3. Using Zune
The Zune user interface, shown in Figure 5,
is a breath of fresh air compared to more staid digital media
applications like Windows Media Player and, especially, Apple iTunes.
This is by design. After basing the first version of its Zune PC
software on Windows Media Player, Microsoft went back to the drawing
board and built its Zune 2 software from the ground up as a brand-new
application, and Zune 3 is an evolution of that design. The result is
visually stimulating and, frankly, kind of pretty.
NOTE
You may be interested to know that the Zune user
interface was created by the same visual designers at Microsoft who were
responsible for the UI of Windows Media Center.
Zune utilizes a single application window and
typically uses a columnar display to present content in different,
visual ways. There are four main UI views, or parts, in Zune:
Collection:
This default view shows the collection of media you have on your PC and
are managing with Zune. It is in turn divided into subzones such as
Music, Videos, Pictures, Podcasts, and Channels. Each represents content
that is stored locally on your PC.
Marketplace:
This view connects to Microsoft's online store, Zune Marketplace. There
are a number of subviews here—Picks, Music, Videos, Podcasts, and
Channels.
Social:
Here you can access your Zune tag/Windows Live ID/Xbox 360 Gamertag
friends list, personal information, and Inbox, the latter of which is
much like e-mail but not nearly as useful.
Device:
This view pertains to any Zune device (or devices) you own and have
linked to this particular PC's collection. It is divided into subviews
such as Status, Music, Videos, Pictures, Podcasts, Friends, and
Channels.
First, however, it's time to take a look at the main reason so many people are interested in Zune: digital music.
3.1. The Zune User Experience
Regardless of where you are in the Collection view, a
few common elements are available. The Collection, Marketplace, Social,
and Device links are common to all parts of the Zune UI, as are the
Sign In, Settings, and Help links in the upper right corner of the
application window. On the bottom is a series of three icons on the left
(see Figure 6).
These icons, from left to right, represent the following:
Device: If
you have a Zune portable device, you can access its sync status and
other information from this first icon. (It also supports multiple Zunes
for you Zune-crazy fans.)
Disk:
From here you can access Zune's disk play, rip, or burn functionality.
You can also drag songs here to create a burn (play)list, which is used
to create a custom audio CD.
Playlist:
This icon enables you to create new playlists and autoplaylists, access
existing playlists, and add songs to the Now Playing playlist.
What you see in the bottom center of the application
window depends on what's going on. If you're not playing any content,
adding media, or performing other tasks, it is empty. When you're
playing back some kind of content, you'll find a playback timeline with
album art, the name of the media, the elapsed time, and the remaining
time, as shown in Figure 7.
Finally, on the bottom right of the application window, you'll see the playback controls shown in Figure 8.
These controls include what you would expect: Play/Stop, Previous, and
Next, as well as Repeat and Shuffle toggles. A final curious-looking
pink icon launches Zune's amazing Now Playing view, which we'll examine
shortly.
If you mouse over the Volume text below the playback
controls, you'll get a volume slider that you can use to adjust the
playback volume.
3.2. Enjoying Music
In the Music view you get a three-pane look at your music collection by default (see Figure 9).
On the left is a textual list of artists, which can be sorted
alphabetically or in reverse alphabetical order. In the center, widest
pane, are your albums, in graphical album art splendor; these can be
sorted alphabetically, by release year, by artist, or by date added. On
the right is a list of songs. These can be sorted alphabetically or by
rating.
NOTE
Sorting these columns is not obvious, but here's
how it works: if you mouse over any of the three column headings, the
heading name will be highlighted in gray. To change the sort type, just
click this heading. It will toggle through each available option as you
click.
Suppose you want to drill into your music collection.
If you select an artist from the leftmost Artists pane, the middle and
right panes change to reflect this choice, as shown in Figure 10.
For example, selecting Collective Soul from the collection will display
what-ever Collective Soul albums are contained in the collection in the
middle Albums pane; on the right, in the Songs pane, is a list of all
of the Collective Soul songs in the collection.
You can drill down further, of course. If you select
an individual album in the Albums pane, that album becomes selected and
the Songs list is constrained to only those songs in the selected album,
as shown in Figure 11.
To play an album or song, just double-click the item.
The first song in the album (or the individual song you selected) will
begin playing immediately. Meanwhile, a few things change in the Zune
UI. The playback timeline appears, a small Now Playing icon appears next
to the currently playing song in the Songs pane, and the Play button
changes to Pause.
This is probably a good time to point out Zune's
amazing Now Playing screen. You enable it by clicking the pink Now
Playing button to the right of the Next button in the playback controls
area. Alternately, you can click the Now Playing icon to the left of the
currently playing song in the Songs pane. Either way, the Zune player
UI switches to Now Playing mode, shown in Figure 12.
There's some information about the currently playing
song over a cool backdrop composed of your collection's album art. In
addition, temporarily, you'll also see the current playlist (what's
displayed in the Songs pane), the playback timeline, and the playback
controls. When you move the mouse off these elements they fade away, as
shown in Figure 13.
If Zune doesn't have imagery and other information
about the currently playing artist, the Now Playing view will instead
show a grid-like collage of album art, as shown in Figure 14.
To close Now Playing, click the Exit button in the bottom-right corner of the player window.
