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[Tolga]

Claim:
I believe MC should better support playlists that are kept externally. Instead of import/export capability, MC should keep external playlist in sync. This is basically treating playlists as objects of the database (like mp3 files) and keeping information in the external files and database in sync (just like what MC does for the tags)

Problem:

Reliability
Based on my 5-6 years experience of using MC, tags are usually more reliable than playlists. You can delete your MC database, i.e. while trying the latest beta. The playlists may disappear but the tags are stored on the files and can be restored by reimporting. (fine you can backup playlists, but how often do you do that? Also, how do you search through 100+ backup files if you don't know when the playlists are lost)

Sharing
Currently, I don't know an easy way of sharing playlists created by multiple users using different databases on different machines. Sure, you can export and import playlists but that is difficult. In contrast, it is relatively easy to keep the tags in sync when they are edited by multiple users. This can be achieved by keeping the music at a shared location and people setup MC so that tags always override MC database. Playlist data could be shared the same way, if MC could keep external playlists in sync.

external applications
Storing playlists externally could allow creative solutions by using external applications to manipulate playlists. Notice that this can already be done for tags.


How about smart lists?:
How to store them externally might not be as easy as the regular playlists but that would be great for sharing smartlists and for backups.

Summary:
MC should support the ability to keep playlists in external files. All MC would need to do is to keep the information in playlists in sync with its internal database, just like as it does for the tags.

[JONCAT]

This is one are that has Mc has needed improvement in for years (how often does the thread "all my playlists are gone!" appear?).
A system as you suggest would also enable the "tracking" of sequence when using a Playlist View Scheme; currently a useless feature with any sequence preservation.

I'd like to give your post some more thought and work this out, and hopefully other interested members can help to make this a reality.

MC has such powerful sorting tools which enable one to make great playlists; the ability to preserve these across machines using different databases or track multiple instances of one song across various playlists is essential.

DC

[jack wallstreet]

I appreciate the integration of the playlists into the database.  It is extraordinarily fast and all records provide an automated and instant identification of what playlists they are in. 

I find the ability of MC to quickly create a current list of external playlists quite satisfactory.

I do not use a lot of multiple machines so I am not saying there aren't problems with use of playlists within the database, but I am just saying that having the playlists within the database works very well for me and I'd hate to lose that.

[Tolga]

jack,

the playlists would still be in the database. They would just have a synchronized external copies outside (just like the mp3 tags).

[jack wallstreet]

oh.  thanks.

[Matt]

A few notes:

Library backups are made automatically.  You should never lose playlists.  I have some (too many actually) that are many years old.

There are several ways to share a library with playlists.  Sharing the same library on a LAN, or using Library Server on a WAN are both solutions.

If you search Interact, you'll find posts from users that automate playlist export.  It's possible using command line switches.  This might also help you.

[Tolga]

Thanks Matt.
I do appreciate MC's autoback. (hmm, I should delete some of those older ones). However, often having n backups is really not sufficient since it is often difficult to figure out when the lost happened (probably because you can't compare databases).

The problem with MC server is that playlists can be edited only on one computer. I haven't used sharing the same library on LAN for a while, maybe because the second computer accesses the database as read-only and if the server is working on one computer, the others have only read-only access (so the two solutions don't work good together).

automating playlist export is a good idea. I will search for it. I think what is really missing is auto import of playlists. In particular, if importing and updating playlists were part of Otto, where would the imported playlists go in MC tree?