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[JoshuaHorowitz]

I have an Archos Jukebox Multimedia with a 20GB hard drive. Unfortunately, although it can read ID3 tags during playback, it is unable to browse, search, or sort by tags, using only a directory structure (it interfaces as a portable hard drive through a drive letter, ex: "E:"). This means I need to get a specific subset of my MC library (which is more than 20GB) to this device with a specific "Rename Files From Properties" style formatting of folders and filenames (ex: E:\Music\[Artist]\[Name].mp3). The problem is that I can not use "Rename Files From Properties", as it actually MOVES the files, removing them from my computer's hard drive. The only way I can use it is by using MC's "Move/Copy Disk File" to copy the files in my playlist to another location on my computer's hard drive, then import this new collection into a new library, and then "Rename Files From Properties" to my Archos. This process is understandably tedious.

I was wondering if it would be possible for the "Rename Files from Properties" tool to be changed to a "Move/Copy Files from Properties" tool with the option of copying a specfic set of tracks to a new location (outside the library) with user-defined formatting by templates. It would be very useful for me, and I'm sure many others could find some use for it.

Does anyone else have an Archos Jukebox or other similar hard drive MP3 player which they use with a large music collection? If so, how do you deal with organization? It's a wonderful device, but somewhat lacking in MP3 organization. I'd be interested to hear any ideas or methods. For example, can MC playlists be converted to Archos Jukebox Multimedia playlists and/or visa-versa?

Many thanks,
Joshua

[DV8]

I also use the Archos Jukebox. I agree with that it is a great low cost unit but severely lacking organization.
The only way I was able to get it to work was to copy music directly using Windows Explorer. I organize the collection by Artist-Album and generally listen to albums so this wasn't a bit problem for me.

[SteveG]

Joshua,

You make a good point. I will work to improve this.

Steve

[SteveG]

Joshuad and DV8,

There is a new Portable Drives plugin (v 9.0.21) posted at:
http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/downloads/mcplugins.pl?type=8

If you get this version, you will now have a right click option on your Archos drive letter for "Enable directory creation from filename".  When enabled, this option will created subfolders on your Archos based on the filename during file uploads. For example "C:\Music\Beatles\Hard days night\Help.mp3" would create an identical path on your Archos. I hope this is a step in the right direction. Please let me know how it works out for you and what could be changed to improve this.

Steve ( JRiver)

[Ingo]

Steve,

sound like a great start..... I'm going to test it right away...

how about having a list of (userdefined) prefixes to be removed from that path?
I have my music organized in paths like
C:\my music\CD\[artist]\[album]
c:\my music\friend\...
e:\my music\...
and I really would love to have these removed... and a custum base folder added... (I store everything on my archos in \audio\ )

installing this new plugin removed the custom drive label and reset it to the default one...

ok... after a first test: it realy is a good start.....

Ingo

[JoshuaHorowitz]

Very nice start, of course. If it's completely new, I'm amazed that a small group of users can get a somewhat obscurely helpful (yet still very helpful, almost neccessary) tool into the program with just a simple request. Very cool. Unfortuneatly, it doesn't really help (as it is now), as my MP3s are stored in MC with filenames starting with "\\josh\joshmusic\...". It gives me an error when I try to upload a file while "Auto-Create Directories..." is enabled (quite understandably, no drive letter) and I can upload normally when it isn't.

Although you're probably hard at work on this problem/feature request (well, not right now, it's kinda late), to reiterate, it would be nice if you could, either in a handheld plugin or a general file-management tool, do the exact thing you do with "Rename Files From Properties". You would have control over both the destination root directory, the subdirectory structure underneath it, and the destination filename. All of these based on ID3 tags. That's my ideal prototype.

The reason why I really need this (or some similar) amount of power is that my MP3 collection is segregated into two seperate filenaming schemes in different folders. Even if it wasn't, I would still probably want to have the ability to use a different naming scheme for a tiny small-screened MP3 player than for a large computer with a mouse, keyboard, and 1152x864 resolution screen. They have different needs.

I would be glad to test any further prototypes or provide further feedback.

Many, many thanks!

Joshua

[kcorbett]

If you get this version, you will now have a right click option on your Archos drive letter for "Enable directory creation from filename".  When enabled, this option will created subfolders on your Archos based on the filename during file uploads.

I'm one of the people who's been asking for this

Looks like the new plugin may do what I want. Can you describe the work flow in brief? I have my music collection on my PC hard drive (F) and a "mirror" (large subset really) on my Archos (G drive). What will I do to synchronize changes to the Archos?

If it's as simple as the right-click "synchronize files" command then I suspect this will make me be very happy

/kmc

[Rudy]

Great idea, thought I'd try the new Portable Drives plugin for my Archos Jukebox 6000. Everytime I try to access the drive in MC, MC crashes. Any ideas, Steve? Or anyone? Worked fine with the previously installed plugin, though I'm not sure what version it was.

Thanks

Media Center Registered 9.0.175 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows 2000  Workstation 5.0 Service Pack 2 (Build 2195)
Intel Pentium III 860 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 522 MB, Free - 271 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.81 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1106 / Shell32.dll: 5.00.3315.2902 / wnaspi32.dll: Internal ASPI Layer

Ripping /   Drive E:   Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
 Drive J:   Copy mode:ModeBurstBigBuffer   CD Type:Auto   Read speed:Max
 Digital playback: Yes /  Use YADB: Yes /  Get cover art: Yes /  Calc replay gain: No /  Copy volume: 32767
 Eject after ripping: Yes /  Play sound after ripping: No  

Burning /  Drive E: CD-R/RW  CW088D CD-R/RW     Addr: 2:1:0  Speed:32  MaxSpeed:48  Use MJ Engine:Yes
 Test mode: No /  Eject after writing: Yes /  Direct decoding: No /  Write CD-Text: No
 Use playback settings: No /  Normalization: None

[Rudy]

Saw I was a few versions behind. Upgraded from .175 to .178. All is better now.

[SteveG]

There is a new Portable Drives plugin (v 9.0.22) posted at:
http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/downloads/mcplugins.pl?type=8

This Plugin will solve the UNC problem for you Joshua. The workflow is to right click on your drive letter and select "Auto-Create directories". After this is selected, drag and drop files on the drive letter and the Plugin will automatically create the appropriate directories from the filename during the upload. If the file already exists, it will be skipped.

Tomorrow I will add some selections for choosing your naming scheme based on tag info. It will look similar to the way we do this when burning a CD.

Steve

[SteveG]

There is now a new Portable Drive Plugin (v 9.0.23). This version provides right click options on your Portable Drive for selecting tag information for folder creation during transfers. Please check it out and let me know if it works as expected.

Thanks,

Steve

[JoshuaHorowitz]

Steve,

I've tried the new plugin (v9.0.23). Seems to work fine, no bugs. You're getting closer and closer to exactly what I want. Great!

As far as I can tell, however, it doesn't yet have the ability to put the folders and files in an arbitrary root path. Also, the actual filename of the MP3s on the handheld is just the same as that on my computers disk, completely uncustomizable (I assume this was the intended behavoir). I don't mean to sound rude, its just hard for me to tell how much further you're going to develop this and I want to make sure you know what I'm looking for. Everything you've done so far is more than enough, though, so thanks!

Just out of curiousity, is there anything specifically standing in the way of just somehow porting over the "Rename Files From Properties" tool to the plugin? Is this what you're working towards, or would it be too much trouble? Just wondering how this fit into the big picture.

More thanks to Steve and everyone else than were previously thought possible,

Joshua

[SteveG]

Joshua,

I am glad this is working pretty well for you. For now this is all the further we are thinking of pushing this. Eventually, we will implement the suggestion to make a whole menu which looks like the "Rename files from properties" but when we do that we are going to rework that whole section of code as well to add a bunch of features.

I hope this will get you through for now.

Steve