Whoops, just spotted the Favorites in the Navigation sub-menu -- my mistake. The Navigation menu under View doesn't contain Favorites, it starts with Back, so I assumed the Navigation menu when you right-clicked did the same thing. It might be slightly more usable if it were visible immediately on a right-click, but I'll let it rest. I'll add a toolbar button and use that. I can certainly see the utility of Favorites!
As for file moving, here's some typical scenarios for me:
1) I rip (download? perish the thought!
) a number of albums by the same artist into my Rips directory. I check them, tag them, etc then want to move them to their permanent home. Currently I need to drag each folder individually in the My Computer view, because I can't select more than one item at once. Also, since my music directory contains many, many folders I have to wait for the tree to auto-scroll until it gets to the point where I want it. Find & replace on the path works, except that I have to remember the source and destination paths to type in. There is no easy way to view existing file paths while in the search & replace dialog. Another way is to rename from properties, and use this to put the files in the appropriate directory. However, this won't work in the next scenario...
2) I rip a multi-disc compilation album, and put all the albums into another folder. I can't really use the rename from properties in this case, because there is no single property that translates into the overall containing folder.
3) I move part of my music collection to another disk drive. (If I was moving the entire collection, I could do a search & replace), and want the library entry to point to their new location.
Now, in all these scenarios what I could do is move the files in Internet explorer, then from MC do an update, followed by an import from each of the folders I keep music in. This works because I keep all the info in the tags up-to-date. However, I lose information about playlists (what playlists each song is in) and possibly playcount/last played. This is why I proposed a multi-stage update/import function:
Define watched folders first, then when doing an update/import:
1) Check if those songs exist, where their File Path field contains one of the watched folders (there is no need to update the entire library - only those files that appear to be in the watched folders)
2) If they don't exist, flag them temporarily
3) Perform an Import on the watched folders
4) Check to see if the imported files match any of those flagged in 2) - if they do, update their file path and (possibly) tags.
5) If they don't, delete them from the library
This would let me rearrange files freely using Internet Explorer, then use a single function to update the library. The flag/check process means that playlists would not be disrupted. Files would only be removed from the library if they were actually gone, not if they had moved.
Note that there is no need for a background process to "watch" the folders - I'm happy to launch this function manually as needed.
Another option is to make the My Computer branch in the tree closer to Internet explorer - where I can select multiple folders, and drag them to a new location. Given that drag & drop can sometimes involve auto-scrolling through many folders, something like Explorer's cut & past would work.
Yet another option is that when carrying out a Find & Replace on the File Path field, you could get a folder browser dialog, like the one during an Import.
Now, Move/Copy Disk File is close, but... it just seems to move files. It doesn't let me move folders. The only way to move folders is by drag & drop in the tree, or Find & Replace the File Path field. Ideally, I'd like to be able to right-click on a folder in the tree, and do a Move/Copy on the entire folder. Also, the Move/Copy Disk File dialog doesn't have the option to make a new folder.
Thank you for your concern - I hope this explains what I need! Incidentally, I need to manage my folder structure carefully because other programs rely on it. Basically, tools for DJing. My DJing laptop constantly gets files added and removed from its disk drive, so a simplified update/import is key.
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Topic: Favorites, forgotten? (Read 2120 times)