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[andrewberg]

I just discovered that 'Last Played' dates have gone from a large number of video files, most of which I played for sure, some even recently... Very bad news, for I actually use the [Last Played] field to sort videos (movies by playback date) decending in my playlists...

Has any one seen similar issues with date fields, and perhaps found a cause and solution? As a workaround to fill the erased fields, I tried to simply copy the [Date Created] fields over to [Last Played], but the field is not editable...

Another idea, was the issue language related? I am using the German version, and have changed the translation for 'Last Played' in my language file. However, if this were causing errors, then all files would be affected, which is not the case...

Thanks for all replies in advance! (NB: Sorry for posting on this old version of MC... I stick with it for other reasons... ;-)

[marko]

Are the affected files on removable media?
If yes, check your auto import settings... specifically, near the bottom of the "Tasks" list, what is your setting for "Fix broken links"?

[andrewberg]

Are the affected files on removable media? (...) what is your setting for "Fix broken links"?

Thanks Marko, and yes they are, but the drives are never removed, and MC is set to keep all ("Fix broken links: No)". Also, this would likely affect most of my ~5000 movies on external drives, not only the current ~800...

By the way, a similar issue was just reported as "Date imported oddities" for MC 25, but the cause wasn't found. If older MC version simply fail to work, signs of ageing?

Back to earnest, is there a way to edit the lost fields manually?

[marko]

There is, but it's not pretty. Before we get into that, can you confirm that the library tools item, "Move/Copy Fields" does not allow you to copy to the "Last Played" field?

[marko]

There is, but it's not pretty.

In anticipation of a "No" answer, here's what you need to do... The instructions below assume that the last played field for these files is empty, that MC reports "Never Played" for them all.
Part 1

• Get a list of all affected files
• Select them all
• From the top menu, choose File > Export Playlist
  
• Choose a name and save location, set type to MPL (Media Center only). "Range" means either all files listed or selected files only. Tip: maybe try just one file first to see it in action.
  
• Press the OK button to save the mpl file.

Part 2

• Open the exported mpl file in a good text editor (by 'good' I mean one with find/replace functionality, like Notepad++)
• You want to find all instances of:
  Code: [Select]
  <Field Name="Date Created"> and replace them with:
  Code: [Select]
  <Field Name="Last Played">
• Save the changes to the mpl file.
• Back to MC...
• Go to File > Import Playlist, browse to the mpl file you just saved and import it.
  
• [Last Played] for these files should now reflect [Date Created] and you can carry on from there.

NOTE: There are other menus around MC that allow the import/export of playlists, but this will only work if you use the entries on the "File" menu.

Good luck, let us know how it goes
-marko

[andrewberg]

... "Move/Copy Fields" does not allow you to copy to the "Last Played" field?

That's right, the [Last Played] field is not available in the 'Move/Copy fields' target list... which makes good sense as the field is auto-filled at runtime.

[andrewberg]

In anticipation of a "No" answer, here's what you need to do...

Thank you so much -- in fact I had a similar idea, exporting as .mpl then edit in Excel, but not sure if that works...

Before I go on, what happens to other fields in the process? I always add lots of metadata to movies, will I have to do these all over again? And/or does import create hundreds of duplicates? Thanks!

  ++ Edit: Just did a test on 3 files, and results are good, no duplicates, existing fields fully preserved including the one replaced with 'Last Played' using text editor! Great, now will run again for the rest of files...

One more trick: As 'created / imported / modified' dates are mostly different (often years apart), I would like to only replace the newest date for each file. Can MC detect which of these 3 dates is the latest, and sort files accordingly?

[andrewberg]

Update: Since I found no way to find & replace only the newest dates (of either 'created / imported / modified') respectively, I chose to replace all 'Date Imported' fields with 'Last Played'. The result was as desired, as far as I can see... thank you again!

This was one of the occasions where a 'comparative search' feature would help to refine results, e. g. 'Date Created'=</>'Date Imported', but no such feature seems to exist in MC, or does it?

Also, I still wonder how the issue could happen in the first place, and how to avoid it moving forward... Possibly caused by changes to language file, auto tagging, number of plays (used a lot) etc?? Any insight is higly appreciated! ;-)