ClickWheel Music Player User Guide

The same guide is in the app: Settings > Help

• Getting started
• The click wheel
• The touch screen
• The main menu
• Now Playing
• Playlists and On-The-Go
• Album Flip
• Shuffle, repeat and voice
• Podcasts and audiobooks
• Adding music from a computer
• Playlists from a computer
• Music from Google Drive
• Album art
• Fixing your library
• Deleting music
• Settings at a glance
• Headphones, cars and the lock screen
• Problems and support

Getting started

ClickWheel is a music player for the music you own: the songs on your phone or SD card, plus, if you like, a music folder on Google Drive. The top half of the screen shows menus and Now Playing; the bottom half is the click wheel you control it with.

The first time it opens, a short setup asks three things: let ClickWheel find your music (one Android permission), choose the folders that hold it, and whether to tidy it up. Press the center button to go along with what's highlighted, or turn the wheel to pick something else. MENU goes back a step.

• Do It For Me tidies up for you: it removes extra copies of songs, fills in missing song details, and files everything into Artist and Album folders. Android asks before each change, and every part can be undone.
• Leave My Files As They Are: changes nothing.
• Later: you can do any of this in Settings > Library > Fix My Library.

The click wheel

• Turn the wheel: scroll. Spin fast to race through long lists; the letter you've reached shows in the middle.
• Center button: choose the highlighted item.
• Hold the center button: options for the highlighted song, album or artist (Play Next, Add to On-The-Go, Add to Playlist, album art, delete and more).
• MENU: back up one level. Hold MENU to jump to the main menu.
• Play/pause (bottom): play or pause. Hold it to ask for music by voice.
• Next and previous (right and left): skip songs. Previous starts the song over if it has played more than 3 seconds.
• Hold next or previous: jump forward or back 10, 20 or 30 seconds, again and again while held (Settings > Playback > Skip Interval).

How far you turn for each step, how fast a quick spin speeds up, how long a hold takes, and the click sound and buzz are all in Settings > Click Wheel.

The touch screen

You can also use the screen itself. Turn this off in Settings > Click Wheel > Touch Screen if you want the wheel only.

• Tap a row: choose it. Hold a row for its options.
• Drag up or down: scroll. Flick to keep it moving.
• Go back: tap the title bar, swipe right, or use your phone's back gesture.
• Tap outside an options box: close it.
• Title bar: a moon or sun on the left (dark or light screen), a gear on the right (Settings), and, while music plays, a Now Playing button in the middle. On Now Playing that button says Main Menu.
• Slide along the title bar: move through the song that's playing.

The main menu

The main menu shows Playlists, Music, Album Flip, Podcasts, Audiobooks, Settings, Shuffle Songs and Import Music, plus Now Playing while music is playing.

Choose what it shows in Settings > Display > Main Menu: you can add Artists, Albums, Songs, Genres, Search and Wi-Fi Transfer, or hide what you don't use.

Music holds everything: Album Flip, Playlists, Artists, Albums, Compilations, Songs, Genres, Audiobooks, Podcasts and Search. Search lets you spell with the wheel, type, or speak.

Now Playing

Now Playing shows the cover, the song, the artist and the album, with the time played and left.

• Turn the wheel: move through the song. To make it change the volume instead, use Settings > Click Wheel > Now Playing Wheel Function.
• Center button: repeat the song on or off (the box at the top right ticks).
• Progress bar: drag along it, or tap it, to jump to a spot.
• MENU: go up to the list the song came from.
• Cloud and the word Drive: the song is playing from Google Drive.

Choosing the song that's already playing never starts it over; it carries on and opens Now Playing.

Playlists and On-The-Go

Playlists comes first on the main menu.

• New Playlist: name it, then use Add Songs to tick the songs you want.
• Inside a playlist: the songs come first, then Add Songs and Delete Playlist. Hold a playlist to rename it, play it shuffled or delete it.
• On-The-Go: a quick list. Hold any song or album and choose Add to On-The-Go. Save turns it into a named playlist.
• Top 25 Most Played, Recently Added and Recently Played: these fill themselves in. A song counts as played once you've heard half of it.

Deleting a playlist never deletes its songs. Playlists can also be made and edited from a computer: see Playlists from a computer.

Album Flip

Album Flip shows your albums as covers you flip through. Open it from the main menu, or turn your phone sideways to see it full screen.

• Turn the wheel or swipe: flip through the covers.
• Choose the middle cover: turn it over to see its songs; choose a song to play it.
• Hold a cover: the album's options. An album without a cover shows its name on a colored card; holding it offers Add Album Art first.

Shuffle, repeat and voice

• Shuffle Songs (main menu): your whole library in random order. Albums, artists, genres and playlists each have their own Shuffle.
• Choosing a song: plays its list in order.
• Repeat: the center button on Now Playing plays the current song again and again.
• Hold play/pause: say what you want, a song, an album, an artist or a playlist. For example "Master of Puppets by Metallica", "the album Abbey Road", "play my Road Trip playlist", "shuffle Metallica" or "some music".

Podcasts and audiobooks

Podcasts and audiobooks remember where you stopped, for each episode or book. New podcast episodes show a blue dot until you play them.

Change their speed (Slower, Normal or Faster) in Settings > Playback > Audiobook Speed. Music always plays at normal speed.

Adding music from a computer

Import Music on the main menu gathers every way to add songs.

From a Computer (Wi-Fi):

• Your phone and computer need to be on the same Wi-Fi.
• On the phone, open Import Music > From a Computer. It shows an address. Copy or Share sends it to your computer; with Phone Link it pastes straight into your PC's browser.
• Open the address in your computer's browser, then drag songs or whole album folders onto the page, or use Choose Songs or Choose a Whole Folder.
• Songs are filed into Artist and Album folders on the phone. Songs already on the phone are skipped, and only real music files are accepted.
• The address stays the same, so you can bookmark it. Wi-Fi Transfer turns itself off after 30 minutes without uploads; if that happens mid-upload, turn it back on on the phone and press Try Again on the page.

The same page has a Playlists tab for managing your playlists from the computer: see Playlists from a computer.

From Files on This Phone: Android's file picker, where you can pick songs from Downloads, other apps or storage services. They're copied into your music.

Playlists from a computer

Your playlists can be made and edited on a computer, which is quicker for long lists. Open the Wi-Fi page (Import Music > From a Computer on the phone, then the address in your computer's browser) and choose the Playlists tab.

• New Playlist: starts one. Type its name in the box at the top; that's also how you rename one.
• Add songs: type part of a title, artist or album in the search box, then press Add next to each song.
• Reorder: drag songs up or down, or use the up and down arrows. The x removes a song from the playlist (the song stays on the phone).
• Import: brings in playlists from iTunes, Winamp, VLC and other players (M3U, M3U8 or PLS files). Songs are matched to the ones on your phone by file name, then artist and title, and it tells you how many it found.
• Export M3U: saves a playlist as a file you can keep or use in another player.
• Delete Playlist: removes the playlist; its songs stay on the phone.
• On-The-Go: there too. You can add, move and remove its songs, and Clear On-The-Go empties it.

Syncing is automatic, with nothing to press. Every change saves to the phone as you make it, and changes made on the phone appear on the page within a few seconds. The line under the playlists says when it last checked; Sync Now checks right away. If it says the phone can't be reached, open Wi-Fi Transfer on the phone again.

If the same playlist was changed on the phone and on the page at the same time, nothing is overwritten without asking. The setting under the page decides: Ask me (the default) shows both versions so you can pick, or always keep the phone's version, or always keep the page's.

Music from Google Drive

ClickWheel can play the music you keep in a Google Drive folder. It works through the Google Drive app, which must be installed on your phone and signed in to your Google account. ClickWheel itself never signs in to Google.

To connect:

• Settings > Google Drive > Choose a Drive Folder.
• In the picker, tap the menu (top left) and choose Drive.
• Open your music folder, then tap Use This Folder, and Allow.

Every artist and album inside that folder joins your library, marked with a small cloud. Songs play straight from Drive while you're online.

• Download to Phone: hold a Drive album or song to keep it on the phone for listening offline.
• When Offline: choose whether Drive songs hide when you have no connection.
• New songs: songs you add to the Drive folder show up at the next sync, which happens when the app opens, or with Sync Now.
• Read only: ClickWheel can only read the one folder you chose, and never changes anything in your Drive.

Album art

ClickWheel uses the covers inside your music files. For albums without one it looks online (on Wi-Fi only, unless you change Settings > Library > Album Art).

Hold an album and choose Album Art:

• Find Online: looks up the cover again.
• Choose a Picture: uses any picture on your phone.
• Remove My Picture: goes back to the original.
• Save Cover to Phone: saves the cover to Pictures > ClickWheel.
• Use for Other Discs: gives the cover to the album's other discs ("Disc 2", "CD 3") in one step.

Fixing your library

Settings > Library > Fix My Library has tools to clean up your collection:

• Tidy Up For Me: does everything below in one go, the same as Do It For Me during setup.
• Missing Info: lists songs without an artist, album or title, with suggestions from their file and folder names, or an online lookup that matches whole albums by their song lengths. Your files aren't rewritten; ClickWheel keeps its corrections, and Undo My Changes goes back.
• Duplicates: finds songs you have more than once, even under different names, and keeps the best copy.
• Albums in One File: splits an album saved as one long file into its songs, using its .cue track list.
• Organize Files: files your songs into Music > Artist > Album folders. Undo Last Organize puts everything back.

Android asks before ClickWheel changes or removes any file.

Deleting music

Hold a song, album or artist and choose Delete. You'll see:

• Cancel / Go Back: highlighted first, so a double press never deletes.
• Delete from Phone (30 days): moves the files to the phone's trash. Settings > Library > Undo Last Delete brings them back.
• Remove from App Only: hides them in ClickWheel and leaves the files alone. Settings > Library > Removed Music brings them back.

Google Drive songs can only be removed from the app; your Drive isn't touched.

Settings at a glance

• Playback: EQ (22 presets), Sound Check (evens out loudness), Skip Interval, Audiobook Speed, Silence Notifications.
• Click Wheel: Sensitivity, Acceleration, Hold Time, Clicker (sound and buzz), Touch Screen, Now Playing Wheel Function.
• Display: Theme (silver or black player), Dark Screen, Backlight (keep the screen on), Main Menu.
• Library: Music Folders, Song Order, Import Music, Fix My Library, Album Art, Removed Music, Rescan Library.
• Also: Google Drive, Sleep Timer (stop playing after 15 minutes to 2 hours), Help, About and Reset Settings.

Silence Notifications quiets notification sounds while music plays, using your phone's Do Not Disturb (Priority only). Calls and alarms your Do Not Disturb settings allow still come through. It's off until you turn it on, and asks once for Do Not Disturb access.

Headphones, cars and the lock screen

• In the background: music keeps playing when you leave the app or lock the phone. The lock screen and notification have play, pause and skip.
• Bluetooth and headphones: their buttons work, and music pauses when headphones are unplugged.
• Android Auto: browse your albums, artists and playlists on the car screen, search, or ask "Hey Google, play ... on ClickWheel".
• Closing the app: swiping ClickWheel away in Recent apps closes it and stops the music. Next time it opens on the same song at the same spot.

Problems and support

• Songs missing: check Settings > Library > Music Folders, then Rescan Library.
• Songs that won't play: some formats, such as WMA and APE, can't play on Android. Convert them to MP3 or FLAC on a computer first.
• Something went wrong: Settings > About > Last Problem shows what happened. Share Details sends it to us so we can fix it. Nothing is sent unless you share it.
• Questions or ideas: hello@tidyaudio.com.

ClickWheel has no accounts, ads or tracking. Your music, playlists and settings stay on your phone. The full privacy policy is at clickwheel.tidyaudio.com/privacy.