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[sraymond]

Sraymond, this stuff is really beautiful! I'm impressed over what I can export here, and believe me, I'm always looking for stuff that makes my life easier! The problem is of  course that these presets are too advanced for the stuff I want to do. If youy've got the time, I'd love to have a very simple preset, looking like this:

Genre
Artist                     - Album               (Album ID)
Artist 1                  - Album 1            (1)
Artist 1                  - Album 2            (2)
Artist 2                  - Album 1            (3)


And so on. This would be easy to print out. The only quirk: I do not want to print out compilation albums (any albums with multiple artists). For those I would like this scheme:

Album                (Album ID)
Album 1               (2578)
Album 2               (2579)

And so on. Would this be possible, perhaps even easy? Thanks again!

Possible and easy!

I just need to be clear on what you expect for an output.  It only needs to be a text document?  No fancy presentation such as HTML, color, italics, etc?  No paging?

Can you describe "compilation albums" better?  How do you know there are multiple artists?  Is it because the [Album Artist (auto)] is "Various"?  Are you saying that the compilation albums should be at the end (after all the Artists are listed)?

Was the ArtistAlbumListing pretty close?

Scott-

[Mastiff]

Nila, it worked when I installed the first one and did a re-register with regserver.  

[Mastiff]

sraymond, if possible I would like printer friendly HTML, in other words with bold Genres in a font a few points larger, preferably on the top of every page, A4 format, no colors (I will use a laser printer anyway).

As for compilation albums the [Album Artist (auto)] is (Multiple artists), not various.

[sraymond]

Mastiff,

You didn't answer the question:

Are you saying that the compilation albums should be at the end (after all the Artists are listed)?

And one big long HTML table is sufficient?  Off the top of my head, I think a <thead> element is repeated on every printed page.

Scott-

[sraymond]

sraymond, if possible I would like printer friendly HTML, in other words with bold Genres in a font a few points larger, preferably on the top of every page, A4 format, no colors (I will use a laser printer anyway).

As for compilation albums the [Album Artist (auto)] is (Multiple artists), not various.

Care to give me an example of the HTML?  Are you familiar with CSS?

Scott-

[Mastiff]

Oh, I'm sorry.   Yes, it would be nice to have them at the end. I sort of thought that it was necessary to make two printouts, one for compilations and one for regular. But if everything can be done in one sweep, nothing's better than that.

CSS? HTML? If you've seen my webpage you'd know that I can barely reach Macromedia Dreamweaver 101... But it would be nice to have it formatted partly like I showed you above:

Genre
Artist             - Album       (Album ID)
Artist 1                  - Album 1            (1)
Artist 1                  - Album 2            (2)
Artist 2                  - Album 1            (3)

In other words Genre in bold, preferably a few points larger (maybe 12 as opposed to 10, I don't want the printout to take too many pages) and the cloumn heading in italics, perhaps a few points larger as well. And finally (I just remembered this) underlining of the full row to make it easier to separate the row from each others with a quick glance. Am I making any sense here? I hope so...  

[Mastiff]

Nila, I found one thing when I was about to begin ID-ing the main library: It seems that ID Generator treats all media files alike. So I started to ID my digital photos as well. Is it possible to limit it to MP3's?

Also, as it is now, it seems like it runs through the library alphabetically, sorted by "Album artist (auto)". So it starts with (Multiple artists) and stops with Åge Aleksandersen (norwegian adult orientated rock). Is it possible to run through the library in a genre/Album artist (auto) order instead? Then "Alternative rock" will be the first genre in my library, and Verbel humor is the last, and within genres the playlists will be in Album artist (auto) sequence. In that order it's possible to flick through for instance a lot of heavy metal or pop albums by using the "next playlist" command in my Girder GML. Or is that to complicated because of multi genre albums?

Then, for another suggestion: The ability to force it to start on a particular number. For instance, so I can have my audio books on 9000 and up, away from the music. But I guess this is a bit more difficult. So this is just a suggestion, not even as strong as a request.

[sraymond]

But it would be nice to have it formatted partly like I showed you above:

Genre
Artist             - Album       (Album ID)
Artist 1                  - Album 1            (1)
Artist 1                  - Album 2            (2)
Artist 2                  - Album 1            (3)

In other words Genre in bold, preferably a few points larger (maybe 12 as opposed to 10, I don't want the printout to take too many pages) and the cloumn heading in italics, perhaps a few points larger as well. And finally (I just remembered this) underlining of the full row to make it easier to separate the row from each others with a quick glance. Am I making any sense here? I hope so...  

OK...  I put together a quick HTML.  To finish polishing it, could you please give me an MPL with just the fields in the output (Genre, Artist, Album Artist (auto), Album, AlbumID)?  Zip up the MPL and e-mail it to me at scottraymond@sbcglobal.net

I don't know how to just underline the cells in an HTML table.  I'd suggest alternating the background of every-other-row, but if you're going to print it out that might not be too desirable.  I'll try to bone up a little bit on HTML tomorrow and see if I can figure out table borders.

Yikes!  1:30am...  after last night's New Year's bash, my circadian clock is all screwed up!

Scott-

[Mastiff]

Eh...I would like to, but what is an MPL? This is really getting embarassing!

No, scratch that. I found it, it's a play list format... It will arrive shortly.

As for alternating colors, that could work if we were alternating between white and very light grey. That could actually be pretty nice, come to think of it!

I'm at work here (it's 10.30 or so in the morning), but the work goes slow and slightly unconcentrated. Having a week off sure can affect performance when you're not used to having more than two days off in a row...

[johnp]

Hi,

I've just started reading this thread.  Very cool ideas here.  

Tor, I like your implementation of IR remote control, and I see how this plug in really makes that a even better solution.  Very elegant and cost effective.  I hope you don't mind if I use parts of it myself.

Looks great so far.  I'm going to try it out and see how she goes.

Thanks,

John

[Mastiff]

No problemo, John. When this is all done and ready for prime time, I'll make a page on it on my website and a link to it in the MC, AVS and Girder forums.  

[johnp]

Here are my initial results.

I installed plugin and had similar problems as others...  Had manually register ocx and manually delete the extra plugin.

Once I figured out how to create the AlbumID field, (OK, so I'm sort of a MC newbie) I had no problem generating the Albums ID's and playlists.  Very cool, and I can't wait for the hardcopy print out part.  Which makes nme think, couldn't we also just post htis same html on a local web server so all PC/PPC devices on the LAN could browse the list?  That would be pretty neat.

Then the trouble starts...  Whe I try to load a m3u file, I get an error message from MC that says:

"Error restoring license:  Invalid file type [M:\Data\Playlists\100.m3u]"

This seems to be a problem with MC in general not this plugin or anything else related to this thread, but since I'm here I thought you all might know why this is.  I did go to the file types area in setup and select m3u files.  No joy.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

John

Edit-- I just went to windows and registered the file type to Music Match, then went back to MC file types unregistered it and re-registered it and all is well.  This is actually very cool.  Great work you guys!

Thanks...

[nila]

So has everyone managed to get this plugin working simply by manually registering the ocx??

If this is the case I know that the installer is simply messing up and so I can just try to fix the installer so it does it properly.

Is this whats happening?

[Mastiff]

Yes, at least for my part...on two different computers.

[johnp]

That was the case for me as well.  Also had to delete the second instance of the plugin after the manual ocx registration.

JP

[sraymond]

As for alternating colors, that could work if we were alternating between white and very light grey. That could actually be pretty nice, come to think of it!

OK.  Consider it done.

Scott-

[nila]

Ok,

Seeing as you both had problems could you both do me a big favour and be my testers

Browse to the install dir and unregister the file by typing:

regsvr32 -u AlbumIDGenerator.ocx

Then run the uninstall program.

Then run the installer again and see if you get the same problem - hopefully you will.

Uninstall it again then download and run:

http://www.hostrus.co.uk/tmp/SetupAPG-new.exe

That's a new installer in which HOPEFULLY everything is working fine.

IF it doesn't give u the same problem again after u unregister and re-install could u also let me know as I really need to try to isolate whats causing the problem.


Either way though - download this new version - it's got the sorting order added to it.

[johnp]

OK, I'll let you know how it goes.

JP

[Mastiff]

Yessir, that worked. I did it your waaaaay (well, I never said I was any good at singing online...), and this installer is the way it should be. The sorting, however, is not. It finds only one album in my whole library (Enigma - Voyageur), the rest were discarded even though I even tried to create a new field that was absolutely clean and set the ID to that. This goes for all types of sorting.

[nila]

Wahoo - so did you have problems with the old way?

If so it means that Setup Factory 6's ocx file register was just messing up before.

The sort i hadn't had a chance to check - was just tryin to get the installer fixed

I'll fix it soon!

[johnp]

Sort?  Did I miss yet another cool feature?  What is the deal with sort?

JP

[sraymond]

Mastiff,

Take a try at http://pages.sbcglobal.net/scottraymond/MastifAlbumListing.zip.  It works with Scott_r.'s latest "MC XML Export" plugin.  I've been having some inconsistency with <thead>s being repeated each page and a little problem with page breaks and I noticed that backgrounds don't seem to show up in HTML Print Preview.

I *hate* HTML.  

Please let me know if this is close and I'll try to work out the HTML bugs later today or tomorrow.  I haven't taken care of the (Multiple Artists) yet, but that's easy enough.

If there are any HTML gurus out there, I'd sure appreciate some help!  

Scott-

[Mastiff]

Nila, yes, the wahoo is justified. Three times tested with the old version, and it did not work. But the new version did.  

Scott, no, that's not close. That's very close, dude! The look is exactly the way I like it! A few minor adjustments: I would like the font even a few points smaller (perhaps 1/3 smaller). And the shading didn't show up when printed out on a black and white laser printer (maybe doing it light grey instead of blue will work). With that and the compilations are in, we're were I wanted to get! Even my wife approved it!

You two are really helping me out here! If you don't mind, I will do a page on my site (like I wrote above - sorry that I didn't ask you first) to detail how to automate several zones with unlimited albums in a way that will have people with expensive multi-room cd changer systems begging for mercy!  

[sraymond]

Scott, no, that's not close. That's very close, dude! The look is exactly the way I like it! A few minor adjustments: I would like the font even a few points smaller (perhaps 1/3 smaller). And the shading didn't show up when printed out on a black and white laser printer (maybe doing it light grey instead of blue will work). With that and the compilations are in, we're were I wanted to get! Even my wife approved it!

In IE6, you need to tell it to print background colors and images.  Go to Tools->Internet Options->Advanced and look for the Printing node.  Check "Print background colors and images" and all will be well.

If you want a lighter shade of background, just go to the .xsl and change the .row0 to

Code: [Select]

               .row0 {
                  background-color:#EEEEEE;
                  }
Did the page breaks and genre headings work OK for you?  For some strange reason, they work for my library's MPL, but not for yours.

Oh...  and to speed up the generation of the HTML, make sure that you've only exported the fields that are used.  I noticed in the MPL that you sent me you included them all.  I also suspect you didn't use MCXMLExport to generate the MPL because calculated fields weren't included.

So...  compilations can be determined from the [Artist] field or the [Album Artist (auto)] field?

Scott-

[sraymond]

With that and the compilations are in, we're were I wanted to get!

How about an MPL that contains some compilations?  

Scott-

[Mastiff]

You've got mail! The compilations are defined in [Album Artist (auto)].

The page breaks were between genres, which is very nice. And no, I only exported the MPL (as with this compliation MPL I just sendt you) directly from a playlist in MC.

I guess I'm able to experiment with different text sizes as well.  

[sraymond]

You've got mail! The compilations are defined in [Album Artist (auto)].

The page breaks were between genres, which is very nice. And no, I only exported the MPL (as with this compliation MPL I just sendt you) directly from a playlist in MC.

I guess I'm able to experiment with different text sizes as well.  

Are you using IE6?  Do you get a page heading on each page?

The MPL exported using MC's internal mechanisms doesn't include calculated fields.  You'll have to use the MCXMLExport plugin in order to get [Album Arist (auto)] in the MPL.

Scott-.

[johnp]

Ok,

Seeing as you both had problems could you both do me a big favour and be my testers

Browse to the install dir and unregister the file by typing:

regsvr32 -u AlbumIDGenerator.ocx

Then run the uninstall program.

Then run the installer again and see if you get the same problem - hopefully you will.

Uninstall it again then download and run:

http://www.hostrus.co.uk/tmp/SetupAPG-new.exe

That's a new installer in which HOPEFULLY everything is working fine.

IF it doesn't give u the same problem again after u unregister and re-install could u also let me know as I really need to try to isolate whats causing the problem.


Either way though - download this new version - it's got the sorting order added to it.

Sorry for the lag, but I did get around to trying this and confirmed that the new installer works like a charm.

JP

[johnp]

OK, now for the next challenge.  I have downloaded and installed MC XML Export, and also the html generator package.  now I just have to understand how to use it.  Can anyone shed some light on this?

Thanks,

John

[sraymond]

Mastiff,

Give this XSLT a try:  http://pages.sbcglobal.net/scottraymond/MastiffAlbumListing.xsl

As soon as I get your MPL, I'll finish the compilation part and this should go good-to-go.

Scott-

[sraymond]

OK, now for the next challenge.  I have downloaded and installed MC XML Export, and also the html generator package.  now I just have to understand how to use it.  Can anyone shed some light on this?

Thanks,

John

MCXMLExport comes with Preset Configurations.  You should be able to try them out by just selecting the right one and hitting "Export".  I'm not sure what you mean by "html generator package", but if it's the MastiffAlbumListing.zip, just unzip it into the MCXMLExport directory and you'll find another preset (called, strangely enough, MastiffAlbumListing).  You'll need to restart MC or the MCXMLExport plugin to see the new preset if the plugin is running when you unzip.  There's a newer XSLT you can try...  it's mentioned in a post above this one.

Check out Scott_r.'s Website for MCXMLExport:  http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/~scottray/MC/xmlexport/
Read my XML Primer if you so desire:   http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=18045

Scott-

[nila]

Wahoooo!!!!

Grrr - Setup Factory 6 sucks!!!

After all this time, the only problem ALL my plugins were having then basically is that it wasn't registering the ocx properly.

Well at least I know now and can fix them ALL.

Thanks for the help guys.

I'll get the sort function working too.

[nila]

ok - uploaded a new version - same link as in the last post (with a link).

Sort is fixed in it

Enjoy!

[scott_r]

Nila, you're using VB6, right? Did it come with a Setup and Deployment Wizard? This might do what you need, if you've got it and haven't already tried it. I don't know how good the VB6 one is, but the VB.NET installer wizard is brilliant.

Scott.

[Mastiff]

Nila, sorry, but sort isn't fixed, it seems (at least not when I run it on my test library). This time it runs, but even though I chose Genre,Artist,Album it sorted only by Artist, it seems (maybe by album as well, but at least not by Genre). But the setup works nicely!  

[nila]

VB6 has an installer but I hate it.

Have u ever installed shareware and it comes up with that really nasty VB installer?
That's the vb6 one and it just looks uck and for me at least is a big put off.
I managed to work out a 'work around' for the bug in Setup Factory which seems to do the trick.

Thanks though Scott



Mastiff - how are you looking at the results after you do it?

The sort is simply being done with MC's build in sort function.
To get the files I'm doing a search and as part of the search I'm adding in the SORT command.

In fact - the text box that I accidentally left there and forgot to remove should have the full search string being used in MC in it.

Try copying and pasting that search string into the search box in MC and see if it works.

[Mastiff]

The sort is done correctly when I paste into the search field, but the ID's are generated based on artist name. So Alf Prøyssen, norweigan children's songs, are first, then Alvin Lee (blues) and then Asgeir (more norwgian children's songs). Instead of putting the first ID's on the alphabetically first genre, which is Alternative rock & pop.

[sraymond]

Mastiff,

Give this XSLT a try:  http://pages.sbcglobal.net/scottraymond/MastiffAlbumListing.xsl

As soon as I get your MPL, I'll finish the compilation part and this should go good-to-go.

Scott-

OK, Mastiff...  all done.  Please redownload the XSLT from the link quoted above and let me know what you think.  If you want to change the font or font-size, take a look at the .xsl and change the CSS at the beginning.

Am I done?

Scott-

[Mastiff]

Sorry, and I wish it was, but either there's something wrong with the way I'm using it or with my setup, or there's still a glitch to iron out. I get the compilation albums represented in all the genres they excist, and mixed with the single artist albums. Do you need a screenshot of my setup, or can you think about something I may have done wrong?

[sraymond]

Sorry, and I wish it was, but either there's something wrong with the way I'm using it or with my setup, or there's still a glitch to iron out. I get the compilation albums represented in all the genres they excist, and mixed with the single artist albums. Do you need a screenshot of my setup, or can you think about something I may have done wrong?

Send me the "raw XML" and the "transformed" HTML output.  If you don't mind, can you quote your config.xml file here?  Are you sure that the preset is outputing the needed database fields?

Scott-

[Mastiff]

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16" standalone="yes" ?>
- <MCXMLExportConfiguration Version="1.0">
  <CharEncodingIndex>1</CharEncodingIndex>
  <SaveRawXMLAs checked="true">MastiffAlbumListing\MastiffAlbumListingMPL.xml</SaveRawXMLAs>
  <IncludeXSLProcInstr checked="true">MastiffAlbumListing.xsl</IncludeXSLProcInstr>
  <ApplyXSLTransformation checked="true">MastiffAlbumListing\MastiffAlbumListing.xsl</ApplyXSLTransformation>
  <SaveTransformedOutputAs>MastiffAlbumListing\MastiffAlbumListing.html</SaveTransformedOutputAs>
  <ProcessImagesTo checked="false" />
  <ForceAbsoluteNaming checked="false" />
  <LaunchOutput checked="true" action="usespecifiedapp" appendoutputfilename="true">iexplore.exe</LaunchOutput>
  <TreePathToExport>Media Library\Audio</TreePathToExport>
- <FieldsToExport>
  <Field>Album</Field>
  <Field>Album Artist (auto)</Field>
  <Field>Artist</Field>
  <Field>Genre</Field>
  </FieldsToExport>
  </MCXMLExportConfiguration>

[Zarius]

A problem & a couple of suggestions:

Hmm... trying out the Album Playlist Generator and got some weird results... without any sorting it warns me that I am about to process 2737 albums, which is surprising, since MC tells me I only have 923 unique album tags (that's audio, 1033 for ML.)  If I sort by [artist],[album] or [genre],[artist],[album]  from the drop-down menu it tells me I'm about to process 1 album, and if I select [artist] it says 0.

Can it be set to just complete albums?  I have 182 'complete' albums... but 923 'unique' album tags... so I'd only want to 'complete' albums. Maybe by allowing the user to work with only a subset of the library, eg I'd add all my complete albums to the playing now and it could just do them?

It doesn't seem to work if the [albumID] field is set to 'integer' (which I had assumed it would be)... a little confusing because it told me it couldn't find the albumID field rather than telling me it was the wrong type.

A version number would come in handy whilst developing, to let me know if I've successfully installled the latest version.

[nila]

They have version numbers but I'm just not too organised with that type of thing


Not sure what's up with the strange number of returned results.

I'm going to have to remove the SORT feature.

It was relying on MC to sort the data but MC seems to ignore sort when doing a search inside the SDK so I'm going to take it out for now.
The number of albums is determined purely by MC - It's creating the 'albums' and I'm just processing them so again not something I can fix there.

I'll add an option to only process Complete albums and see if that's enough for you

[Mastiff]

That's OK, Nila. No biggie. Thanks for all your work!  

[Zarius]

Hmm... with the sorting... I've noticed a couple of plugins that grab the songs from the 'Playing Now' playlist (KingSparta's)... would it be possible with this one, 'cause I'm thinking that may solve the sorting (and allow one to limit it to a section of the library)... one could add the albums to 'Playing Now' already sorted, and the plugin would grab them one by one from the top?

Anyway, it's just an idea I had.  A 'Complete Albums' option would be great :)  Thanks for the great plugin :)

They have version numbers but I'm just not too organised with that type of thing

I know what you mean :)  I keep forgetting to increment the numbers on my builds... even though I've got an automated script to do it for me somewhere around here :|  But then, I haven't really released much I've done yet... so it doesn't matter too much :)

PS: What happens if one removes albums from the library and frees up albumID's?  Does it fill those in or keep going from the bottom (I think keep going from the bottom would be the best option)

[sraymond]

Another Preset Configuration has been added for MCXMLExport...  MastiffAlbumListing.  Named after, you guess who.

Check it out here:  http://pages.sbcglobal.net/scottraymond/Presets.htm

Scott-

[johnp]

Hi,

I have been playing with the MC XML Exporter and I'm having a bit of trouble, hoping someone can help.  When I run the export with the "Mastiff" presets, It takes a really long time to complete,  >2hours.  When it finally does complete, none of the AlbumIDs are populated.  There is just a symbol that resembles a stretched 0 for every album.

What am I doing wrong?  You guys have really done some coll stuff here, this is going to be great!

Thanks,

[sraymond]

Hi,

I have been playing with the MC XML Exporter and I'm having a bit of trouble, hoping someone can help.  When I run the export with the "Mastiff" presets, It takes a really long time to complete,  >2hours.  When it finally does complete, none of the AlbumIDs are populated.  There is just a symbol that resembles a stretched 0 for every album.

What am I doing wrong?  You guys have really done some coll stuff here, this is going to be great!

Thanks,

John,

I'm a bum for not changing this sooner - Mastiff had pointed it out to me, but I forgot to do it.  I'll try and fix it tomorrow.  The problem is that not everyone will use the same field name for the AlbumID.  In fact, Mastiff used ID - which is why you're not seeing an AlbumID information.  If you go into the .xsl, you shoud see where to make the change yourself:

Code: [Select]

                        <td width="50%">
                           <p class="hangindent">
                              <xsl:text>(</xsl:text>
                              <xsl:value-of select="Field[@Name='ID']"/>
                              <xsl:text>)</xsl:text>
                           </p>
                        </td>
Replace 'ID' with whatever you named the field (i.e. 'AlbumID').

I will change the XSLT to use a variable - so it will be easy to see at the top of the .xsl where to change the value.

If it's taking a really long time, are you sure you're only exporting the desired fields to the MPL?  If you make some concessions (like, say, only look at Track #1 for the album information), things speed up to the blink of an eye.  This is what I did for Mastiff, because his library is on the order of "huge".

If you don't mind, would you email an MPL of all your audio with all your fields in it?  Zip it up and it will be plently reasonable in size.  My address is scottraymond@sbcglobal.net.  Then I can work on optimizing the XSLT.

Scott-

[johnp]

Bum?  I don't think so.  You are making my life a lot easier and the least I can do is go through a little trial and error.  Please excuse my ignorance, but how do I complie an mpl to send you?  I am really not sure where the mpl fits into this puzzle.

Thanks for your patience with me.

John

[sraymond]

Bum?  I don't think so.  You are making my life a lot easier and the least I can do is go through a little trial and error.  Please excuse my ignorance, but how do I complie an mpl to send you?  I am really nt sure where the mpl fits into this puzzle.

Thanks for your patience with me.

John

An MPL is the "Save raw XML as" option in the MCXMLExport plugin.  This is an XML format that JRiver has specified for describing media items.  Just go into the MCXMLExport plugin, select your Media Library/Audio, all fields, check the "Save raw XML as" and set to whatever.  Just zip the result, and Bob's your uncle.

I just noticed that I neglected to check "Track #" in the preset config.xml file I packaged in the zip.  So...  that pretty much tells me you probably selected all the fields when running the export ('cause if you didn't have Track # selected, the output would be blank).  That will make the transformation take *A LONG TIME* to run.  So...  check only the fields:

Code: [Select]

   <Field>Album</Field>
    <Field>Album Artist (auto)</Field>
    <Field>Artist</Field>
    <Field>Genre</Field>
    <Field>Track #</Field>
And if you want to get slick, instead of using your Media Library as the source of items, create a playlist that just has audio and [Track #]=1.  Then the transformation will happen in the bliink of an eye.

Scott-