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[ajp_anton]

How do I name external .srt subtitles so that they are properly loaded in MC? Right now, any .srt subtitle is loaded together with any movie.

Example:

Movie1.mp4
Movie2.avi
Movie3.mkv
testing1.srt
\subs\Movie1.srt
\subs\testing2.srt

No matter which one of the three movies I play, MC matches all of them with all three subtitles (from same folder as well as from "subs" folder).

What am I doing wrong?

[RoderickGI]

I'm sure you have read the Subtitles sidecar naming rules in the Wiki: https://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Subtitles

"subtitles must use the convention, [Name]*.[Extension] where * is an identifier (or empty)"

Complications like this is one of the reasons that I put each movie into its own sub-directory. But you are correct in that only Movie1.mp4 should show any available Subtitles to select, and only movie1.srt should be offered for selection. So your issue seems a bit strange.

I just tested with the movie;

The.Matrix.1999.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264.mp4

and the Subtitle file;

The.Matrix.1999.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_English.srt

I did have an issue there as the one Subtitle file was shown twice in the menus for selection. But that is a separate issue.

However, if I added the Subtitle file;

The.Matrix.1998.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_English.srt

to the directory, it was not offered as a valid Subtitle. i.e. The Subtitle file name prefix did not match the movie file name, so it wasn't included in the selection.

Adding the file;

The.Matrix.1999.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OSX_English.srt

also saw that offered for selection, as only the suffix was changed. Also correct.

I conclude that MC is selecting the correct files for Subtitles, and I can't explain why you are seeing different results.


Maybe provide some real examples of movie and Subtitle file names which aren't working correctly. It is possible that MC is ignoring the '1', '2', '3' suffix on the movie names, but it should still only offer the \subs\Movie1.srt file for selection.

[ajp_anton]

The example in my first post is real. It's not the "original" problem, but that's what I ended up renaming stuff while testing, and it was simple enough that I showed that as an example.

Putting everything in their own folders isn't practical with as many movies as I have. The problem exists for TV series as well, where the total number of episodes in all of my shows is just too much.

Also, I believe this is some kind of root cause of another problem I've had, where language identifiers aren't recognized. So it isn't really helped by separating the folders, because MC seems to completely ignore the filename of the subtitles and thus doesn't care about the language identifier.

May I ask what the _OS_ in your subtitle filename is? I thought the "identifier" was for languages only. Also, your "English" is different from the "en" I've been told to use. Is there some hidden Wiki page that explains this?

[RoderickGI]

Putting everything in their own folders isn't practical with as many movies as I have. The problem exists for TV series as well, where the total number of episodes in all of my shows is just too much.

The MC Rename, Move, & Copy Files (RM&CF) function is very easy to use, even though it has a bit of a learning curve. It can quickly move lots of movies and TV Shows to their own sub-directories. Sure, the actual move will take a while, but if it is just a move within the one disk drive, it will be fast. Having a very large number of files in one sub-directory on Windows is not a good thing. There is actually a limit to the number of files, though it is high for later versions of Windows, NTFS etc. Still, finding files in a sub-directory with lots of files is slower. It just isn't best practice to put all movie or TV Show files in one sub-directory.

Also, I believe this is some kind of root cause of another problem I've had, where language identifiers aren't recognized. So it isn't really helped by separating the folders, because MC seems to completely ignore the filename of the subtitles and thus doesn't care about the language identifier.

I haven't tested MC's language identification from the file name for some time, so any Subtitle files I collect are assumed to be English, and are offered for selection. But it used to work, so I would assume that it still does. Language identification on srt files isn't as good as other formats, because it does rely on the file name rather than have the language information embedded in the file. But it works. I'm pretty sure MC only uses the language identifier for Force Subtitles anyway, so that the correct language Forced Subtitles are displayed automatically.

May I ask what the _OS_ in your subtitle filename is? I thought the "identifier" was for languages only. Also, your "English" is different from the "en" I've been told to use. Is there some hidden Wiki page that explains this?

I believe that the "OS" indicates that MC got the Subtitles from OpenSubtitles.org. The suffix can have more than just the language identifier in it. "English", "en" and I think "eng" are acceptable suffixes to identify the English language for the Subtitles. There isn't any specific JRiver Wiki describing the file naming layout for suffixes. I learned that by Googling and reading many years ago. Unfortunately, I have never found one reference site that provides all information about SRT naming and formatting.

I did just download French and Italian Subtitles for "The Matrix" using MC, and the files were named "The.Matrix.1998.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_French.srt" and "The.Matrix.1998.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_Italian.srt" respectively. MC then offered the English, French, and Italian Subtitles for selection.

If MC doesn't appear to be recognising the language in your Subtitle filenames, try using "English" instead of "en" and see if that works. But as above, it is only used for Forced Subtitles, allowing you to select other languages when you want to, even if your default Audio and Subtitle language is English. SRT files do not support Forced Subtitles.

[ajp_anton]

The MC Rename, Move, & Copy Files (RM&CF) function is very easy to use, even though it has a bit of a learning curve. It can quickly move lots of movies and TV Shows to their own sub-directories. Sure, the actual move will take a while, but if it is just a move within the one disk drive, it will be fast. Having a very large number of files in one sub-directory on Windows is not a good thing. There is actually a limit to the number of files, though it is high for later versions of Windows, NTFS etc. Still, finding files in a sub-directory with lots of files is slower. It just isn't best practice to put all movie or TV Show files in one sub-directory.

No, I still have every show in its own folder. But every episode of a show is in one folder. Still, I'd have to create separate subfolders for each. And it still wouldn't solve the language problem.

I believe that the "OS" indicates that MC got the Subtitles from OpenSubtitles.org. The suffix can have more than just the language identifier in it. "English", "en" and I think "eng" are acceptable suffixes to identify the English language for the Subtitles. There isn't any specific JRiver Wiki describing the file naming layout for suffixes. I learned that by Googling and reading many years ago. Unfortunately, I have never found one reference site that provides all information about SRT naming and formatting.

I did just download French and Italian Subtitles for "The Matrix" using MC, and the files were named "The.Matrix.1998.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_French.srt" and "The.Matrix.1998.Bluray.1080p.BluRay.x264_OS_Italian.srt" respectively. MC then offered the English, French, and Italian Subtitles for selection.

If MC doesn't appear to be recognising the language in your Subtitle filenames, try using "English" instead of "en" and see if that works. But as above, it is only used for Forced Subtitles, allowing you to select other languages when you want to, even if your default Audio and Subtitle language is English. SRT files do not support Forced Subtitles.

Never even thought about the automatic opensubtitles download. Somehow I don't trust it to find a correctly synced one. But I tested it now. It downloaded a .srt file similar to yours ("OS" and "English"), however the original problem persists.

[ajp_anton]

I'll continue in my old thread.

I've re-installed Media Center, and it now correctly only picks subtitles from the correct movie. But I still can't get the language selection to work.

Together with moviename.mkv, I've tried every combination of
moviename[space, _ or .][EN, en, En, English, english, Eng, ENG, eng].srt

No indication whatsoever that MC knows what language the subtitle file has.

[RoderickGI]

I'm pretty sure MC only uses the language identifier for Force Subtitles anyway, so that the correct language Forced Subtitles are displayed automatically.

But as above, it is only used for Forced Subtitles, allowing you to select other languages when you want to, even if your default Audio and Subtitle language is English. SRT files do not support Forced Subtitles.

Basically, if you want MC to only offer English Subtitles when you try to select them, you have to use one of the other subtitles formats, such as VobSub (.sub/.idx) or SubStation Alpha/Advanced SubStation Alpha (.ssa/.ass).

I think. I haven't played with .sub or other formats for some time, and not much with MC.