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More => Old Versions => Media Center 11 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: himini on March 28, 2006, 04:36:52 am

Title: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: himini on March 28, 2006, 04:36:52 am

Sorry if this has been covered before, but a quick search didn't come up with much.  Does MC actually have only one "shuffle" mode?  I haven't been able to figure out a way to have it play or sort full albums with the tracks in sequence but the albums themselves selected randomly.  The only way to play full albums is to either select them manually or play them alphabetically?  This cannot be; not the mighty Media Center.  I must be missing something.  Please confirm that I am an idiot.

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: marko on March 28, 2006, 04:44:42 am

how many albums? say, perhaps... 5?

either in the search bar, or as a new smartlist, type:

~limit=5,-1,[album]

This will land you five random albums.

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: himini on March 28, 2006, 05:00:58 am

Holy Moly that was a quick response!.  Thank you, Marko; I just did a more extensive search and found one of your posts from about a year ago mentioning this expression:

[media type]=audio [track #]==1 ~sort=[random] ~a

which seemed to work.  Would your new expression be better?  Sorry I haven't taken the time yet to decode how the smartlist expressions work.  Thanks again!

(I actually want the entire collection sorted this way; I'm working with a temporary library of my wife's new age music for her massage business and I want to get all her music onto mp3 discs sorted by random album.)

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: marko on March 28, 2006, 11:34:19 am

Hi Himini.

For listing your entire library this way, I'd use:

[media type]=audio [track #]==1 ~sort=[random] ~a

for grabbing a few random albums, I'd use:

[media type]=audio ~limit=5,-1,[album]

-marko.

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: himini on March 28, 2006, 03:53:46 pm

You are awesome.  Thank you so much!  I knew it was just me.

Incidently, does anyone else think there should be additional "shuffle" options (the idiot-proof kind) perhaps in the "player" menu?  Even my 5-year old carousel CD player lets me change the shuffle mode.

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: modelmaker on March 28, 2006, 05:27:36 pm

Quote from: himini on March 28, 2006, 03:53:46 pm

You are awesome.  Thank you so much!  I knew it was just me.

Incidently, does anyone else think there should be additional "shuffle" options (the idiot-proof kind) perhaps in the "player" menu?  Even my 5-year old carousel CD player lets me change the shuffle mode.

I would certainly agree that there should be additional "idiot proof" options for shuffle play.

BTW marko, using your expression for 5 random albums, I get 5 single songs from 5 random albums.

Title: Re: Random Album Sorting?
Post by: marko on March 29, 2006, 04:05:01 am

Quote from: modelmaker on March 28, 2006, 05:27:36 pm

I would certainly agree that there should be additional "idiot proof" options for shuffle play.

BTW marko, using your expression for 5 random albums, I get 5 single songs from 5 random albums.

really? you mean this one here?

[media type]=audio ~limit=5,-1,[album]

it's working fine here...

did you type it yourself or did you copy/paste?

If you typed it manually, I think perhaps you typed: [media type]=audio ~limit=5,1,[album]
instead?