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More => Old Versions => Media Center 12 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: benn600 on August 20, 2007, 09:52:04 am

Title: Search List Question
Post by: benn600 on August 20, 2007, 09:52:04 am
Is there a way to use two search lists more effectively as I describe:

I want one list to list various categories, Movies, Home Movies, Comedy Movies, Television Shows, etc.

IF the user selects Television Shows, then I want to list another list of searches, "Simpsons," "South Park," etc.

I was thinking filter in both directions might work because if I select Movies, it's very unlikely that "Simpsons" would show up anywhere so the search entry Simpsons, since it would return 0 entries, then it shouldn't show up.

Basically, I want to customize the order by which items are selected.  Even if I had to add search lists customized for each first level search value, that would be fine.  So it would be a hierarchy.  So under customizing the first search item, then users could customize a secondary list that would appear once that item is selected.

I just want a very easy way to view all my TV DVDs without the long list listing every DVD.  It should just say Simpsons, South Park, etc.  Not Simpsons 1.1, Simpsons 1.2, all the way to Simpsons 10.4!  That's a lot to list so a top level menu would be great.

The real issue is that yes, I could add a Television 1st level search and yes, it would then list Simpsons, South Park.  However, if I select Movies, it will still list those!  So I would have to click All.
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: robydago on August 20, 2007, 10:18:58 am
I just want a very easy way to view all my TV DVDs without the long list listing every DVD.  It should just say Simpsons, South Park, etc.  Not Simpsons 1.1, Simpsons 1.2, all the way to Simpsons 10.4!  That's a lot to list so a top level menu would be great.


The better way, IMHO, is to create user fields like SeriesTitle. That's something useful also for Classical Music, since the Work and the Album often don't match, so I created a user field for WorkName as well.
The only drawback is the additional manual tagging you have to do...
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: benn600 on August 20, 2007, 10:21:46 am
That's not a bad idea.  In fact, I could utilize more fields.

What I would like is when you go to Video in theater view for it to list the view schemes.  Then, I could have a view scheme for each type: Television, Movies, etc.  Then that would work great.

I don't mind doing manual tagging but where is the tagging stored?  It doesn't seem to be stored in the VIDEO_TS folder anywhere so if I create a new MC database or auto-import in another database, all my work doesn't carry over.
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: robydago on August 20, 2007, 10:35:15 am
I don't mind doing manual tagging but where is the tagging stored? 

I guess all tags not embedded in files are in the DB only

Quote
It doesn't seem to be stored in the VIDEO_TS folder anywhere so if I create a new MC database or auto-import in another database, all my work doesn't carry over.

I think that if you import files you loose all extra (non embedded) tags, but why creating more than one DB?
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: robydago on August 20, 2007, 11:51:30 am
come to think of it, there could be a way to avoid additional tagging:
if the excel-like language of MC is powerfule enough you could use a name standard like this:

Simpsons #01-01
Simpsons #01-02
Simpsons #02-01
MagnumP.I. #01-01
MagnumP.I. #02-01
MagnumP.I. #02-02

(where #xx-xx is #season-episode)

then with a calculated field you could (at least with excel, no idea if MC can do it) manipulate strings to get all chars from the start up to the ' #" position

Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: hit_ny on August 20, 2007, 01:07:05 pm
I think that if you import files you loose all extra (non embedded) tags, but why creating more than one DB?
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: benn600 on August 20, 2007, 01:13:26 pm
Well, I have my server which serves up my MP101, etc.  Besides, we have four users in my family.  Don't I need a database for each user?  What is the way around that?  But I have four + the server's database.  I can't use the server's because it's always on and would only allow read only access.  Plus, the server has special settings for the MP101's and the user's databases all have varying setups for view schemes and obviously, playlists.
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: hit_ny on August 20, 2007, 01:21:46 pm
tag your vid files and then save them as mpl in the same directory.

Then import the dir on other machines from the file server.

There are many ways to import, method that worked for me is Tools->Import Folder->(search for the dir) and then import. Try with one and then you could add to your auto-import for the future.
Title: Re: Search List Question
Post by: Alex B on August 20, 2007, 01:46:57 pm
Benn,

You are so busy in creating new threads that you sometimes seem to miss replies in old threads:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=42033.msg286524#msg286524