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More => Old Versions => JRiver Media Center 18 for Mac => Topic started by: Eccles on February 11, 2013, 06:36:34 pm

Title: iPhone sync?
Post by: Eccles on February 11, 2013, 06:36:34 pm
My MacWife hates iTunes, but must have a way to sync her tunes to her iPhone.  Will this be her panacea, or will she still need that POS for syncing (and a Mac port of MCiS to keep 'em in sync)?
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: JimH on February 11, 2013, 06:52:10 pm
Apple locked their database.  It's encrypted.  There is no practical way for us to support the new ones.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: shAf on February 11, 2013, 08:19:51 pm
Apple locked their database.  It's encrypted.  There is no practical way for us to support the new ones.

It would be of some help if MC Mac could write a iTunes compatible XML playlist. The user only then needs to show iTunes the same library and sync via the playlist.

This does not change the method, but I assume MC Mac will make it a lot easier to create a playlist!

My CA$0.02 :)
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: JimH on February 11, 2013, 08:25:57 pm
It would be of some help if MC Mac could write a iTunes compatible XML playlist. The user only then needs to show iTunes the same library and sync via the playlist.

This does not change the method, but I assume MC Mac will make it a lot easier to create a playlist!

My CA$0.02 :)
We prefer MC Mac.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: sunfire7 on February 11, 2013, 10:35:55 pm
Well, I'm sure Mac MC will provide an easy way to sync your iphone via itunes, just like the windows version, but better, right Jim?
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: laerm on February 12, 2013, 01:53:21 pm
We prefer MC Mac.

So we'll be pronouncing this "Mick-Mack" as opposed to MC Mac's "Mack-Mick"? ;)

Micah
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: sgallaghe on February 12, 2013, 07:16:22 pm
My MacWife hates iTunes, but must have a way to sync her tunes to her iPhone.  Will this be her panacea, or will she still need that POS for syncing (and a Mac port of MCiS to keep 'em in sync)?

In a similar vein, I'd love to ditch iTunes too now that it's more of an iTunes Store portal than a library manager, but I rely on certain metadata that I don't think are included in the tags, things like date added and date modified.

If I switch, will I lose all this valuable data?

Or will I have to keep the iTunes POS for these features and have MC Mac look to the external HD where I have my song files stored to update the new MC database?

Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: glynor on February 13, 2013, 10:54:15 am
In a similar vein, I'd love to ditch iTunes too now that it's more of an iTunes Store portal than a library manager, but I rely on certain metadata that I don't think are included in the tags, things like date added and date modified.

[Date Modified] is tracked by the filesystem, and should be preserved properly no matter what.
[Date Added] is specific to the database (it is, literally, the date it was added to iTunes), and therefore would be different.  MC has its own "Date Added" field, called [Date Imported].  You could, conceivably migrate this data over, but it might not be easy as iTunes doesn't have the most robust metadata export functionality.

Someone who knows how iTunes handles in-file tagging would have to comment on whether the iTunes-specific Data Added field is actually included in the file tags (which would be the easiest way to migrate it over).

PS.  It looks like from the briefest of Google searches (http://www.MediaMonkey.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23898) that it is possible to export the data from iTunes and get it into an Excel-capable text file of some kind.  From there, you should be able to import the data into MC with relative ease, if you import the files "in-place".

There might be other ways too... I haven't used iTunes seriously in so long that I haven't followed this very closely.  MC can import Playlists, including XML type lists, so it is possible that just exporting the entire iTunes database to an XML, and then importing that XML into MC would handle this automatically.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: Cmagic on February 13, 2013, 11:14:43 am

AFAIK "Date Added" is not included in the tracks tags, it's a specific iTunes DB field.
Using some AppleScript trickery it should be possible to read the "Date Added" field, which is read only, and save it to some file (txt, csv, xml) or even mpl playlist in order to transfer it to MC Mac.
However if MC Mac behaves like MC Win, the [Date Imported] field will be set to the actual date the mpl file was imported. So let's wait and see...

BTW, will MC Mac be Apple Scriptable like the MC Automation API on WIn?

Looks like there wille be some fun ahead experimenting with MC Mac!

Cheers.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: glynor on February 13, 2013, 12:11:46 pm
However if MC Mac behaves like MC Win, the [Date Imported] field will be set to the actual date the mpl file was imported. So let's wait and see...

Yeah, you'd probably need to hack it a bit.  Import the data to a user-defined field, and then copypasta it into the appropriate field in MC.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: sgallaghe on February 13, 2013, 04:55:30 pm
There might be other ways too... I haven't used iTunes seriously in so long that I haven't followed this very closely.  MC can import Playlists, including XML type lists, so it is possible that just exporting the entire iTunes database to an XML, and then importing that XML into MC would handle this automatically.

If you guys could come up with an Import Wizard that transfers all the current iTunes metadata, not just the music files, you'd have a lot more Mac iTunes people jumping ship.

Most people's eyes glaze over when to talk about XML files. ;-)
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: glynor on February 13, 2013, 05:01:02 pm
There honestly might already be a way.

I don't know... I do know that some work was done a few years back on importing from iTunes.  It also CAN handle exporting back into iTunes (the Windows version, anyway).  The third-party plugin discussed above (MCiS) is WAY more powerful, but it has quite a few things built-in.

I just haven't used them.  In any case, most of this probably won't be in the first versions, but I think they'll certainly consider it.
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: sgallaghe on February 17, 2013, 01:17:40 pm
So we'll be pronouncing this "Mick-Mack" as opposed to MC Mac's "Mack-Mick"? ;)

Micah


I thought of it more like MC Hammer.  ;)
Title: Re: iPhone sync?
Post by: Cmagic on February 18, 2013, 05:07:53 am
We prefer MC Mac.
Yes, Mc.Mac that's the right name. (pronounce mac mac)   :D