RateYourMusic Web Rating Distribution Overlay

WHAT IT DOES

This tool visualizes RateYourMusic rating distributions as an interactive horizontal bar chart. It extracts rating counts per star level (0.5 to 5.0), average rating, total number of ratings, and the user's personal rating from the page. The panel displays each rating level with a color-coded bar—green for high ratings (4.0+), yellow for medium (2.5-3.5), and red for low (0.5-2.0). The user's personal rating is highlighted with a blue bar and a glowing effect. Summary statistics show the weighted average, median, total ratings, and user rating. A legend explains the color coding. Toggle controls let you show/hide the user rating and display percentages on bars.

WHERE IT RUNS

The script activates on RateYourMusic pages (rateyourmusic.com), including release pages, album pages, and rating overview pages. It automatically detects rating distribution data using multiple extraction strategies that work across different RYM layouts. The panel appears as a draggable overlay that stays accessible as you browse release ratings.

HOW TO USE

Navigate to any RateYourMusic release page. The panel will appear showing the rating distribution chart. Toggle "User on/off" to show or hide your personal rating on the chart. Toggle "Pct on/off" to show or hide percentage labels on each bar. Set the "Refresh (s)" input to control how often the script checks for updates (default 60 seconds). The "Refresh" button manually updates the data. The summary shows the average rating, median, total ratings, and your rating. The bars show the distribution of ratings across all users who rated the release. The legend explains the color coding by rating range.

THE TECHNICAL MECHANISM

The script employs a multi-strategy DOM extraction approach for RateYourMusic's rating interface. It first attempts structured selectors targeting known class names like .rating-distribution, .ratings-distribution, and .rating-stats, then falls back to heuristic detection of rating bars based on content patterns including rating levels (0.5, 1.0, etc.) and star indicators. Rating counts are extracted from text patterns matching level numbers followed by counts, or from bar elements with text containing both rating and count. The average rating is extracted from patterns like "avg: X.XX" or "average: X.XX". The total number of ratings is extracted from patterns like "X ratings" or "X votes". The user's personal rating is extracted from patterns like "your rating: X.X". The median is calculated from the cumulative distribution when not directly available. Weighted average is calculated from the distribution data when not found directly. The bar chart uses CSS for rendering with width percentage based on the maximum count. All settings are persisted using GM_setValue. The auto-refresh uses setInterval with a user-configurable interval, and a MutationObserver watches for page updates.

THE PANEL

The panel is fully draggable by its header and remembers its position on the page across sessions. It can be collapsed to a small bubble using the minimize button, then restored by clicking the bubble. The panel resizes automatically to fit its content and can be closed with the Escape key or by clicking the close button. The panel's position and state persist globally, so it returns to the same location on subsequent visits.

PLEASE NOTE

Requires the free BotGentz extension to run. RateYourMusic may update its site structure, which could affect the script's ability to detect rating data — updates will be released as needed. All rating data is read from the page and displayed locally; nothing is transmitted externally. The script reads data from the visible page and does not access any data beyond what is visibly presented. The script does not modify your RateYourMusic account or ratings. The median calculation uses the distribution data from the page and may not match the official median if the page data is incomplete. This tool is for informational purposes only and is not affiliated with RateYourMusic.