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[darichman]

I use MC for pretty much all my multimedia management on the PC at the moment. It's not quite there yet for me in theatre view but it's getting close. There are a few niggling things remaining in my database organisation....

1. Untaggable files -- I can't count how many times I've lost tag info because I've moved or renamed a file outside MC. For taggable files, I store all info in the file, but for video files, and unsupported audio, image and document files, I've had to settle for manually creating mpl and xml files. This presents a few problems, however...
   -- It's a very manual process. If I change a field in MC, I have to remember to re-export the mpl file. I'd really rather tag the file and forget about it!
   -- Moving files to a new computer, sharing files with others etc ~ the paths change and because the MPL file contains the path info... tags are lost
   -- If I reimport a file, MC won't automatically look for the info in the MPL file

So I was just wondering how other users get around / deal with this?

Possible Solutions: It would be great if MC could either

• auto generate an MPL file for each folder if tags cannot be written to files
• create a *.tag file or similar for each file that cannot be tagged. This could be a hidden file similar to folder.jpg, thumbs.db etc

2. Long Filenames -- This is a longrunning issue and is essentially quicktime-related problem relating to quicktime's bizarre filename restriction of 63 characters. I have lots and lots of .mov files from my camera and over and over again I come across files which I can no longer play because I have performed a rename from properties from within MC and the resultant filename is too long. The problem is:
 -- I usually performed the rename long ago without realising
 -- MC can't undo the problem because it can't read the file, so I end up having to rename it externally (which means I lose tags -- d'oh! see 1.)

Firstly, does anyone out there know of a workaround for this restriction? I haven't tried quicktime alternative. Does it have the same restriction because it used the same engine? Has apple expressed any intention to fix it?
If not, then I think MC really has to tell the user that it is renaming the file to a filename which is essentially unusable. Especially considering MC is pushing it's support for iPod, podcasts etc and these use primarily apple formats.

[rjm]

1. Untaggable files

I rely on folder and file name conventions that would permit me to rebuild the tags. For example, I name my music text files [Artist] - [Album]\[Name] - [Date(year)] - [Genre].  I use different naming conventions for each class of media such as music, books, movies, etc. and keep the media classes separated with a folder structure. I back up my library everyday and hope I will never have to use this structure to recreate my tags because it does not handle special characters such as : and ?. Nor does it preserve data in some fields such as Comments and Notes.

With regard to your idea of creating MPL or tag files, I am a little concerned about the additional complexity of keeping the pairs syncronized and connected when moving media files around. Already many people seem to struggle with folder.jpg artwork. But I am intersted to hear what others think.

2. Long Filenames

Sorry you won't like my answer. Quicktime is crap and I avoid mov files like the plague. Have you considered transcoding your mov files to a more standard format like XviD or x264?

[darichman]

I rely on folder and file name conventions that would permit me to rebuild the tags. For example, I name my music text files [Artist] - [Album]\[Name] - [Date(year)] - [Genre].  I use different naming conventions for each class of media such as music, books, movies, etc. and keep the media classes separated with a folder structure.

I do the same... but there are simply too many fields to store everything in the file path/filename. Eg movies have fields for director, actors etc etc etc plus, as you mentioned, any notes or bios attached are lost. I don't know that there really is an ideal solution here. Any creative ideas?

With regard to your idea of creating MPL or tag files, I am a little concerned about the additional complexity of keeping the pairs syncronized and connected when moving media files around. Already many people seem to struggle with folder.jpg artwork. But I am intersted to hear what others think.

It would definitely have to be an option (just like we have the option to use folder.jpg)... would this actually be possible though?

Sorry you won't like my answer. Quicktime is crap and I avoid mov files like the plague. Have you considered transcoding your mov files to a more standard format like XviD or x264?

I couldn't agree more. I hate it from the marrow of my bones I actually spent a lot of time converting them to various formats way back and honestly couldn't find a solution I was happy with -- few of the programs I used could do it in batch and I couldn't get a quality I was happy with without bloating the file size. What transcoding software / format would you suggest? I guess another point is, I have a lot of data stored in MC's database (eg [People] field for personal videos) which I would really hate to have to tag all over again if I transcode to a new filetype.

[bspachman]

With regards to the file naming problems, I frequently use some of the expression logic with phrases like:

IsEqual([File Type],m4p,8)
IsEmpty(Mid([Filename (name)],59, -1))

The 1st checks to see if it's one of my iTunes-purchased tracks. The second checks to see if it violates the filename length rule.

Then I can use a phrase like:

If(IsEqual([track #],0,2),Mid([Artist] - [Name],0,56)...,[track #] - Mid([Artist] - [Name],0,51)...)

to do some actual renaming. (I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader...)

If you want to see my entire renaming setup, let me know and I'll post it...

brad

[rjm]

I do the same... but there are simply too many fields to store everything in the file path/filename. Eg movies have fields for director, actors etc etc etc plus, as you mentioned, any notes or bios attached are lost. I don't know that there really is an ideal solution here. Any creative ideas?

In general I try to keep the use of fields as simple as possible. If I want more information about an item I create an info.txt file and give it the same Artist/Album as the media item it is describing. I suppose you could use a desktop search tool like that which comes with Vista to index the contents of the info.txt files however I have not yet found the need to do this.

Not all media types are well suited for cataloging with MC. Movies are a good example. There is far too much movie specific data to use a generic tool like MC. I prefer to use a specialized tool like Movie Collector from Collectorz.com. Same for family photos. I use ThumbsPlus from cerious.com. MC is fine for generic video & photos that don't have a lot of meta-data.

It would definitely have to be an option (just like we have the option to use folder.jpg)... would this actually be possible though?

Yes, an option might keep support headaches to a minimum.

I couldn't agree more. I hate it from the marrow of my bones I actually spent a lot of time converting them to various formats way back and honestly couldn't find a solution I was happy with -- few of the programs I used could do it in batch and I couldn't get a quality I was happy with without bloating the file size. What transcoding software / format would you suggest? I guess another point is, I have a lot of data stored in MC's database (eg [People] field for personal videos) which I would really hate to have to tag all over again if I transcode to a new filetype.

My favorite transcoding tool is MediaCoder. It is a swiss army knife that seems to handle just about every input and output format. And it has a batch mode for doing a bunch at once. I just did an interesting test with it on mov files. I told it to leave the audio and video unchanged but to change the container from mov to mp4 (and also mkv). Both tests seemed to work and it was very fast. This might suggest you can dump your mov files for a more standard container without changing the quality/size of your audio and video. Assuming you told MediaCoder to not change the name of the file and only change the extension, then you probably could do a find and replace of the extension in MC to preserve your tags.

[darichman]

If you want to see my entire renaming setup, let me know and I'll post it...

brad

I'd definitely be interested... I've used expressions in a few key areas for renaming, but haven't covered all bases yet. No rush though!

I prefer to use a specialized tool like Movie Collector from Collectorz.com.

I looked at Collectorz.com and tried the trial version not long ago, but it would seem that Australia isn't very high up on their priorities I like the idea, but there are very few barcodes up there outside region 1. I'm not averse to entering data in myself, but I just want to make sure that if I do, I never have to enter it again later

My favorite transcoding tool is MediaCoder. It is a swiss army knife that seems to handle just about every input and output format. And it has a batch mode for doing a bunch at once. I just did an interesting test with it on mov files. I told it to leave the audio and video unchanged but to change the container from mov to mp4 (and also mkv). Both tests seemed to work and it was very fast. This might suggest you can dump your mov files for a more standard container without changing the quality/size of your audio and video. Assuming you told MediaCoder to not change the name of the file and only change the extension, then you probably could do a find and replace of the extension in MC to preserve your tags.

I will definitely try this. I'll have a look at MediaCoder as well. I've been looking for an all in one conversion tool for a while.

Thanks for your help RJM.

[rjm]

I looked at Collectorz.com and tried the trial version not long ago, but it would seem that Australia isn't very high up on their priorities I like the idea, but there are very few barcodes up there outside region 1. I'm not averse to entering data in myself, but I just want to make sure that if I do, I never have to enter it again later

The bar code interface saves you from having to type in the movie title. Assuming you don't mind this one manual step, you can still use Movie Collector to automatically extract movie data from IMDB, Amazon, DVD Empire and others. Unfortunatley they got a cease and desist from AMG so if you want AMG data you have to copy and paste from their site.

[darichman]

Unfortunatley they got a cease and desist from AMG so if you want AMG data you have to copy and paste from their site.

AMG has seemed very good at them lately

[bspachman]

I'd definitely be interested... I've used expressions in a few key areas for renaming, but haven't covered all bases yet. No rush though!

Here you go...

Code: [Select]

If(IsEqual([File Type],m4p,8),
If(IsEmpty(Mid([Filename (name)],59, -1)),
If(IsEqual([Genre],Podcast),
[Track #] - [Name],
If(IsEqual([Album Artist],unknown,8),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),
[Name],[Track #] - [Name]),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),
[Artist] - [Name],
[Track #] - [Artist] - [Name]
)
)
),
If(IsEqual([Genre],Podcast),
[Track #] - Mid([Name],0,51)...,
If(IsEqual([Album Artist],unknown,8),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),Mid([Name],0,56)...,[Track #] - Mid([Name],0,51)...),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),Mid([Artist] - [Name],0,56)...,[Track #] - Mid([Artist] - [Name],0,51)...)
)
)
),
If(IsEqual([Media Type],image,8),
[Album Artist (auto)] - [Album],
If(IsEqual([File Type],ape,8),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),
[Album],
If(IsEqual([Album Artist],unknown,8),[Track #] - [Name],[Track #] - [Artist] - [Name])
),
If(IsEqual([Name],.cue,8),
[Album].cue,
If(IsEqual([Genre],Podcast),[Track #] - [Name],
If(IsEqual([Album Artist],unknown,8),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),
[Name],
[Track #] - [Name]
),
If(IsEqual([Track #],0,2),
[Artist] - [Name],
[Track #] - [Artist] - [Name]
)
)
)
)
)
)
)

[darichman]

Thanks for that! I'll give  it a go