Methods and apparatus for visualizing a media library

Abstract

Visualizing and exploring a music library using metadata, such as genre, sub-genre, artist, and year, is provided. Geometric shapes, such as disks or rectangles, may be divided into sectors representing genre and each sector may be further divided into sub-sectors representing artists associated with each genre. The sector's relative size generally reflects the importance of the corresponding genre within the library. Likewise, the sub-sector's relative size generally reflects the importance of the corresponding artist within the genre which may be determined by the number of media items of the artist. Marks representing each media item may be arranged and displayed within the geometric shape to reflect the mark's corresponding genre, artist, and year. In addition, each mark may reflect an attribute, such as playcount, of the media item and each sector may reflect the mean value of an attribute of all media items within the sector.

1 . A computer-implemented method comprising:
 accessing metadata that describes a set of media items, the metadata comprising a plurality of attribute values for each media item in the set of media items;   generating a graphical representation of the set of media items, the graphical representation comprising:
 a geometric shape divided into a plurality of sectors based on a first attribute value from the metadata, wherein each sector is sub-divided based on a second attribute value from the metadata; and 
 a mark for each media item in the set of media items, wherein the mark is positioned within the geometric shape based on a third attribute value from the metadata. 
   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein each sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the first attribute value associated with the sector, divided by the total number of media items in the set of media items. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein each sub-sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the second attribute value associated with the sub-sector, divided by the total number of media items in the sector. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the marks are colored differently in the graphical representation of the set of media items based on an attribute from among the plurality of attributes. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the marks are shaped differently in the graphical representation of the set of media items based on an attribute from among the plurality of attributes. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the attributes in the plurality of attribute are selected from among a group of attributes consisting of: media item genre, media item artist name, media item album name, media album date of release, title of the media item, media items style, media item era, media item tempo, musicians featured in the media item, instruments used in the media item, total number of musicians in a media item, soloing musician in a media item, composer of the media item, producer of the media item, where the media item was recorded, whether the media item is a live performance, media item record company information, media item rhythmic foundation, melodic/harmonic development of the media item, media item playcount, media item last played date, and date the media item was added to a datastore. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the geometric shape comprises a circle, and wherein each sector of the display is a geometric sector of the circle. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the geometric shape comprises a rectangle, and wherein each sector of the display is a sector of the rectangle. 
     
     
         9 . A computer-implemented method comprising:
 accessing metadata that describes a set of music files, the metadata comprising at least: attribute values describing musical genre, artist name, album name, and play count for each media item in the set of media items;   generating a graphical representation of the set of media items, the graphical representation comprising:
 a circle divided into a plurality of sectors based on the musical genre value from the metadata, wherein each sector is sub-divided based on the artist name value from the metadata; and 
 a mark for each music file in the set of music files, wherein the mark is positioned within the geometric shape based on the album name value from the metadata. 
   
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein the marks are colored differently based on the play count value from the metadata. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein each sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the genre value associated with the sector, divided by the total number of media items in the set of media items. 
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein each sub-sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the artist name attribute value associated with the sub-sector, divided by the total number of media items in the sector. 
     
     
         13 . A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising:
 a medium configured to store computer-readable instructions thereon; and   the computer-readable instructions that, when executed by a processing device cause the processing device to perform a method, comprising:
 accessing metadata that describes a set of media items, the metadata comprising a plurality of attribute values for each media item in the set of media items; 
 generating a graphical representation of the set of media items, the graphical representation comprising:
 a geometric shape, wherein the geometric shape is divided into a plurality of sectors based on a first attribute from the metadata and sub-divided based on a second attribute value from the metadata; and 
 a mark for each media item in the set of media items, wherein the mark is positioned within the geometric shape based on a third attribute value from the metadata. 
 
   
     
     
         14 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein each sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the first attribute value associated with the sector, divided by the total number of media items in the set of media items. 
     
     
         15 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein each sector is divided into one or more sub-sectors, each sub-sector representing a corresponding value of a second attribute, and wherein each sub-sector is sized to reflect a ratio computed as the number of media items in the media library that have the second attribute value associated with the sub-sector, divided by the total number of media items in the sector. 
     
     
         16 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein the marks are colored differently in the graphical representation of the set of media items based on an attribute from among the plurality of attributes. 
     
     
         17 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein the marks are shaped differently in the graphical representation of the set of media items based on an attribute from among the plurality of attributes. 
     
     
         18 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein the attributes in the plurality of attribute are selected from among a group of attributes consisting of: media item genre, media item artist name, media item album name, media album date of release, title of the media item, media items style, media item era, media item tempo, musicians featured in the media item, instruments used in the media item, total number of musicians in a media item, soloing musician in a media item, composer of the media item, producer of the media item, where the media item was recorded, whether the media item is a live performance, media item record company information, media item rhythmic foundation, melodic/harmonic development of the media item, media item playcount, media item last played date, and date the media item was added to a datastore. 
     
     
         19 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein the geometric shape comprises a circle. 
     
     
         20 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of  claim 13 , wherein the geometric shape comprises a rectangle, and wherein each sector of the display is a geometric sector of the rectangle.