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[cncb]

My Onkyo AVR does not let me access my Playlists presumably because they possibly don't contain all audio (has a red X through Playlists like Images and Videos entries).  Is there a way to present them as audio only?  I can't seem to add a particular Playlists group like I can with Theater View views.

[bob]

My Onkyo AVR does not let me access my Playlists presumably because they possibly don't contain all audio (has a red X through Playlists like Images and Videos entries).  Is there a way to present them as audio only?  I can't seem to add a particular Playlists group like I can with Theater View views.

You could customize the view scheme (add or configure DLNA servers->[select server]->Customize view) so that the playlists are audio only or add a playlist view under audio that's audio only.

[cncb]

Thanks but for the first suggestion I don't see a way to add a shortcut to a particular playlist group (containing only music playlists) as we can in the Theater View view configuration?

[bob]

I'm not very adept at customization however I did a play with it a little deleting the playlists root item and creating a new root item and renaming it playlists at which point I could customize it some. There are a couple of things to be aware of.

1) Playlists are special in DLNA, they have a fixed container ID and
2) Various rendering devices treat Playlists differently. Some will only allow a Playlist to be a group of tracks. In other words, they can't be grouped. If your Onkyo won't allow grouping, you're limited to one level of playlists.

[cncb]

I tried adding a new root item as you suggested but I still get a red X through it and can't access it even though I set up the file rules to only show Audio?  The only way I can access my playlists is by adding a Playlist group library item under the default "Audio" item.

Another problem I'm having is that my Smartlists are never regenerating.  I read in another thread that they are supposed to be re-evaluated after a minute or so but they show the same list of songs for me even if I turn off the AVR for 5 minutes and navigate back to the Smartlist.  The only way I can get a new list of songs is to close and re-open the MC server.  Is there a setting that I'm missing to fix this?  I have tried to check "Include session ID" but it doesn't seem to have any effect.

[cncb]

1) After further testing I have discovered the following weird behavior.  I have added 2 root items other than the default "Audio" item.  I can't access either of the new root items unless I add the string "Audio" to just one of their names??

2) Do you have any idea how I can get my Smartlists to re-evaluate without requiring a restart of MC on the server?

[bob]

1) After further testing I have discovered the following weird behavior.  I have added 2 root items other than the default "Audio" item.  I can't access either of the new root items unless I add the string "Audio" to just one of their names??

2) Do you have any idea how I can get my Smartlists to re-evaluate without requiring a restart of MC on the server?

It looks to me like the Onkyo is making those decisions.
Assuming you are using at least the stable version of MC 17 or newer, the updateID is being incremented when smartlists change. This informs the renderer that its cached information for that content directory is obsolete and should be discarded which is appears the Onkyo is not doing.

Also, based on your findings, I'd say that adding items at the root is restricted to the 4 base containers, Audio, Image, Video and Playlist. Those container ID's are fixed at
1,2,3 and 4. I'd assume most devices will not allow adding of containers at the root level.

[cncb]

Assuming you are using at least the stable version of MC 17 or newer, the updateID is being incremented when smartlists change. This informs the renderer that it's cached information for that content directory is obsolete and should be discarded which is appears the Onkyo is not doing.

I am using the latest version of MC 18.  As a test I tried the MediaMonkey server and their version of dynamic playlists do re-evaluate as expected on my Onkyo.  I don't know what they are doing differently but hopefully this can be resolved in MC.

[bob]

I am using the latest version of MC 18.  As a test I tried the MediaMonkey server and their version of dynamic playlists do re-evaluate as expected on my Onkyo.  I don't know what they are doing differently but hopefully this can be resolved in MC.

Interesting...
You aren't stopping and re-starting MM I assume?
I wonder if MM's server is stopping and re-starting automatically when a change is detected. That would send a bye-bye and re-discovery which also would be expected to trigger a cache flush (just guessing).
If you were willing, it could be interesting for me to see a wireshark trace of the MM interaction with your Onkyo when accessing dynamic playlists...

[cncb]

You aren't stopping and re-starting MM I assume?
I wonder if MM's server is stopping and re-starting automatically when a change is detected. That would send a bye-bye and re-discovery which also would be expected to trigger a cache flush (just guessing).
If you were willing, it could be interesting for me to see a wireshark trace of the MM interaction with your Onkyo when accessing dynamic playlists...

Yes, no restarts of MM - just browsing.  With MM, there appears to be no time delay for re-evaluation.  I just need to access a different dynamic playlist first and then the re-evaluation will take place (if I try to drill down into the same dynamic playlist twice in succession the same list of files will be shown).  I'll see what I can do with Wireshark but I've never used it before.

[bob]

Yes, no restarts of MM - just browsing.  With MM, there appears to be no time delay for re-evaluation.  I just need to access a different dynamic playlist first and then the re-evaluation will take place (if I try to drill down into the same dynamic playlist twice in succession the same list of files will be shown).  I'll see what I can do with Wireshark but I've never used it before.

Thanks!
There are some brief instructions here:
http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Sharing_Plug-in_Debugging_Hints
It's important to do the capture filter to keep down the size of the dump we need to sort through.

[cncb]

Ok, I have attached a capture that I hope has the necessary data captured between MM and my Onkyo AVR.  I browsed to "Playlists\Random Genre Mixes\Country", went up a level, browsed to "Heavy", went up a level, and then browsed to "Country" again.  The second time had a different list of songs.  Let me know if I need to do it again with different settings.  Thanks.

By the way, I used the following display filter but I'm not sure if it transferred to the capture: ip.src==192.168.1.3 and ip.dst==192.168.1.20.

[bob]

Ok, I have attached a capture that I hope has the necessary data captured between MM and my Onkyo AVR.  I browsed to "Playlists\Random Genre Mixes\Country", went up a level, browsed to "Heavy", went up a level, and then browsed to "Country" again.  The second time had a different list of songs.  Let me know if I need to do it again with different settings.  Thanks.

By the way, I used the following display filter but I'm not sure if it transferred to the capture: ip.src==192.168.1.3 and ip.dst==192.168.1.20.

Thanks, I'll give it a look.
If you do another in the future, you will want to use the capture filter under capture options, not the display filter. Using the capture filter allows one to later apply different display filters to the capture when inspecting the output.

[cncb]

Did you get a chance to look at this to see if MC could do the same thing?  Thanks.

[cncb]

bump

[bob]

Seeing some interesting things regarding the updateID. Doing more investigation.

[cncb]

Turns out the Smartlists probably weren't updating since the access problems described above caused me to create a DLNA "view" with the "category" being the playlist group containing my Smartlists.  With some renaming I was able to add and access the "Playlists" root DLNA item and now the Smartlists update properly.  To avoid this situation, it would nice to be able to add a root item that points to a particular playlist group like we can do for Theater View now.