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[DaveMc]

I would like some advice regarding the best way to do something.

A lot of the music on the computer was seasonal, which we only play during the Christmas season. Also, having imported all of the music on the computer into MC has resulted in a bit of a mess due to the way iTunes split compilation albums into folders by the artist.

What I would like to do is split out, or restrict from view, the seasonal selections from the non-seasonal and also restrict the ones I have to work on to another separate view also.

I thought I might be able to do this using libraries, but is that the best way?  Has anyone else done this?  How did you do it if so?

I greatly appreciate any advice.

Thank you,
Dave

[dtc]

I just use XMAS as the Genre tab, then exclude XMAS from any of my views except the actual Christmas one.   To do the exclusion, right click on a view, select  Customize View, then Set Files for Display and set a rule  Genre is not XMAS or Genre is XMAS.  Using XMAS instead of Christmas means that for a view that has all you genre in it, XMAS will go to the bottom on the display.

[DaveMc]

That worked great for separating out the Christmas music. Thank you.

[dtc]

Media Center determines what tracks are in an album by using the field/tag [Album Artist]. The tracks with the same [Album Artist] and [Album] tags become an album.  Typically, those tracks are stored in the same folder. For compilation albums, [Album Artist] is often set to [Various].  Albums are typically stored in a folder [Artist]\[Album] which does not work for compilation albums, as you note. If you want to collect all the tracks from a compilation album into a single folder, you need to come up with a name scheme for that. You can use [Various]\[Album] or just drop the artist part and use the album name, hoping you do not have 2 compilation albums with the same album name.  If you set [Album Artist] to [Various] you could use [Album Artist]\[Album]  and all the compilation albums will be in the Various folder.

Media Center has a very powerful tool known as Rename, Move & Copy (RMC).  It allows you to do those actions based on tag values. It not only moves the files, but updates the library to the new location. See the Wiki for a full description. For example, if you have the tracks for a compilation album selected, you could Rename these tracks to a new folder using a Filename rule like  c:\Music Files\[Album]  The tool will show you the original file name and the new file name, so you can be sure you did it right. 

You should try the tool on a few files, like one album, before doing a wholesale change. You can really screw things up with this tool if you are not careful.  But, used correctly it is incredible powerful.  You should also set the [Album Artist] to [Various] for the compilation albums.

To get to RMC, select the tracks of a compilation album, highlight them, right click and select Library Tools and Rename, Move & Copy.  Look at the preview before committing. Select Rename at the top and fill in a Filename rule.

Take it slow but once you master it the changes will be easy.

[DaveMc]

Thanks a lot!  I will definitely try this when I get the chance (probably over the weekend). I greatly appreciate your explanation of this.