[GSoC update] Distributed Collections: Week 1

[Varrun Ramani]

Distributed Collections::GSoC update
============================
I did some base work first, configuring Amarok as a front end to Ampache to
check out the features the current API offers. I also went through the
Ampache XML API documentation[1] and looked at the provision for searching
local collections in Amarok. Identified the main tasks to initially look
at:-

1. Make a detailed set of requirements for the new API. Currently, to do a
multi-level search, multiple requests have to be sent to the server. A
solution to do the same in one single query is needed.

2. Make improvements to AmpacheServiceQueryMaker, to satisfy the new API.

1. Regarding the first part i.e making it one request, I had an idea, but i
dont know how viable it may be. Like in LaTeX, we have the concept of
sections, subsections, subsubsections to maintain hierarchy, we can use a
similar concept to distinguish between levels of search in the API.
Eg.
Methods :-
Level 1: artist, album, title,...
Level 2: subartist,subalbum, subtitle, ...
Level 3: subsubartist subalbum, .......

An example request could be :
server?genre=hiphop&subartist=eminem&subyear=2000&subsubtitle=8mile

The obvious disadvantage is that only few levels can be used here
and  number of methods increases n times where n - # of levels.

2. Also, since Amarok supports more fields than Ampache the methods
for Playcount, Rating, Bitrate, Year and Score have to be added.

[1] http://ampache.org/wiki/dev:xmlapi
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