Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

2023-03-19 00:23:15

Step By Step Guide To Favoriting Songs with Foobar v 1.6.10

(I have used Step by step guide to use ratings with foobar2000 0.9.5 as a template for this guide, changing the explanations where necessary and keeping the original explanations otherwise. That guide shows you how to rate your songs on a scale from 1 to 5 with keyboard shortcuts. This guide is for a simpler rating system of either favorited or not, similar to the "Liked" heart icon on Spotify. Thank you to jayjo for the original guide, which helped me figure out this similar system.)

This guide will show you how to "Like" or "Favorite" a song with a keyboard shortcut, display a ♥ in a "Favorite" column in your playlist for each song you've favorited, and save that status to the Rating tag of an mp3. You will also be able to remove the heart (♥) with a separate keyboard shortcut.

These steps use the existing features of the most current Foobar version with just one additional component "Quick Tagger", which is officially supported by Foobar.

Step 1: Get Quick Tagger which is needed to update the "Rating" tag. We will use the Rating tag to "favorite" songs.
Download: Quick Tagger from https://www.foobar2000.org/components
Then add this plugin to Foobar by going to Foobar Preferences -> Components, then clicking the Install... button. In the pop-up dialog box, navigate to where you downloaded the Quick Tagger plugin and double-click on the plugin file. The plugin will be installed.

Step 2: Set Up Rating column in playlists to display a ♥ next to favorited songs (songs with certain high Rating tag values)
Open Foobar Preferences -> Display -> Default User Interface -> Playlist View
Under Custom Columns, Click "Add New" button

Set Name To:

Code: [Select]

Favorite

Set Pattern To:

Code: [Select]

$ifequal($meta(rating),4,♥,) $ifequal($meta(rating),5,♥,)

This adds a column called "Favorite" to our playlists. If a song has a Rating tag value of 4 or 5, a ♥ symbol will be displayed in the column. If the song's Rating tag has any other value, such as 3, 2, 1, or 0, or no value at all, the heart will not be displayed.

(You can name the column whatever you want--you can call it "Liked" if you want, for example. It doesn't have to be called "Favorite" if you prefer a different title.)

Step 3: Add "Rating" to Preferences box
Open Foobar Preferences -> Advanced -> Display -> Properties Dialog -> Standard Fields.
Add "Rating=RATING;" to the end of the string
Now when you open the properties field of a file or group of files, you can change the rating for single or multiple files, just like you can for other properties.

Step 4: Set Up Quick Tagger for "Rating" tag
Open Foobar Preferences -> Tools -> Tagging -> Quick Tagger
Click "Add New" button

Field Name:

Code: [Select]

Rating

(It must be Rating, so that the Rating tag is the tag that is updated)

Values (semicolon-separated):

Code: [Select]

0; 5

This will allow you to assign a song's Rating tag a value of either 0 or 5. A Rating tag value of 5 will display a ♥ in the Favorites column in your playlist. A Ratings tag value of 0 will result in an empty Favorite column for that file.

Under this you'll see another box:
Require confirmation before processing more [ ] tracks

Set this to 1 if you don't want confirmation for single updates. Set to a very high number if you never want confirmation on multiple file updates.

Now that this is done, you can <right click> on your song to change the rating. Choose "Tagging -> Quick Tagger -> Set <Rating> To -> 0 or 5.

Step 5: Set up quick keyboard shortcuts to update the Rating tag
Open Foobar Preferences -> General -> Keyboard Shortcuts
Click "Add New" button

Action:
Filter List by: Rating
You'll See: Tagging -> Quick Tagger -> Set <Rating> to
Underneath are the values set in Step 3 (e.g. 0 and 5)
Click on 5.

Key: Click in this box, then press the key or key combination you want for setting the Rating tag value to 5 ("favoriting" a song).

I suggest a key combination of Ctrl plus "=" (equals sign, the key where the "+" symbol is).

Click Apply.

Now click "Add New" button again. Under Tagging -> Quick Tagger -> Set <Rating> to, click on 0 (zero).

Key: Click in this box, then press the key or key combination you want for setting the Rating to 0.

For "unfavoriting" a song, I suggest Ctrl plus "-" (minus sign).

Click Apply.

Click the OK button. Now everything should work.

Re: Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

Reply #1 – 2023-03-20 17:03:52

Thank you for the guide! I'm new to foobar2000, (And this forum, Hello

)this was super helpful.

Re: Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

Reply #2 – 2023-03-20 18:29:51

Quote from: zagato2000 on 2023-03-20 17:03:52

Thank you for the guide! I'm new to foobar2000, (And this forum, Hello )this was super helpful.

You're very welcome! I'm new to the forum too, though I used to use foobar before, a long time ago.

Re: Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

Reply #3 – 2024-09-22 16:53:19

Thanks for the guide.

The link to the original guide seems broken, maybe you can check if it's a typo, otherwise who knows, maybe the thread has been deleted.

Anyway I want to post my modification of your modification

I changed the rating from your 0-5 to 1-3, because if I'd rate something 0, 1 or 2, I would rather delete the file and bye bye.
So my string for the playlist is: $IFEQUAL($META(RATING),1,♥,) $IFEQUAL($META(RATING),2,♥♥,) $IFEQUAL($META(RATING),3,♥♥♥,)
The QuickTag values I've put "1; 2; 3" instead of your "0; 5" (which btw only adds 0 and 5).
And for the shortcuts I used ctrl+1, ctrl+2 and ctrl+3.

I guess it's obvious for anybody that you can create your own system of rating, for instance you can have 0 to 10 or 0 to 5 or whatever. You'll just have to change the string adding as many sections as numbers in your rating, and then create the corresponding ratings.
It's going to be a long series of hearts if you have a rating of 10, but up to you.

Btw I use Column UI instead of the Default User Interface, and in that case the instructions are:
Open Foobar Preferences -> Display -> Columns UI -> Playlist View -> Columns.
Under the list of columns click on "New", and then you'll see where to add the title (I used Like because I wanted something not much longer than 3 hearts, but anything goes), the width (I find that 75 is the right width to fit 3 hearts. It might differ depending on the font and font-size in your system), etc.
In this case the string is not called pattern but script, so you have to select the tab "Display Script" and there you paste the string that I gave before, with one, two and three hearts, or the one you created with more or less hearts.

Easy.
Now not only you can quickly rate a song from 1 to 3 with a shortcut (which in my case when I created the shortcut I selected the box "global hotkey" so I can rate while I browse, without having to put Foobar in focus), but you can also sort a playlist according to the number of hearts.

Cheers

Re: Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

Reply #4 – 2024-09-23 14:56:27

Quote from: Infinite100 on 2024-09-22 16:53:19

I changed the rating from your 0-5 to 1-3, because if I'd rate something 0, 1 or 2, I would rather delete the file and bye bye.

By which I mean that my 1 out of 3 is like your 3 out of 5. Just to be clear.

Re: Step by step guide to use simplified ratings (Favorite/Like/♥) with foobar2000

Reply #5 – 2024-09-28 02:24:48

Quote from: Infinite100 on 2024-09-22 16:53:19

Thanks for the guide.

The link to the original guide seems broken, maybe you can check if it's a typo, otherwise who knows, maybe the thread has been deleted.

Anyway I want to post my modification of your modification

I changed the rating from your 0-5 to 1-3

Hi, thanks for your post! It's great to see what people come up with.

The link to the original post still works for me. Here is the plain URL: https://hydrogenaud.io/index.php/topic,59187.0.html

One clarification--it's the original post that uses a 0-5 rating system. My modification uses a 0 or 5 (yay or nay) rating system, as you noted. If the rating is a 5, a ♥ is displayed in the column. If the rating is 0, nothing is displayed in the column. I'm emulating the rating system of Spotify, for example. Like you, I think a simpler rating system is better.

Cheers!

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