I want to randomly select 40GB of complete albums and put them in a playlist so I can sync to my portable. I've come up with this, and think it works:
sort:random modifier:full albums limit:40000
(done using the smartlist dropdown menus)
I should clarify, that what I want the smartlist to do is to grab a random sampling of tracks, add all the other tracks that are in the albums from which the random sample is taken, but limit the final size of the playlist. (What I don't want is a random sample of tracks only from full albums which would result in incomplete albums on the playlist).
I think the above works, I think that what it is doing (because the smartlist appears to apply the list parameters in sequence) is:
1. randomly grab all the tracks in the library
2. then, the effect of the "full albums" modifier is to sort the playlist
by album in the order the album first appeared in the random list (it doesn't add any tracks because they're already all in the list) [i.e., if there are 3 albums, each with 3 tracks, and the initial random track order is b-3, a-2, a-1, c-1, b-2, a-1, c-2, c-3, b-1, then after the full album modifier is applied, the playlist order will be b-1, b-2, b-3, a-1, a-2, a-3, c-1, c-2, c-3]
3. then the effect of the limit modifier is to lop off the tracks on the bottom of the playlist that exceed the size limit.
So there will almost always be one incomplete album on the playlist, but I can live with that.
Man, I love this program!
Any comments?
(For those who care, I'm doing this because I want to make sure there's "fresh blood" on my portable, which I often listen to in random mode, but then switch to a full album when the impulse strikes. This smartlist is an easy way to select a random subset of my full library to sych over, while ensuring that I have full albums on the portable. I never actually use the playlist for listening.)