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[datdude]

I love the ability to be able to click any field, drag and drop any group, check any box, etc., and apply tag changes.  However there are numerous problems to this ease of change.  The main one is that metadata can get changed without ever knowing it. Cases in point:

1) Sometimes when I want to play a song I will double click it.  However sometimes this does not work because I didn't click right or whatever.  The problem is that when this happens often times the field I clicked on to play will turn to edit mode and with the ability to then scroll and select another field name, that can be replaced in a matter of milliseconds without ever knowing this has happened.  I know because I saw a song name that wasn't correct and realized that the alternate name was just below on the alphabetical list and I have also accidentally caught myself doing this as well.

2) Sometimes in the year pane view, I will accidentally drag a year instead of scrolling to highlight several years, and then accidentally drop that year into an alternate year.  This happens partially because the year pane is smaller than normal with MC11's auto pane sizing.  Combine that with tagging mode check boxes and it makes it even more difficult to highlight and easier to accidentally drag and drop a field which will overwrite all of the year tags for those files which is really bad and I didn't realize I had done this until I messed up a bunch of fields.

3) Just recently I was right clicking on a group of highlighted songs and I accidentally hit the top command in the menu which happened to be at the time, paste cover art from clipboard which of course replaced about 85 different songs worth of cover art.

The one constant in all of these scenarios is that there was never any mechanism that said do you want to do this or would you like to enable tagging mode or your selection in the tagging options does not allow you to do this or something to that affect.

I have tried to use Party Mode for general browsing, which is a great idea however it has problems as well such as resetting my view schemes to default when I revert back, so I won't be using that feature again.

Overall I have learned to use MC and avoid these tagging mistakes however what happens when friends come over to use it.  Your library is going to get messed up by them on accident.  I love MC and will continue to use it, however I am always worried and looking out for irregularities in my library because of how easy it is to change metadata in MC.

What does everyone else think?

[GHammer]

I'd be in favor of a 'tag' view.
I have found the edit box open too many times myself.

[gpvillamil]

Same here. I don't really feel safe letting anyone else use the system in anything other than party mode.

[datdude]

Same here. I don't really feel safe letting anyone else use the system in anything other than party mode.

That kinda gets rid of hallf the fun of MC.  I know I like it when my friends come over and check my system out.  But if im like 'hey guys could be carefull not screw anything up', that wouldn't fly to well.

I just noticed in the options library view that you can control whether certain fields are editable or not.  I would love to just be able to toggle between all the fields being editable or not.  Combine that with party mode for limited situations.  I don't feel that party mode can be used all the time, which I tried to do and just doesn’t work well at all. 

So there definitely needs to be some sort of toggle between all fields editable and locked.

Does that sound reasonable?

[hit_ny]

MC is too powerful that way, i agree. I have not let others use it so have not noticed the problems you mentioned, however this might change one day,

I don't do any dragging in the tag fields, never learned how to do it, seems a bit counter-intuitive (even dangerous) to me.

if i notice im in edit view by accident, a click on escape fixes that. F2 to rename etc. If its too late a Ctrl+Z to undo. The same applies in windows explorer, which is where MC inherits these shortcuts.

But i guess you learn to make slow deliberate movements when doing mass tagging.

[datdude]

MC is too powerful that way, i agree. I have not let others use it so have not noticed the problems you mentioned, however this might change one day,

I don't do any dragging in the tag fields, never learned how to do it, seems a bit counter-intuitive (even dangerous) to me.

if i notice im in edit view by accident, a click on escape fixes that. F2 to rename etc. If its too late a Ctrl+Z to undo. The same applies in windows explorer, which is where MC inherits these shortcuts.

But i guess you learn to make slow deliberate movements when doing mass tagging.

It's not just with others that can cause problems because as mentioned above I was doing things I didn't even realise.  As far as dragging, I didn't even know you could do that either unitl I realized I was doing it inadvertantly and screwed up a bunch of tags.

[GHammer]

I'm curious. When/why would you want to drag a tag to another selection?
Can you drag a tag to multiple selections (batch edit)?

For me, I'd rather highlight the selections then open a tagging dialog.

I know what to expect then.

[datdude]

I'm curious. When/why would you want to drag a tag to another selection?
Can you drag a tag to multiple selections (batch edit)?

For me, I'd rather highlight the selections then open a tagging dialog.

I know what to expect then.

Let me explain as best I can.  I would rather not drag at all however it happens from time to time whitout realizing it.  When trying to highlight several fields in a pane view one can accidentally take the first field trying to highlight and inadvertently drag it and then drop it into the field you thought you were highliting to(Try it, It's a neat trick, Trust Me ).  The reason is that you can only highlight from the right side of the pane and it has to be an open space i.e. to the right of any characters or else it will act as dragging.  Combine that with check boxes in the way and it makes it difficult to highlight.

Or course its not just dragging that I am having tagging problems with.  So we definitely need some sort of fix to the tagging system.  Maybe a toggle all fields lock or something so that none of the problems described above would ever happen.

[GHammer]

Let me explain as best I can.  I would rather not drag at all however it happens from time to time whitout realizing it.  When trying to highlight several fields in a pane view one can accidentally take the first field trying to highlight and inadvertently drag it and then drop it into the field you thought you were highliting to(Try it, It's a neat trick, Trust Me ).  The reason is that you can only highlight from the right side of the pane and it has to be an open space i.e. to the right of any characters or else it will act as dragging.  Combine that with check boxes in the way and it makes it difficult to highlight.

Or course its not just dragging that I am having tagging problems with.  So we definitely need some sort of fix to the tagging system.  Maybe a toggle all fields lock or something so that none of the problems described above would ever happen.

Ok, I got that part. But why would I want to highlight certain fields?

I'm in "incredibly dense" mode today.

[datdude]

Ok, I got that part. But why would I want to highlight certain fields?

I'm in "incrediby dense" mode today.

No Prob

I use highlite in the year pane quite often.  Say I select rock from the genre pane first.  Then maybe I want listen to some recent stuff from say 2000 to 2005 so I highlite those in the year pane.  From there I can then choose specific artists etc.  Highliting by scrolling is much fast than ctrl clicking multiple years.  The problem of course is by accident, one can drag instead of highlite a year field and screw alot of things up.

[gpvillamil]

Also - I use a wireless keyboard/mouse unit that, while OK for normal use, is not the most precise for delicate operations. So that makes the whole accidental tagging issue worse.

Another issue I have is with the depth of nested menus...

[datdude]

I have tried both rf and bluetooth.  bluetooth is much much better but I digress...It does not change the fact that many errors can occur using the MC interface

[indybrett]

I would be in favor of a check box that makes EVERYTHING read-only mode. If for no other reason than to protect me from myself.

[datdude]

I agree with you here, but, and a pretty big "but" at that, the lock should only apply to changes attempted via the user-interface. MC should still be allowed internal write access to the database. (for updating number plays, last played etc during playback)

Hide the interface lock somewhere obscure and there's a half decent replacement for party mode, which in my experience is generally pretty grotty, and was downright scary the first time I tested it out!!!!

-marko.

Exactly.  Party mode just reverts back to default settings(At Least in my case) and also has problems with showing data that was changed during party mode but after reverting back doesn't show up correctly.  I would rather just back up my library and then restore in the morning after a party rather than use party mode.

I would really like to see some sort of toggle switch that can be shown on any of the tool bars that  prevents you from editing any of the the fields available in the library relating to the files themselves.  I am not too worried about specialy UI settings and things of that nature.  I am just extremely worried about my music files (which I spent months tagging correctly) getting messed up and not even realising it until its too late!!!

[hit_ny]

There appear to be (2) things to be done here.

- provide a toggle switch to prevent editing.

- get Party Mode to not revert view schemes to default.

If Party Mode were improved would the toggle switch still be required ?

The hard part is if your friends do make changes in Party Mode, there seems to be no way to take those into account thats is for those times when they dont have UI accidents

Ahh maybe i see what your saying, get rid of Party Mode all together and just have a toggle switch. So when you were just browsing, there would be less chances of data corruption. If a change was required, toggle the switch , make change toggle back and your good to go.

[datdude]

There appear to be (2) things to be done here.

- provide a toggle switch to prevent editing.

- get Party Mode to not revert view schemes to default.

If Party Mode were improved would the toggle switch still be required ?

The hard part is if your friends do make changes in Party Mode, there seems to be no way to take those into account thats is for those times when they dont have UI accidents

Ahh maybe i see what your saying, get rid of Party Mode all together and just have a toggle switch. So when you were just browsing, there would be less chances of data corruption. If a change was required, toggle the switch , make change toggle back and your good to go.

Basically I tried to use Party Mode full time and that was not a good thing when I actually wanted to make some changes.  I don't think improving party mode will work since it is only meant as a temporary fail safe. So I would like a switch that allows me to keep my metadata in my audio files safe ALL THE TIME and when I need to change somehting, just hit the switch and MC acts as it does now.  HIt it again and Im back to 'safe mode' so to speak with all of the great MC features except that you can't change any of the metadata in the audio files.  I know this can be done but it's a question of whether JRiver wants to or not.  When I was tagging my files correctly over the past year, the MC Interface for tagging was amazing and made it a ton easier to tag.  However now that all of my songs are tagged correctly(I still hope so anyways) I am afraid of the metadata getting screwed up becuase of MC's ability to change that data with virtual ease in a blink of an eye without even realising as explained in the first post of this thread.

I think anohter thing to point out is that I could just revert back to a previous library back up before I want to change a field.  However this is very cumbersome and not a good idea for last played info and so a toggle switch would be much easier for the MC User.

[hit_ny]

I know this can be done but it's a question of whether JRiver wants to or not.  When I was tagging my files correctly over the past year, the MC Interface for tagging was amazing and made it a ton easier to tag.  However now that all of my songs are tagged correctly(I still hope so anyways) I am afraid of the metadata getting screwed up becuase of MC's ability to change that data with virtual ease in a blink of an eye without even realising as explained in the first post of this thread.

I think anohter thing to point out is that I could just revert back to a previous library back up before I want to change a field.  However this is very cumbersome and not a good idea for last played info and so a toggle switch would be much easier for the MC User.

I think there will be more people asking for this when they get through tagging their whole library, and would like to let others play with it.

You don't realise the potential for mistakes while tagging work is remaining, but i see now that its a possibility.

Thing that gets me is should the toggle be buried in the options or be easily accessible on the same screen as MC ?

There are certain situations when either is preferable.

[Dragyn]

I have a lot of tags showing as <too many items in list> ..or whatever it is.

It's because when the library is big, it takes a long time to pop that up (inline editing). and I just don't see it when clicking around because MC is stalled.

[datdude]

I think there will be more people asking for this when they get through tagging their whole library, and would like to let others play with it.

You don't realise the potential for mistakes while tagging work is remaining, but i see now that its a possibility.

Thing that gets me is should the toggle be buried in the options or be easily accessible on the same screen as MC ?

There are certain situations when either is preferable.

Let's get a discussion going on here.  What situations do you think it would and would not be preferable?

I think it would be good to have it as an option on any of the toolbars.  Reason being that there are still times when I do want to change a file maybe a couple of times a week and so it would be easy to jsut switch from 'safe mode' to 'tagging mode'.  The only reason I oculd see it being bad would that because it is on the main UI that someone might hit it by accident on a party.  So all you would have to do is disable it with in the toolbar menu. 

[Jakester]

I'll add my vote for a password protected toggle to prevent editing.   That would be great.

[glynor]

I think it would be good to have it as an option on any of the toolbars.  ...So all you would have to do is disable it with in the toolbar menu. 

The toggle gets my vote.  I wouldn't use the feature often, but those few times when I needed it, it would be a lifesaver!

I definately think it needs a toolbar button option.  The icon could be a padlock!

[Dragyn]

This needs to be addressed. My tags keep getting changed accidentally.
Large libraries take longer for inline editing to show up. Once you click somewhere else (not knowing), sometimes they get changed.

Tagging mode should be just what it is. F2 to work regardless of mode to avoid confusion. Problem solved.