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Topic: Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones? (Read 4392 times) previous topic - next topic
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Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Hello guys

first post on here, (apart from the one asking where the 'new topic' button was  )

i use foobar religiously and it has been the most solid piece of software ive used.

this is my question.....

i have multiple computers, and each of them has foobar, and each has its own folder with music, (which are usually different per computer)

so i add the 'resident' folder into foobar on each computer and it scans lovely. then i have 2 portable usb drives that contain masses of music and audio for my work.

i add the 'external' drive onto one computer and foobar scans it and all is great, but! obviously when i remove the drive and move it to another computer, the one i removed it from still keeps the drive in its memory and foobar still displays tracks from that drive even though its not connected.

is there a way to get foobar to ignore any audio that is on a 'missing drive'??

as currently if i search for an album, and for some reason it is on both the local, and removable drive, when i drag the album into my playlist, i then have to go through the playlist and delete the 'duplicate' files that are missing so that it doesnt try and play them.

there must be a way to solve this apart from deleting the drive and re-adding it everytime. i have it setup so that no matter what, the drives alwaysw come up with the same drive letter on every computer so that its just plug and play....

any thoughts??

waffled on a bit there, but hopefully that makes sense...


cheers in advance!



lm

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #1
Hi,

Not a Foobar expert by any means, but will try to help
What Library viewer are you using? Some viewers, like Album List Panel, might have a Refresh Tree option if you right click on them.
Maybe activating it when your external drive is unplugged might solve your problems?

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #2
Hi there Frecktel...

cheers for the reply..

well i am using the album list view like you say, but i cant seem to find any way of refreshing the list from that window directly. I am sure that i have all the options opened up in the right click menu, but there doesnt seem to be anything there.
im also not a great expert, but i guess the album list is just displaying info from a stored database of audio file tags. i think actual information about file location, stems from earlier in the chain. im probably wrong though, but i am only guessing really.

theres a probably a big button somewhere saying 'ignore missing drives' but im damned if i can find it....

any thoughts??



cheers


lm


Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #3
there is probably a way to do it using the playlist view options in preferences, maybe by using some IF commands to check whether the drive is there or not, but that sort of thing is way above my pay grade to be honest!

hopefully someone has had this same thing and can chip in...


cheers again


lm

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #4
Quote
theres a probably a big button somewhere saying 'ignore missing drives' but im damned if i can find it....

Let's try to create it!
If you right click on the existing previous, play, pause next, etc. buttons, select Buttons Options ->add -> Main Menu Items, then create a button for Library/Rescan folders, you might be able to create a single click button to remove all dead links from your unplugged drive.
The description of that button is "Rescans Folders specified in your media library configuration to update media library with newly added as well as remove references to files that have been deleted".
This is pretty close to what you want to achieve I think.
Still, I'm surprised it doesn't do it by itself when monitoring folders. There must be something we're missing.
Hope this helps.

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #5
Thanks Frecktel,

well i have tried the button, i added it to the controls at the top and done some tests. Its strange, it rescans folders etc like it says, but the only thing it doesnt seem to do is remove the stored folder path for the files.
If i actually move a folder of audio to somewhere else, it recognises that, and if i delete a folder of music from either of the drives it registers that, but for some reason it fails to remove the link to multiple locations from the file itself.

very odd, but actually while i was messing around i noticed the 'remove dea items' option in the edit menu. I hadnt seen that before because it had been greyed out. As it seems you have to be in the playlist window for it to work, not the media library list view.

That actually does exactly what i need, but the problem is i have to do it myself. now im not saying i am the laziest person on the planet, but for my work i need to be able to just search for something then add it and then leave it.

There has to be a way for foobar to do this automatically, but the truth is, that works. i can add the button to the top and then just click that after dragging the album across. this removes the dead links.

my other small problem is, its not always me using the computer, so people have these file errors pop up all the time when foobar cant find the file, and i get a phone call every time


does anyone know how to make this happen automatically?


cheers for the help by the way, much appreciated...



lm

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #6
my other small problem is, its not always me using the computer, so people have these file errors pop up all the time when foobar cant find the file, and i get a phone call every time

Customize the button to look like a massive refresh button! Quite the brute force solution to your problem (people calling you), but when people see a big button, they tend to click it if there is a problem... Else unplug your phone! 

There has to be a way for foobar to do this automatically[...]

Agreed. I use external drives too, but very rarely unplug them. I always found that Foobar2K was correctly updating my library. But I never had duplicated files, so I never ran into your problem. From here, I'll guess we'll have to wait for the big guns to propose solutions...

cheers for the help by the way, much appreciated...

Brainstorming more than anything mate. Trying to learn more about FB2K myself, so thank you for your interesting question in the first place!

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #7
Anyone have any more ideas on the whole removable drive problem??

someone must know a way to get foobar to automatically ignore dead links and therefore not cue them up in the playlist window....

anyone........ ?

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #8
Try library search filters using the "filter search" toolbar and look here http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=92647

I suggest you set up your portable drive letter assignments so that they appear as the save drive letter everytime you connect, ensure these drives are included in your Foobar2000 library music folders, and use the search filters to ignore the portable drive letters when appropriate.

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #9
Try library search filters using the "filter search" toolbar and look here http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=92647

I suggest you set up your portable drive letter assignments so that they appear as the save drive letter everytime you connect, ensure these drives are included in your Foobar2000 library music folders, and use the search filters to ignore the portable drive letters when appropriate.


Hi Godrick

thanks for the advice. actually thats exactly what i have, each external drive is programmed to be the same letter on every computer and foobar has it logged in its media library drives. i will take a read through the post you gave me and see if i can work out the search filters thing. that seems like it would work also, but im still gona try and hold out for the automatic approach, as im sure it can be done .

will check out that thread, cheers for the link!


lm

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #10
Hi again

ok well i read that thread, it seems to discuss vaguely what i want to do, but seems like a slightly different end result. there the guy wants to be able to basically search seperately within different libraries, which i think is probably crazy impossible... i guess the main issue would be that you get duplicates of everything if you have multiple copies of files.

just so i can clear what i need more in my head than anyone else, basically....

home computer...drive E has my audio
work laptop...drive D has my audio

external drive (permanently labelled as M (for music  ahem) which is always drive M on every computer of mine ... has audio that is both a copy of some audio on each computer, and has unique audio on it aswell.

so foobar on each computer has its own resident drive being monitored, and also has drive M registered.

therefore, when i dont have drive M: connected to either of them, the files are not available, but foobar still thinks they are there, right up until the point where it trys to play them.

my goal is for foobar to KNOW that the drive isnt connected, and therefore to ignore any files that are registered with path M:/....blah blahddy nuggets.


so this would allow me to search for artists, or descriptions, and it would only show me the files that are actually physically attached to the computer. if this isnt possible pre-playlist, then surely there is a way to tell foobar to ignore 'dis-connected' drive files as you drag them over into the playlist window. it should just not add them to the playlist.


its that automatic aspect that im looking for.....


maybe there just isnt a way, it could just be an actual software thing that could be added i guess....


cheers again..



lm

 

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #11
i don't know what library viewers you guys are using, or in which other contexts you need to exclude the not-connected drive...furthermore i don't know how elegant/easy to use the solution should be or how hoften you in/-exclude your external media
therefore my proposed solution may not fit all needs, but i guess most:

just use "%path% HAS <path of your in-/external library>" whereever you need it
this works with autoplaylists and other queries like filters (e.g. when using facets) and searches, as well with other components (like random_pools)
this simple query can be used in so many contexts in so many ways...i guess you can figure a good one yourself...
you could also add a custom column with something like "$if(%path% HAS <path of your in/-external library>,$char(<whatever>)/$rgb(<whatever>/external/...,) to have a visiual indication so you don't try to play dead items


Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #13
Hi there Ruebe

thankyou for the reply! i do know first hand that it almost impossible to offer a solution without actually being in front of the computer in question.... i did try and describe my situation as best as i can, but i dint include the user's perspective i think.

im not really up on where exactly you type all the options you have given me, for example the %path% HAS ....... etc.. is this something you do once and then it just works? or is it based on the fact that you know a particular drive is not connected?

the custom column idea seems good, and actually all i did was just right click on the header of the playlist window and show 'filepath', then when i dragged a collection of music across from the media library, it showed me the path the file lay in. and then i would go along and just delete the files that i knew werent there. problem is, sometimes there could be 200 duplicates that pop up..! (i understand a music collection should be better organised, but this is more work orientated)

like i mentioned, i could do this using the 'remove dead links' in the edit menu, but the playlist window has to have priority for that to work.

the thing is, all the ways to either show me the problem files, or remove them from the playlist are very far down the programs chain of thought. my thinking is, if the media library is 'monitoring' as it says, thenthe shouldnt the software (as i does) see that a drive is missing, and therefore just remove any reference to it in the media library view?

i have attached a view of my foobar layout, i dont think its anything special in any way, just a standard view.

i think the thing thats bugging me is that if i know the software if constantly working in the background and monitoring folders and drives, why would it show that a file is available from a certain path even though the path doesnt actually exist at the time..?

errmmm.... i havnt included an image because i dont seem to be able to do it..... will work on it though! Rueb


cheers for chippin in Ruebe, appreciate all the help i can get!




lm

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #14
I think foo_skip is still being developed, so if an existing variable doesn't exist that changes its value based on whether or not a certain drive is mounted, then perhaps you could request the creation of such a variable in the foo_skip thread.  I looked for an existing variable in the title formatting and search query areas and I didn't find anything that looked appropriate.

Media Library w/ folders from multiple drives—ignore unconnected ones?

Reply #15
Hi chaps...


sooo... im still struggling to find a way for foobar to ignore tracks that are un an 'unconnected' drive..........

has anyone got an idea how to do it yet? i have played around for a few weeks now and can still not do it.

multiple drives being monitored, but not all connected, so just want foobar to automatically not add the 'unconnected' ones to the search in media library, or when i drag an album that has a duplicate on a missing drive, i want it to NOT show me the ones that are missing....

please!!!! there has to be a way......


cheeeeers again!


lm