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[7Bong13]

When I listen to something, I would like JRiver to continue to play the next album in the list instead of either stop playback, or repeat that particular album. I want to be able to have a repeat function that repeats the entire discography of an artist - say I only have 2 albums by an artist, I want to listen to both then start back from the first album in the list. Just stop playback is simply stupid. Once again, if this is hidden away in some weird setting somewhere do let me know since I've only been using the program a week...

[coderego]

From the tree pane on left side:

1) Select Audio
2) Select Artist
3) choose your artist.

Now you should see a list of albums and their tracks for the artist you selected.

4) There is a tab at the top with your artists name and a drop down arrow. click that arrow
5) go to group by
6) select none.

Enjoy!

JRiver is really an advanced program with LOTS of features. It can probably do what you are looking to do. Just need to learn how

[7Bong13]

Hmm? Then I get a list of all the albums I have in my library, without big images for each album. That's not what I want. I want it to have the view of my choice AND follow through playing the next one.

Image: how it looks when doing that

Now my complete view was ruined... and I don't know how to get it back. I don't get this program... I'm starting to think I should go for something else... it's not intitutive and whatever changes I make I have no idea how to get the original one back. :/

So since this was ruined how do I get this back:

1) image for every album, not just a list
2) sorted on album A-Z

[edit] - managed to get the view back - this is the way I want it (image 2)

[csimon]

If you have a view where you can see a list of artists, then all you have to do is right-click on your selected artist and select Play. This will add all tracks for that Artist to the Playing Now list. In fact, this works for any view - selecting Play on an item (whether it's Artist, Genre or any other grouping that you've got) will add all tracks below that item to Playing Now. Note that I have my views set up as "Categories" rather than "Panes", I don't know if this makes any difference?  See my screengrab.

[7Bong13]

If you have a view where you can see a list of artists, then all you have to do is right-click on your selected artist and select Play. This will add all tracks for that Artist to the Playing Now list. In fact, this works for any view - selecting Play on an item (whether it's Artist, Genre or any other grouping that you've got) will add all tracks below that item to Playing Now. Note that I have my views set up as "Categories" rather than "Panes", I don't know if this makes any difference?  See my screengrab.

You're comparing apples and pears here. Say I want to play "Construction Time Again" with Depeche Mode, which is not the first album they've made in alphabetical order - they've made for example "A Broken Frame" which comes before. I want to be able to play say "Delta Machine", and after "Delta Machine", whatever is in their list of albums, I want it to play next. Not Play all of their albums from start to finish. Or did I misunderstand you? This is how it works in iTunes. And in every other music player I've used.

[6233638]

Adding tracks when double-clicking is restricted to the current group, not the currently selected view.
Because you are grouping by album, it will only play from the currently selected track to the end of that group. (the album)

I wish that there was some way around this limitation, and an option to set it on a per-view basis. (at least per-category)
Every time I start playback of a film, it adds my entire film library to the "Now Playing" list.  

[csimon]

Just had a play - yes, using my method, it seems to add albums in alphabetical order regardless of the way I've ordered my album view of the artist. However, if I drill down into Artist first it gives me album thumbnails in chronological order which is the way I've got my views sorted. Selecting all albums then pressing Play seems to add them in chronological order then, the way I've sorted them. If you want to start playing at a different point rather than the first album, simply go to Playing now and select the first track you want. If you've then got Repeat on, it will go back to the start of the list once the last track has played.

[7Bong13]

Or why not just add a function that will continue to play the artist album list? Why make it so complicated? Look at the other music programs out there - that's how they work.

I will try your advice - but frankly I think JRiver makes things too complicated sometimes. Why would I want to stop listening to an artist just because an album has played through?

[csimon]

Why would I want to stop listening to an artist just because an album has played through?

On the other hand, why would it play another album from the same artist if you haven't told it to? It can't read your mind. Maybe there are lots of people who do what you do and it could be a useful default, but for me it would be annoying. There are also lots of people who complain that this program already makes too many assumptions.

To summarise this thread, you first asked for a way to repeat the entire discography of an artist after you've played it once. The answer is to turn Repeat Playing Now on. Then you wanted to be able to bulk-add albums in a custom order you've specified. We've established I think that this doesn't happen if you bulk-add by artist, only if you bulk-add by selecting the albums in that order, that may or may not be a bug.  Then you wanted to be able to start from any point in the discography and have it cycle round the discography from there, and the answer is to click on the track you want to start playing from in the Playing Now list. I don't think this is too complicated, nor is this behaviour "stupid".  It's actually quite logical - select all the albums you want to play in the order you want to play then, then choose a starting point.  I think what you're asking for is to be able to pick any arbitrary album in an artist view and then have it automatically assume you want to play the rest of the subsequent albums and then when it's finished play the previous albums. Maybe iTunes makes this assumption better, I don't know, but I certainly prefer MC's cataloguing and playing functions over iTunes!

[7Bong13]

On the other hand, why would it play another album from the same artist if you haven't told it to? It can't read your mind. Maybe there are lots of people who do what you do and it could be a useful default, but for me it would be annoying. There are also lots of people who complain that this program already makes too many assumptions.

So, what's wrong with having the option to do so?

[7Bong13]

I think what you're asking for is to be able to pick any arbitrary album in an artist view and then have it automatically assume you want to play the rest of the subsequent albums and then when it's finished play the previous albums.

To be frank with you - the only reason I'm trying to shift from iTunes to JRiver is becuse iTunes doesn't support FLAC. What's the logic in stopping the playlist when there's another album in the album view? I don't get it. I've used music player programs for 15 years and none of them have behaved like that.

[7Bong13]

the answer is to click on the track you want to start playing from in the Playing Now list. I don't think this is too complicated, nor is this behaviour "stupid".  It's actually quite logical - select all the albums you want to play in the order you want to play then, then choose a starting point.  I think what you're asking for is to be able to pick any arbitrary album in an artist view and then have it automatically assume you want to play the rest of the subsequent albums and then when it's finished play the previous albums. Maybe iTunes makes this assumption better, I don't know, but I certainly prefer MC's cataloguing and playing functions over iTunes!

Because it ruins my view. I want to have each album displayed in a big picture, and to be able to click on an album, and just keep it playing from there. Is that so hard to implement and so much to ask for? That's how every other music player works. There could be 3 options:

1) don't repeat
2) repeat an album
3) continue to play in whatever way you have sorted your artist list (year/album/whatever).

Since when did it get wrong to ask for a feature request that you have or is going to shell out money for? Would you MIND if this possibility was there? You could just have your default value the way it is.

[7Bong13]

I just find it frustrating that a program as good as JRiver doesn't have this basic function. I would love to buy it, but I can't keep on changing albums all the time. I will look at other alternatives and if those other alternatives has other flaws I will come back for JRiver. I do sincerely like the program, it's just this basic feature which I took for granted having used other music programs would come natural. I'm sorry about the way I came across - it was cause of frustration and that I only got one week to try JRiver before deciding to pay or not.

[JimH]

If I select an artist, and press play, I get a playlist of tracks by album. 

I could also drill down into the artist's albums, select the albums I wanted, and press play.

In Tools/Options/General/Behavior, you can alter what happens when you press the play button.

[7Bong13]

I didn't really get what you meant by that, but I found a way around my problem. If I select the first track I want to play, then press shift+end to select the "coming" tracks, then right click and press play on the first one, it will continue throughout the list. I guess that's a workaround I'll have to deal with.

[csimon]

Yeah, it's "playlist" oriented I guess, I don't know if that's how iTunes works, or any other media player, but the general concept is that you browse your library then queue things up in the Playing Now list. iTunes may make assumptions as to what you are currently browsing and what you click on as to what items it thinks you want to queue up.

I understand that your views always show the files, i.e. you have a large album cover on the left and then a list of its tracks to its right, and then this is repeated down the page. I generally turn off file view and normally just browse by album cover, and I assume you could use the same Shift-End trick there too as I described - just select all the albums you want and play them, this will add all their tracks to Playing Now. As Jim has said, also look in the settings to see if changing the action of the Play button might help in your case.

MC is highly configurable, and this is what makes it look so complicated I guess! But it does come with a default set of views out of the box, which may or may not work for any particular person. Do play around with the Customise Views facility to see if you can get it more easily workable for what you want to do.

I'm not convinced that the assumption you are describing would work for everyone, especially people who listen to classical music, so I certainly don't think it should be made a default action, but I guess it would not harm to make it a configurable option. But of course, that's adding to the complexity and amount of configuration! It's very difficult to provide something out of the box that will work for everyone.

[7Bong13]

Thank you for your comments.

There seems to be something general I lack in knowledge about MC, because I would love to play around more with it, but everytime I do so it changes something that I don't like, and I find it extremely hard to get it back the way it used to be. Like for instance, I don't know how many times I've had to deselect it showing the file path in the list of tracks. It adds that every time I try to fiddle around with it. I can't seem to find any "save view" thing that would make me instantly come back to my prefered view - I tried doing that by saving my default view under a separate name, but it doesn't seem to work properly.

Yeah, I totally get that it's very hard to make such a complex program that suits everyone's needs - and indeed adding yet another feature would add to the complexity, as you say. But here's where I think it might also be useful to listen to someone like me who's a newbie and comes from using other programs (most recently iTunes - which I'm scrapping because it doesn't play FLAC), because us newbies might have valueable insights to share compared to experienced users who's very used to how MC is built up. I realize I came out as being cocky and demanding this feature (I did apologise for that, but that post seems to have been removed), but this was mainly cause of frustration that I, because of my own mistake, only got a week try the program out (I did the mistake of installing it then going abroad for 3 weeks so my first trial month went down the drain).

But coming back to the subject, my suggestion for this could just be added to one of the menus, be it play behaviour or repeat - and it could be something that wasn't turned on when the program starts. I don't think it continuing to play along whatever view you have it sorted as would require a drastical change programming wise. Like you say, it shouldn't be the default - but there's no harm in having it as an option seeing that's how every other program works.

iTunes is not very configurable at all - so it doesn't really compete with MC - but it is more straight forward, and I have never encountered a music player where I've had to ask so many questions about how it works. I usually don't hang too much on forums because I get the idea of a program - but during my try out week I've already made 20+ posts here. So, it *IS* very complicated. And I hope in the end that is what will make me like it, when I've gotten the hang of it.

I had a look of what Jim said about the Play button behaviour but I didn't see anything that would help me - and half of it I didn't understand what it does.

[Arindelle]

When I listen to something, I would like JRiver to continue to play the next album in the list instead of either stop playback, or repeat that particular album. I want to be able to have a repeat function that repeats the entire discography of an artist - say I only have 2 albums by an artist, I want to listen to both then start back from the first album in the list. Just stop playback is simply stupid

It's not stupid for everybody ... however of course JRiver can do this -  and I believe Jim was trying to help if I understand correctly(on a Sunday btw^^)

I had a look of what Jim said about the Play button behaviour but I didn't see anything that would help me - and half of it I didn't understand what it does.

Try this in options where Jim I believe was trying to steer you towards (on a Sunday btw^^)



Look I think we're going at this the wrong way .... There are many ways of doing EVERYTHING (well almost you would like to do) which Views give you a tremendous lattitude. So in your example you wa


Create YOUR Template Perso
[/s]
edit :oops posted this by accident before I finished  absolutely impossible to understand sorry will post the rest in 10 mins

[JimH]

I had a look of what Jim said about the Play button behaviour but I didn't see anything that would help me - and half of it I didn't understand what it does.

If you don't understand an option, the best way to learn may be to try it.

It might be less frustrating for you if you would drop the comparisons with other players.  It isn't iTunes.

Please save your feature requests for a later date.

[Arindelle]

Hope second try is the good one  

When I listen to something, I would like JRiver to continue to play the next album in the list instead of either stop playback, or repeat that particular album. I want to be able to have a repeat function that repeats the entire discography of an artist - say I only have 2 albums by an artist, I want to listen to both then start back from the first album in the list. Just stop playback is simply stupid

It’s not stupid for everybody ... however of course JRiver can do this

I had a look of what Jim said about the Play button behavior but I didn't see anything that would help me - and half of it I didn't understand what it does.

Try this in options where Jim, I believe, was trying to steer you towards (on a Sunday btw^^)



Look I think we're going at this the wrong way, you can do elaborate stuff like csimon is suggesting with some tweaking but you are not there yet on the learning curve.... There are many ways of doing EVERYTHING (well almost) you can think of through Views giving you tremendous latitude. So each view is there, IMHO, not only to look nice but also to manipulate your music differently. So in your example you wanted to play an album by Depeche mode first then play all your albums, no repeating, no stopping, and no work around. Another view would be easier for this ...

- go to the view "Artists" already created by MC -  you will get all the BIG album covers -- hover over any one and click the "file" option and a pane with the track listing will appear just like in the view you created (you can adjust size of this file pane  and the size of the covers to your liking)

- double click on an Artist like Depeche Mode in your example which will open up all the albums of theirs you have. Right click and play

- go back (back button on mouse or the little arrow left) select everything using ctrl+A -- then right click, chose "Add (Next to play)"

- DONE - time for manip the time it takes to press ctrl+A and play (ok, you will have the album repeated if important deselect with ctrl+A again)

(you want a different play order - you can sort columns from playing now, or repeat, shuffle whatever)


Now, if you are still interested ... read on (or maybe it can help someone else otherwise)

Like any modified document you overwrite and save, a view is going to change or be "ruined" as you said (there is a box warning you of this, btw)

So/
Suggestion 1  Save before you experiment
Backup your library after you get some thing you like ... if you screw up,  restore it --- Did you know that Restoring a backup also will restore your Views AND settings so go ahead and play around with the options.

Suggestion 2 (more advanced)

You like your View OK - click right from the tree and save it as a "template" see screen



Want to experiment with it with no risk or have similar ones slightly modified..... just add a new library view and you will see "Your" saved view. Load it, rename it, modify or just screw around to learn how, without mucking up your original and restoring all the time.

[7Bong13]

Suggestion 1  Save before you experiment
Backup your library after you get some thing you like ... if you screw up,  restore it --- Did you know that Restoring a backup also will restore your Views AND settings so go ahead and play around with the

Thanks for your comments, very much appreciated - I will check it out. I just saved my view to try out a few things, but when I saved my view, it changed to sort on album instead of on artist. Why is that?

If you don't understand an option, the best way to learn may be to try it.

I would, if it wasn't so darn hard to get back to how it was before. It's an extremely complicated program. But, I will live and learn.

It might be less frustrating for you if you would drop the comparisons with other players.  It isn't iTunes.

I think you should be open to that JRiver isn't the 100% best programs in all respect even if it's much better than (and very different from) iTunes. There's always stuff to learn from other programs.

Please save your feature requests for a later date.

Fair enough - I will.

[JimH]

I think you should be open to that JRiver isn't the 100% best programs in all respect even if it's much better than (and very different from) iTunes.

I don't believe you know just how interested I am in making MC better.