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[jaquestati]

tons of failed to import -files are ok - wondering whats going on

files are fine.... actually play in media center if dragged in just fail to import.....

any ideas??

[glynor]

Yep.  Probably a DirectShow filter problem (or a resurgance of the MP4/MKV mis-importing thingy).  Couple of questions...

1. What file types are they?  Is it a variety, or are they all AVIs/MKVs/MP4s/etc?

2. Check under the Documents item in MC's Tree-View and make sure the missing files aren't listed there.  If they are, then MC is actually importing them, just not "realizing" that they are Video files and is filing them under the generic document file type ("data").  If this is the case, make sure you are using the most current build of MC.  Some bugs were fixed in this area over the past month or two.

3. Play one representative of the files in MC, and then right-click in the display window.  Choose DirectShow Filters --> Copy graph info to clipboard and then come and paste the results here.

[jaquestati]

no the files are mostly if not all mp3s... and the files are fine... play in media center if dropped in.....  weird...... just refuse to import..?

[rjm]

Check that you do not have "Ignore files previously removed from library" enabled.

[jaquestati]

yea that was the first thing i thought of too..... alas its unchecked

[JimH]

Try searching for a few to make sure they aren't imported.

[jaquestati]

yea that was the second thing i did  

[jaquestati]

ok i'm an idiot... its official.......
the files were there but for some strange inexplicable reason there were zero byte copies of the files in a root dir above the files......
i dont understand it..... but let me end this thread.... by saying one of your users is an idiot..... media center is not to blame.....  

i know i searched inside media center for two of the files and didnt find them..... no explanation for that unless i happened to pick 2 that were corrupt by some weird chance..... and the ones i dragged and dropped were of the zero byte copy not imported variety.....

but anyways..... call off the dogs..... i am a complete idiot....

[Matt]

Thanks for the update, and glad to hear you got it working.

[NoBS]

Just had a cow over missing files from the MC DB!
3K MP3 of files would NOT import, yet would play fine from XP explorer and even Drives and Devices in MC12.0.447.
Darn fustrating. Verified all the options where correct.
Backed up Library and then Cleared for trouble shooting.
Imported files into a clean MC with success, without my 100+ playlists or tagged DRM audio books.
Only 18K of MP3's, but over a year of audio books, 50 gigs with well over 2/3 DRM and MC DB dependent tags.
Apon a restore the same corrupted library would drop 3K of MP3s.
Tried importing from win Explorer, no go... (shell options on, of course)
Out of pure desperation I tried Replace and Play. It worked!
My library got corrupted I guess. I did some heavy tag, rename, album art...

Lets see how many of my external HDD's will have Library Back-ups before I sleep 

Just posting to help some other MCer who's at wits end

[newsposter]

getting messed up by zero-byte files is a fairly common problem in software.  Zero-byte files (and those that use hugely hashed filenames) are commonly used as place markers and 'registers' by developers.  But if considerations are not taken for the possible existance of 'other peoples' files, things can go wrong quickly.

What kind of logic could MC implement to keep an eye out for these things and not mess up an import (continue to walk a directory tree)?

[NoBS]

getting messed up by zero-byte files is a fairly common problem in software.  Zero-byte files (and those that use hugely hashed filenames) are commonly used as place markers and 'registers' by developers.  But if considerations are not taken for the possible existance of 'other peoples' files, things can go wrong quickly.

What kind of logic could MC implement to keep an eye out for these things and not mess up an import (continue to walk a directory tree)?

Forgive the ignorance from my question, but would zero-byte file really need to be imported into the media DB?
I really don't grasp the "other peoples" files, but then again I'm a SW clutz who still hunt n pecks<shift 1> Darn it<shift 111>

[newsposter]

no, zero length files don't need to be imported but they need to be 'handled' somehow, probably by ignoring them.

The point being is that unless there are some pretty good security options put on a directory structure, pretty much anything can find it's way in there, either deliberatly or by mistake.  MC (I believe) assumes that everything in a said dir struct is deliberate (i.e 'good' user data/tunes) and does minimal error handling in case of both duplicate file names and zero length files.

Error handling in software is not trivial.  I"ve seen lots of code where error and exception handling is a higher percentage of code than the actual working bits.

You can program for best guess but a user somewhere is sure to come up with something that blows your bst guess out of the water.

[rjm]

I regularly create and import zero length files into MC. I would be unhappy to see any change in MC's current behavior.

[NoBS]

newsposter, thank you for the clear answer...
I still feel like fish out of water, but the knowledge around here really does make newbs like me raise the bar.