I got this message via PM, but I'm going to answer it here. If anyone else has time to write up more comprehensive tutorial-like stuff, here would be a good place.
Hi Glynor,
Sorry to PM you but i`v searched WIKI and this forum but cant find the answer. Is there a help file that explains how to customize views in the DNLA Servers Dialog.I am trying to view my artists & Albums by letter on my PS3 media server.
Also is there any way to customize a view on epsisode number in the tag for TV shows?
Any help most appreciated.
Regards
Steve
First off, I don't know what you mean by the second part. "Customize a view on episode number in the tag" doesn't make any sense to me. Explain more what you are trying to accomplish.
The other part I can help with though. To do this, go to
Options -> Media Network -> Advanced -> Customize Views for...The dialog that appears works basically just like the Options -> Theater View configuration tool, but simplified a bit because you don't have to worry about the different roller types. Otherwise it is the same. You can either customize the views that are there, or build your own from scratch.
I'll explain how to build a view from scratch that works like this:
* Shows audio files and is under Audio in the "tree".
* Shows the following categories: Genre, Artist Letters (grouped in pairs, like A-B, C-D, etc), Artist Name, and then Album last.
* Displays "All" as a choice
* Filters out Audiobooks and Podcasts, so that the view is just "music".
Steps:1. Select
Audio under
Items to Show on the left hand side of the dialog, click the
Add button, and choose
Library Item.
2. This creates a new item underneath Audio called "New Library Item". Select it (if it isn't already) and look to the right-side of the dialog.
3. Give it an appropriate name, like "Genres" for example.
4. Next to the Show Categories In this Order pane, click the
Add button. In the dialog that appears, choose
Genre and then click OK. That adds a regular Genre category to the view.
5. Click the
Add button again. This time pick
Artist and then down below check the
Grouping box, and then make the
Grouping Size "2". Then click OK. This adds a "A-B, C-D, E-F, etc" Artists view to the view.
6. Click the
Add button again. Pick
Artist again, but this time de-select the
Grouping box, and then click OK. This will then add another tier, after the first Artist tier, showing the actual artist names.
7. Lastly, click the
Add button one more time. Pick
Album this time, and click OK.
8. Now, in the Show Categories pane, you should see the following list: Genre, Artist, Artist, Album. Good so far.
9. Click the Options drop-down combobox, and enable
Display All as a choice. This option is handy for views where you use grouping as described above.
10. Click the
Set Rules for File Display button. This opens a dialog very similar (if not identical) to the Smartlist Filtering dialog. Here you're going to create a search to filter what shows up in the view. Note, these filters are
added to whatever filters are present in a particular view's "parent views" (they "inherit" their parent's filters). So, you don't need to filter out Video and Images from this view, because the top-level Audio view already does that (you can check these by selecting the main Audio view on the left and then hitting its
Set rules for file display button).
11. So, we don't need to worry about excluding videos and pictures and data files here, just Podcasts and Audiobooks. This is easy. Under Rules, select the combobox on the left-hand side, and pick
Media Sub Type.
12. Then, the middle box turns into "is". Change this to "is not".
13. Lastly, open the right-hand combobox and pick Audiobook and Podcast from the list. There, now when you click OK, it will filter out any file that is either a Podcast or an Audiobook based on the [Media Sub Type] tag.
14. I'm not going to explain this in detail, but you can also define your sorting in this dialog. Under
Modify Results, you can add a Sort modifier, and define any crazy sorting scheme you want. You can also do all sorts of fancy things with expressions, and use the
Import/Export button to import things from other views or from helpful folks online. Anyhow, click OK when you are satisfied, and then if you're done messing with the views, OK to the Customize Views dialog.
15. Done! You'll now have a view like described above underneath Audio in the hierarchy when you browse your library with any DLNA device you connect, with Gizmo on an android device (or WebGizmo elsewhere), and with any app that uses MC's Web API.