos implementation could be wrong with Asset UPNP.

So are you suggesting using BubbleUPNP as my server, or controller? Either way this isn't an option. The whole point of Asset UPNP is the rich features available and flexibility in browsing my libraries. The Heos is absolutely fine and required for grouping multiple HEOS devices, which I have quite a few, including several with their own displays.

[kaled]

Re: option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

Thanks the comprehensive discussion. See below

Are you saying that if a track on a regular album (albumartist is not 'Various Artists') has a track artist that differs to the album artist, then the track artist is displayed correctly, or just that it's not as much of a problem, as it's not just 'Various Artists'?
OK, this is exactly what happens.
ID tag embedded into FLAC file is for two examples
[album artist] [artist] [track] HEOS display [artist] [track]
artist A artist A track 1 artist A track 1
Various Artists artist A track 1 Various Artists track 1



I'm assuming then that the 'Now Playing' screen on the app and the screen on your hardware devices both show the same thing, the albumartist?
It's curious that it works for other servers but not for Asset; it would be interesting to see exactly what was sent to the HEOS app from those servers, as it could be that they didn't send the albumartist tag along with the track details and so the app/device defaulted to artist, or it doesn't understand a particular UPnP object type in use, or something along those lines. I wouldn't have thought they were tailoring their response because they know they're talking to a Denon product, well Plex maybe, but not Synology.
yes, app and hardware screen show the same information as you describe.
Completely agree, I don't think there is any tailoring.


I was suggesting to use an alternative UPnP control point, not a different server, realising this would have meant still using the HEOS app for defining groups. From what I've read the HEOS app isn't great (currently a score of 2.4 on Google Play), and I didn't think it surfaced the rich browsing experience that Asset offers, are you saying it does?

I use the app all the time and is generally robust and it provides the rich browsing experience of asset UPNP in terms of the library navigation structure. Works perfectly well for me.

I've been looking to purchase some wireless speakers for around the home but local metadata support is generally awful. If I could access the full UPnP browsing experience of the server from the HEOS app, or play to groups/stereo pairs as defined by the HEOS app using a standard UPnP control point then I'd be very interested.

I have approximately 10 Heos devices throughout the home (they do more than speakers - AVRs, HiFi streamer, sound bars etc) and regularly group them, play different sources in different rooms etc. All works perfectly well.

If you have a chance you should install another UPnP control point just to make sure your Asset configuration is correct (that you see track artist when playing a song) and that it is definitely the HEOS system that's causing the problem. The next step would be to see if you can capture the DIDL/information that's being sent to the HEOS app from the various servers - unless someone else has already investigated this.

OK, so now I know what you mean by control point. So I've used USB Audio Pro (android app) and that correctly shows artist for albums that are compliations i.e. with albumartist set to various artists.

[kaled]

Re: option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

Apologies for the poor formating repeated the first part of my response

ID tag embedded into FLAC file is for two examples
[album artist]------[artist]-------[track]-----------HEOS display-------[artist]--------[track]
artist A------------artist A--------track 1------------------------------artist A--------track 1
Various Artists-----artist A--------track 1------------------------------Various Artists-track 1

[kaled]

Re: option to map 'artist' to 'album artist' during playback

I should be getting hold of a Home 150 tomorrow so I can check out its UPnP support (UPnP/DLNA isn't mentioned on any of the specification).
Whilst my primary server isn't Asset I'll see how it behaves with AssetUPnP too.

How did you get on?