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[Lunatique]

I absolutely love Media Jukebox, but there's one problem I have right now, and I was hoping someone could help me out.

I have music on multiple hard drives (a particular genre will reside on one drive, and another genre would reside on another drive), and I also have external hard drives that I use as master backups for my entire music library. So essentially I have 3x redundancy. My usual workflow when dealing with new music files is as such:

1) I place the new arrivals to the local drives (the various drives with different genres). I'd then let Media Jukebox auto-import the files with audio analizer enabled. If I listen to some of the files before the next backup session, I'd also set some ratings for how much I like the new music.

2) When I back up these various drives onto the external drive master collection, I use Allway Sync, which would sync the various folders with the corresponding ones.

3) When I need to backup that external drive master library to the other external drive (2nd copy of master library), I also use Allway Sync, and I would sync the entire library folder, and also the "Documents/Settings/Application Data/J River" folder too. I also back up the Application Data because the 2nd external drive master library is usually connected to another computer, and I need to transfer all the Application Data over to that computer so it's updated on that computer's Media Jukebox.

The problem I have is that when I have new music, new ratings, and new replay gain settings for the folders on local drives, they don't seem to carry over to my external drives when I sync/backup the corresponding folders. I think this is because all that data (ratings, replay gain, genre...etc) are stored in the Application Data folder, and since my backing up of the local folders to the external drive doesn't involve the Application Data folder, all that information won't carry over. (But when I do the back up between the two external drives, it does because that backup involves the Application Data folder).

So, my question is, how can I get all that information over to the external drive when I do my backup? Or, maybe it's not possible and I shouldn't try to set the ratings/genre/replay gain on the local drive library at all and only do it when the files have been copied over to the external drive and then do it on the external drive copies instead?

[Alex B]

I read your post twice and I still don't think I can fully understand your workflow. Could you please try to rephrase and simplify it?

Most likely there is a way to do what you want, but I'd rather not try to guess what you are doing and write a detailed answer that may not be based on your actual situation.

[Lunatique]

Ok, I'll try again, but it'll be hard to make it shorter. I'll try to be more clear instead.

1) My music collection resides on my local hard drives. As I add new music to my collection, I also set ratings for the songs as I listen to them, and also change some tags.

2) When I need to backup my music collection, I connect an external drive to the computer.

3) I then backup my music collection to the external drive with a software called Allway Sync, which has the ability to sync folders, and you can set it to detect files that have been modified (change in file size, date...etc), files that have been deleted or added...etc.

4) I have noticed that my tag changes and star ratings I have set with Media Jukebox while dealing with the files on my local hard drive do not always carry over to the external drive when I do my backups. Often previously set star rating, tag changes...etc would be missing after the new files have been copied to the external drive.

5) I have noticed that if a file already exists on both the local drives and the external drive, but I have made tag changes to the one on the local drive, and then Allway Sync updates the same file on the external drive, my tag changes do not carry over. HOWEVER, if I have new files on the local drive that's not on the external drive, whatever tag changes I've made to the local drive version will carry over to the external drive once the file is copied over. Why is that?

I did an experiment today where I made star rating/tag changes to a files on my local drive while inside Media Jukebox, and then I checked that mp3 file and saw that the file date has changed--which tells me Media Jukebox will alter your mp3 file when you make tag changes. But when I copied that altered mp3 file over the one that's on the external hard drive, the star rating/tag changes did not show up in Media Jukebox.

So I guess my question is, are star ratings and tag changes saved in the mp3 files themselves, or are they stored in some other config file in the Application Data folder? How can I make sure that whatever star rating/tag changes I make to the files on the local drive will carry over when I do my backups?

[AUser]

Check Tools->Options->General : Update tags when file info changes

also

Tools->Options->Library & Folders : Standard Library Fields
Tools->Options->Library & Folders : User Library Fields
You can set each tag to be stored in the file or not individually here

After you set those up, highlight your files, right click the files, library tools, update tags (from library)

[Alex B]

1) My music collection resides on my local hard drives. As I add new music to my collection, I also set ratings for the songs as I listen to them, and also change some tags.

Verify that your tag changes are saved to the physical file tags. Be default MJ saves most library field values automatically to the file tags if the file format supports tagging (but you said you use MP3, which supports tagging, correct?).

You can check the library field specific write options in Options > Standard Library Fields (or user fields if you have created them) > click a field name and select Edit to open its properties page.

You can check the physical file tags in Action Window > Tag > Format Info (click the topmost line in the Tag wiindow to open the format window)

2) When I need to backup my music collection, I connect an external drive to the computer.

3) I then backup my music collection to the external drive with a software called Allway Sync, which has the ability to sync folders, and you can set it to detect files that have been modified (change in file size, date...etc), files that have been deleted or added...etc.

4) I have noticed that my tag changes and star ratings I have set with Media Jukebox while dealing with the files on my local hard drive do not always carry over to the external drive when I do my backups. Often previously set star rating, tag changes...etc would be missing after the new files have been copied to the external drive.

5) I have noticed that if a file already exists on both the local drives and the external drive, but I have made tag changes to the one on the local drive, and then Allway Sync updates the same file on the external drive, my tag changes do not carry over. HOWEVER, if I have new files on the local drive that's not on the external drive, whatever tag changes I've made to the local drive version will carry over to the external drive once the file is copied over. Why is that?

I did an experiment today where I made star rating/tag changes to a files on my local drive while inside Media Jukebox, and then I checked that mp3 file and saw that the file date has changed--which tells me Media Jukebox will alter your mp3 file when you make tag changes. But when I copied that altered mp3 file over the one that's on the external hard drive, the star rating/tag changes did not show up in Media Jukebox.

So I guess my question is, are star ratings and tag changes saved in the mp3 files themselves, or are they stored in some other config file in the Application Data folder? How can I make sure that whatever star rating/tag changes I make to the files on the local drive will carry over when I do my backups?

If the tags are correctly written to the files they are included in the backed up files.

Probably your issue is about updating MJ's library. You didn't say if you use another MJ instance on a different PC, another MJ library on the same PC or only one MJ library that sees both file locations.

In any case you can manually update the library by selecting the files and doing: right-click > Library Tools > Update Libary (from tags).

In addition, you can configure the Auto-Import tool to check for changed files. (Auto-Import options > Auto-Import Folders > Options > Update for external changes). It should be able to detect the changed file modification date and automatically import the changed tag data.


Edit

AUser posted while I was writing my reply.


Be careful with the Update tools:
Update Library (from tags)  -- reads the physical file tags and changes the library accordingly.
Update Tags (from library)  -- writes library data to the physical file tags.

[Lunatique]

Ahh, that helps (updating from tag), but there's still a problem. I'll get to that. First, I drew a diagram showing my exact setup--which I hope will make things even more clear:



The copy of Media Jukebox installed on the Surf Computer has all the local drives plus USB #1 set on Auto-Import. Whenever new files on the local drives get synchronized to USB #1, this should be reflected in Media Jukebox if Auto-Import is working.

To backup the main library on USB #1 to USB #2, simply synchronizing the folders should be enough, but I want to make sure any new information stored in the Application Data folder on Surf Computer will also show up on the Workstation Computer, so I also synchronize that as well. So when I boot up either copy of Media Jukebox with either computer, they should contain identical view/tagging/columns...etc, except on the Workstation Computer I cannot access the files in the local drives on the Surf Computer (which is fine, since I have extensive Smart Lists that exclude certain drives depending on which computer I'm using or if the USB drives are even turned on).

Ok, so the issues that remain are:

1) Let's say I changed the rating/tagging of an mp3 located on a local drive. I can see that it's been changed because the file date has been updated.

Now, if I synchronize that file to USB #1, although the mp3 file itself will save over the version on USB #1, the rating/tagging changes will not show up in Media Jukebox. So now I have an mp3 that is rated and tagged a certain way on the local drive, but rated and tagged a different way on the USB #1 drive, because Media Jukebox has not updated the rating/tagging of that file after it's been updated from the synchronization. I can go and manually find all the files I've recently synchronized and manually update them by using the "Update from Tags" option, but what I'd really like to be able to do is to have Media Jukebox do this automatically. That, is the main problem here. If I can only get Media Jukebox to update the newly synchronized rating/tagging, all my problems will be solved.

I do have Auto-Import set to "Update for External Changes" but it doesn't seem to work. I also checked all the Standard Library Fields and they are all set to "save tagging info in physical file when possible." If those are the only settings that can get me what I need, and they aren't working properly, then it's probably a bug? Or am I missing something still (on how to do what I want Media Jukebox to do)?

BTW, thanks for the help thus far. Really appreciate it.

[Alex B]

So are you saying that you would like to make the second instance of MJ automatically update the physical file tags in a duplicated (but older) set of disk files when you sync only the changed library (but not the changed disk files)?

Unfortunately, I don't think that would be possible. The Auto-Import feature can only update the database from the disk files when it detects changed files on the disk. It is not designed to check for the possible changes in both directions and automatically write all library field values that differ from the physical file tags to the disk files.

I'd suggest to change the sync software's settings and drive configurations so that the library files and the media files would be copied (or "backed up") whenever they have changed.

Edit: edited a bit...

[Lunatique]

OK, I'm doing some more tests right now, and it's looking good so far. I don't know why it didn't work before. Basically I'll pick certain files on the local drives and change the rating/tagging/replay gain on them, and then use Allway Sync to update the copies on the USB #1 drive, and they do show up in Media Jukebox now.

But now there's another problem I forgot to mention. Often the tags I've changed quite a while back will suddenly change itself back to what they were before I did the change. What's causing this automatic reverting back?

[Lunatique]

So are you saying that you would like to make the second instance of MJ automatically update the physical file tags in a duplicated (but older) set of disk files when you sync only the changed library (but not the changed disk files)?

Nope. I don't need that. I use Allway Sync for that.

What I was hoping for was simply to have Media Jukebox notice that the mp3's on the USB #1 drive have been updated after I sync the local drives to the USB #1 drive. But like my last post mentioned, this appears to be working now.

The remaining problem is now files that automatically reverts back to old taggings on their own without me doing anything.