Search improvements: Universal search bar for tracks/albums/artists/playlist

[bbsixzz]

I propose moving all search bars to the top navigation bar (right side next to settings) for easy access.

Let us also search tracks/artists/playlists.

[dweymouth]

Converting this to a discussion for now as I want to throw a few ideas out there. I actually thought about a global search bar initially but I decided to go with contextual search (the search bar basically acting as a filter) because 1) it was easier to build :) and 2) I thought it's a better UI for when you have more than a few results in your search. (i.e. if I search say "Bach" in albums view I can scroll through dozens of results)

First a note that, if staying with the contextual search design, I will definitely add a search bar to the artists, playlists, and songs page (once it exists) as well.

So, a few questions:

1. Is global search a better UX than contextual search? Or should it support both?
2. The existing search bar on the albums page actually does include artist and song results, i.e. if you search a song name, the album the song appears on is in the results. Was this a confusing/unclear UX?
3. If the app should support both, should one search bar be used for both? (I am of the opinion that that is a confusing and unclean UX, but I'm open to being persuaded otherwise)
4. Is it a bad UX to have a global search bar in the navigation bar (which shows a drop down of results), and a contextual search bar on searchable pages?
5. Side question - do you think the navigation buttons design is nice, or should I add a more traditional left-hand sidebar (which could be a good place for a global search bar). I actually thought about doing this first, but it was easier initially to just do the navigation buttons and now I've come to like that clean, minimal design.

[bbsixzz]

1. I think you should keep contextual search for now and just add the others (tracks/artist/playlist).

2. This is a bit confusing, I think a list of results similar to now playing is more apt because right now the track result is hidden behind the album; it works but doesn't really make sense.

Navidrome has a separate songs category so album search is separated and doesn't show results for tracks and vice versa.

3. I think contextual is enough and should be for the foreseeable future as this app is very early in development and I'm sure there are more important things you want to deal with.

4. Yeah I think this is overkill.

5. I like the design, I guess my only wish would be to be able to customize which buttons are available. I don't care much for favorites and genres for example.

That's a bit of a tall order but a simple checkbox for each button in settings would be great.

[dweymouth]

Thanks for your detailed feedback! I created issue #115 to track adding the search bar to the other pages. As far as customizing the navigation buttons, it should definitely be doable to add a checkbox to enable/disable each individually, though I have a few other features I want to work on ahead of that. Top of my list right now is adding a dropdown to the settings dialog to choose the output audio device.

[freshgum-bubbles]

Just my 2c: an OK implementation of this is the Tempo app: they have a universal search bar, and they've implemented type-ahead to suggest what you may have meant (pretty bog standard, though works very well.) You also have search history, so pretty similar to YouTube [Music] overall. The only downside is you have to click (for example) the track title, and then click it again in the results. I do prefer how Supersonic handles that part of the experience (of course, they are a bit space-constrained, so Supersonic has the opportunity to present more metadata at once :D)

Here's an example of Tempo, for reference:

The existing search bar on the albums page actually does include artist and song results, i.e. if you search a song name, the album the song appears on is in the results. Was this a confusing/unclear UX?

IME: It works well, but I think at that point it would be handy to show the matched song instead of having to click and scroll through the album. That might just be me being lazy, though.

Side question - do you think the navigation buttons design is nice, or should I add a more traditional left-hand sidebar (which could be a good place for a global search bar). I actually thought about doing this first, but it was easier initially to just do the navigation buttons and now I've come to like that clean, minimal design.

The design works way better than a sidebar: you've got much more room for content. Aside from a few stand-outs (the playlist and now playing icons aren't the most clear), of course. I think the only thing I would change re: the navigation buttons is having the "selected" one highlighted, which would reinforce the relationship between each button and the page it represents.

The contextual search thing does seem quite tricky to solve without being confusing, though I'm not a designer. I see a few paths you could take:

• Have a button for the current page in the global search bar. You could click and it would enable contextual search (so, on the Albums page, you would have an Albums button you could click). This seems quite lame for those used to Ctrl+F.
• Make the whole thing global, and then add tabs for each object type (Release, Recording, Playlist, etc.) on the search page. May not be the best for keyboard users, and seems to reduce friction in general.
• Use GitHub/Discord-esque syntax (type:playlist, etc.) -- this might work better, though may ultimately be more confusing. Not sure, I'd need to test it over the long-term; this would also, of course, require parsing whatever's entered into the search bar (a quick regexp should handle this nicely).
• Some other option that works nicely for everyone. Hmm... :)

Apologies for the brain dump, though I hope my many many hours of using Supersonic can contribute in some meaningful way :-)

^{(Obligatory shill: Tempo seems to be the new kid on the block, but it's a very well-rounded app. Mostly stable, great UI and amazing experience.)}

[ccoenen]

I would like to propose adding the standard shortcut for focusing search Ctrl+F - this would make search quicker to access for me.

[dweymouth]

That is already added (it's Cmd+F on Mac). Is it not working for you?

[ccoenen]

I realize now that it works, as long as there's the input box on my screen

So, on my favorites screen, it works with the shortcut:

But on a screen where this input does not exist, the shortcut does not work. In this example, I have a specific artist open, and I can press Ctrl+F all I want, it does nothing.

When I wrote this earlier discussion entry, I didn't really know about that search input in the top screenshot, I would have expected it to open the search box that opens when clicking the search icon:

I'm currently on 0.8.2 from flatpak, in case that's relevant.

[dweymouth]

Ctrl (or Cmd)+G is the shortcut for that one. I couldn't think of a better shortcut and I chose that because Ctrl+G is also a search shortcut in browsers. (Also I think of it as with the mnemonic "Ctrl + Go to")