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[AlanDistro]

I thought this was the purpose of "stacks" but after reading the wiki article, I was wrong. So...

Is there a feature that will non-destructively link two tracks to appear as one in JRiver?

For example, I will never want to hear Pink Floyd's "Brain Damage" without also hearing "Eclipse" right after it. But when I shuffle, JRiver treats those two tracks as separate entities. I'd love to link them so that if JRiver shuffles, it sees those two tracks as one song (I assume the classical guys would love this as well for different parts or movements of one larger piece).

Is that possible?

If not, is there a "destructive" way to combine two tracks into one without having to use a third party piece of software? (like, obviously I could open both tracks in Audacity, and then export them as one track, but I'd much rather select both in JRiver and choose "combine" or something like that)

[Matt]

Pick the files you want linked together, right-click, and pick Library Tools > Link Tracks.

That'll make them always play together and stay together through a shuffle.

[AlanDistro]

Pick the files you want linked together, right-click, and pick Library Tools > Link Tracks.

That'll make them always play together and stay together through a shuffle.

Hah, perfect. Thank you. Is there any visual indication that tracks are linked like there are for stacks? I found a column header for "Link", but it only shows a string of numbers next to the first track in the link. I think over the years I'll get confused about which tracks are linked and which aren't, so it might help to have the visual reminder.

[~OHM~]

I think you should find a playlist called Linked Tracks....now this may only appear after you have made a link. Or somehow I made it from help here on Interact after that feature was added...I just don't remember!

[marko]

I think you should find a playlist called Linked Tracks....now this may only appear after you have made a link. Or somehow I made it from help here on Interact after that feature was added...I just don't remember!

I don't have that. Is it a playlist or a smartlist? If it's a smartlist, could you post the search rule?

I'm with AlanDistro on this... It has bothered me on and off for a long time now. The linking of tracks is a great feature. It also works exceptionally well in the photo library, where we want a sequence of shots to always play together, but, my OCD really gets the better of me because I want to have a view that shows me all the sets of linked files.

All the linked members have a [Link] field, which contains the "FileKey()" of the next file... except, of course, for the last file in the link.

If we know the FileKey() value, is there any way to use it to return the file it relates to?
I tried something along the lines of if(isempty([link]),,FileKey([link])) but that fails.

[~OHM~]

It's yellow so it may be a smartlist....not sure sorry

I guess it is a smartlist...someone helped me.....obviously

[~OHM~]

looks like it was Matt and Brian (Blgentry)

https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,107321.msg745317.html#msg745317

[marko]

Cheers for that. Sadly, and possibly surprising for you, that will NOT return the full linked sequence.

Imagine three linked files... The [Link] field for these is like so...
File #1 --> reference to file #2
File #2 --> reference to file #3
File #3 --> [Link] is empty

This means that File #3 will not be present in your smartlist results.

Thanks for the link, posted while I was typing confirming what I had typed

[~OHM~]

can you fix it?

[marko]

Not at the moment. I won't believe this is not possible until Matt / Hendrik tell me so

If we know the FileKey() value, is there any way to use it to return the file it relates to?
I tried something along the lines of if(isempty([link]),,FileKey([link])) but that fails.

I think FileKey([Link]) is like a circular reference kind of thing. How do we go "Here's the FileKey, show me the file" ?

[blgentry]

As far as I can tell, FileKey() doesn't take an argument.  It gets the file to operate on based on context.  It's just returning the filekey (numeric identifier) of the file you run it on.  I can't find an inverse to convert filekey to something else.  ...and you have to wonder how you'd use that if you had it.  I guess you could have a column that showed the filename of the next linked track or something...

Take a look at my post in the linked thread:  https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,107321.msg745322.html#msg745322

Notice that my expression expands to full albums.  Because my links are always within albums, I always see all linked tracks.  I also see the "not linked" tracks in each album, but it's visually very easy to spot which ones are which.  Plus the view is limited to those albums that *do* have linked tracks, which narrows it down to what you want to see.  See the screen shot in the link above.

For photos I'm not sure if this, or some other expansion term would work well or not.  I've only played with MC's image support a little bit and I wasn't really able to get the hang of it, so I haven't returned to it in a while.

The only really clean way I can think of solving this problem would be to change how linked tracks work.  Namely, turning linked tracks into doubly linked lists instead of singly linked lists.  [Link Next] would point to the next track in the link chain.  [Link Previous] would point to the previous track in the linked chain.  You could easily find them all by specifying a search term of [Link Next] not empty OR [Link Previous] not empty.  This would also neatly solve the problem of adding say, linked track #2 to Playing Now and wondering why it doesn't pull in Linked Track #1 with it.  Having next and previous links would allow you to pull in previously linked tracks also.

Brian.

Brian.

[AlanDistro]

Sorry for another question, but because shuffle is random I can't exactly test this... obviously when the first linked track comes up in shuffle, it'll play the second track... but what if the second track comes up in shuffle? Will it know to play the first track before the second? Because the second track doesn't have anything in the "Link" column, I could see how maybe JRiver might be tricked into playing just the second track when that one comes up on shuffle, but correctly playing both when the first track comes up. Hopefully that's clear?

[Matt]

I'm thinking about adding a "Link Start" field that's the ID of the first file in the link and would be set for all the files in the link.

Using that, it's pretty simple to see if a track is in a link because the "Link Start" value isn't empty.

Is that a good idea?

Thanks.

[marko]

Sounds good. Cannot think of any reason it would be a bad idea.

This would allow us to build a view that specifically only contains linked files, which would be peachy

[blgentry]

obviously when the first linked track comes up in shuffle, it'll play the second track... but what if the second track comes up in shuffle? Will it know to play the first track before the second?

I think it might depend on how you are using MC.  There is a shuffle setting which affects how tracks are added to Playing Now.  But I find that confusing and simply put what I want into Playing Now and then press "reshuffle" to randomize the tracks I just put into Playing Now.

So it kinda depends on how you are adding tracks to Playing Now.  What is a typical workflow for you when you play music "in shuffle"?  This answer might need to include the setting of:

Tools > Options > General > Behavior > Double Click

Brian.

[blgentry]

Matt,

Your idea sounds like a fine solution to me.  Even better than my doubly linked list actually. 

Brian.

[AlanDistro]

I think it might depend on how you are using MC.  There is a shuffle setting which affects how tracks are added to Playing Now.  But I find that confusing and simply put what I want into Playing Now and then press "reshuffle" to randomize the tracks I just put into Playing Now.

So it kinda depends on how you are adding tracks to Playing Now.  What is a typical workflow for you when you play music "in shuffle"?  This answer might need to include the setting of:

Tools > Options > General > Behavior > Double Click

Brian.

Hi Brian, I use smart playlists and usually just the 12 radio buttons when I shuffle. I have a smart radio button that is set to "Modify Results -> Shuffle" my 4-5 star rated tracks, this is what I listen to 90% of the time that I'm not putting on a specific album.

My Tools > Options > General > Behavior > Double Click is set to "Replace Playing Now (all)".

[blgentry]

As far as I can tell, if your Smarlist does NOT contain all of the linked tracks, then adding the last track of a linked chain will not include the other track or tracks.

I think for your uses, you probably won't run into a case where your smartlist picks only a last track, because you probably have linked tracks all rated the same for any given link chain.  The key here is that all tracks in the linked chain have to be in the same playlist or view that you are playing.

My testing on this has been limited, but I'm pretty sure I'm correct.  All the linking does is make sure of this:  When you add tracks in a linked chain to Playing Now, it makes sure that they are ordered sequentially.  That seems to be it.

Brian.

[AlanDistro]

As far as I can tell, if your Smarlist does NOT contain all of the linked tracks, then adding the last track of a linked chain will not include the other track or tracks.

I think for your uses, you probably won't run into a case where your smartlist picks only a last track, because you probably have linked tracks all rated the same for any given link chain.  The key here is that all tracks in the linked chain have to be in the same playlist or view that you are playing.

My testing on this has been limited, but I'm pretty sure I'm correct.  All the linking does is make sure of this:  When you add tracks in a linked chain to Playing Now, it makes sure that they are ordered sequentially.  That seems to be it.

Brian.

Awesome. So linking three tracks won't cause that linked sequence to show up in the playlist three times, it'll just ensure the three tracks always play in order, overriding shuffle momentarily. That's really cool.