Hey guys! iTunes 11 is here and it is AWESOME!
Yeah, yeah, I know it this is a random post from what I usually post but hey it is always good for change, right? I thought it was part of design, new look, new way of making things work better which is my slogan now, have you heard.
Well, let's get to it then. The BRAND NEW iTUNES 11 has AWESOME new features where you can sync your music, apps, books, movies, etc., to your iCloud account. This makes it easy to access your personalized iTunes anywhere and everywhere. Here is how it looks now:
PRETTY, RIGHT? I just love how they managed to simplify it more even though it is already very clean and minimal looking. Some people are confused on where the sidebar went and WHY they took it away. Well, from a designers perspective I think they just wanted it out of the way, making the music library look more clean and easier to access. It is all about the music and when you open your library your beautiful artwork jumps at you. It's just right there for you to click on and play!
Anyway, to get your sidebar back you just hit ALT+CMD+S (MAC) / CTRL+ALT+S (WINDOWS) and TA-DA! But personally I prefer the new look better. Problems start when you want to sync your iPod or other devices with playlists... So just turn on that sidebar and do it the old fashion way. Can also be switched on from the menu: "View > Show Sidebar"
Enough technical stuff lets talk about the design of the new interface!
Apple has manages to design this amazing feature with the new iTunes 11 when you download an album with an artwork the library extracts the colours from the cover art and changes the theme of that album window. As you can see in the picture above from the latest Rihanna album (LOVE HER!) the window extracted her skin colour of the art work and replaced the text in the window with that colour. AMAZING! Here is another example for you to get the picture:
The new mini player is a big change in iTunes and I think many people will start using this more often now. You can search and add songs to "up next" playlists from the mini player. This is an awesome new feature that I think is very handy when working and don't want the big iTunes window to open.
Furthermore you can change the views of your library that I am in love with!!! They limited it to Songs, Albums, Artists, Genres, and Playlists which is SO much easier to handle. The sidebar with all my hundreds of playlists made it confusing and difficult to find stuff. Thanks Apple for making this so awesome!
Now you just have to go download the new iTunes A.S.A.P!!! It is really a must-have that will make your life off organizing your music MUCH easier and well pretty to look at while browsing your library.
Till Later!
*F
