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Library sorting and tags

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eruse:
Hi-
I am using the Standard View for viewing my audio library and have the library view set to "Artists."  I like the thumbnail display of the CDs in the library but want to have the library sorted by the artist's last name or band's name.  I've tried a couple of suggestions from the forum but could not get them to work:

https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=92092.0
https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=78210.0

Is it possible to configure MC to use a specific CD tag to sort the library but use a different CD tag to display the artist or band name while maintaining proper grouping of CDs under a specific artist or band?

Thanks in advance for the help.

blgentry:
The short answer:  Yes, you can.  But it's hard.

Slightly longer answer:

You can tell MC to sort any view using any field.  The thumbnail display text is totally configurable.  So you can (for example) sort by a field called [Artist Sort], and display [Artist] for each artist's thumbnail.

However, it's "hard" because:

1.  You can make an automated expression that will swap first and last name and then sort by that.  This is easy.   But...
2.  This doesn't work for things like 38 Special, Aldo Nova, Alice In Chains, Joy Division, etc.  For those you want to sort by the first word.
3.  So this means you need an override field too.  Which means that you need 3 new fields:  One to hold the auto swapped Artist name, one to hold the optional override value (or check box), and a third to hold the final value that's actually used to sort by (because it might be the swapped name, or it might be an override using the original name).
4.  "The", "A", etc are a consideration in this.  MC normally ignores these articles if you turn on "ignore articles" in it's sorting options.  But I'm not sure if this is obeyed or not on custom fields, which we are talking about.

I have not done this myself.  It's too much work for me.  There are numerous discussions about it.  You've linked to two of them.  There are lots more.  Glynor and MrC are both quite good at this king of thing, but I'm not sure if either one of them have a full working "recipe" that you can use.  That would be nice since this one has several elements.

I hope this helps rather than confuses the issue.  Good luck to you.

Brian.

eruse:
Thanks Brian-

I would prefer not to use expressions or need to figure out the expression language at all.  I know the Wiki page tries to convince you that it’s easy, but it isn’t nearly easy enough in my opinion.

Each of my CDs has an “Album Artist” tag (such as “Art Blakey”) that I would like to use to display the name of the artist.  Each CD also has an “Artist Sort” tag that I can configure (such as “Blakey”) for the purpose of sorting the library the way I want.  For the example you gave of “Alice in Chains”, I would just have the 2 tags be the same.  What I don’t know how to do is to configure MC to use the contents of the “Album Artist” tag to display the artist or band name but use the “Artist Sort” tag to sort the library.  That seems like it should be easy, not hard.

I’m a bit dismayed that MC has not implemented a simple way to do this.  It’s clearly a feature that users have wanted for at least 5 years and it is a feature that is very easy to control in other media libraries such as Plex and iTunes.

Hope that clarifies what I would like to do and that MC is able to do it.

blgentry:

--- Quote from: j_riveruser on October 18, 2019, 02:37:13 pm ---What I don’t know how to do is to configure MC to use the contents of the “Album Artist” tag to display the artist or band name but use the “Artist Sort” tag to sort the library.  That seems like it should be easy, not hard.

--- End quote ---

Well... that's pretty easy actually!  Here's how to do it:

Go to your Artists view.  Now, look up at the top just underneath the big playback information area is.  You should see that your view you are looking at has a little tab with the name of your view on it.  It probably says "Artists".  Just to the right of the name is a little down arrow.  Click the down arrow and you'll get a neat little menu.  Notice that it has a submenu called "Sort by".  Click that and you'll get lots of options.  At the bottom you'll see "Custom".  Click on that and it will let you add one or more fields to sort by.  Go find your [Artist Sort] field, and select it.

That should do it.  Your Artists view should now sort by that field.

Best of luck.

Brian.

eruse:
Many thanks Brian-

I’ll give that a try when I’m back at my computer but that won’t be for a couple of days.  Will let you know the results.

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