First off, I very much appreciate the attention being given to JRemote lately. (Thanks, Bob!) JRemote is why I use MC. JRemote is simply the best piece of music playing software I've ever used, and I've tried a lot of them. Nothing even comes close to JRemote. I use it every day. Conceptually, web apps like Panel are really good, but no web app can approach the fine sheen and snappy UI of a great native app like JRemote.
Here is one consistent problem I see with Remote. It involves syncing to the connected host when new music is added to the library. Briefly, the problem is: when music is added to the host, there is no way to reliably get Remote to sync its list of songs (when viewing an album).
Here's a detailed description of how I repro the failure.
1. JRemote on iPad is connected to MC on Mac host "MacHost". MC is configured to auto-import.
2. Get an audio file which is by an artist already in your library, on an album already in your library, but with a song that is not in your library.
3. Add the song to MacHost's media library by dropping the file into an auto-import location.
4. Observe MC import the song, it only takes a few seconds usually. MV displays the song in all the right places.
5. On JRemote, go to Playlists and hit the refresh icon.
6. On JRemote, look at the standard "Recently Imported" playlist. There is the song you added to MC. Thus, JRemote really does know about this song.
7. Now here is the bug. Navigate to the added song by drilling down, Audio -> Artists -> <artist of the added song> -> <album of the selected song>. The added song is not there. And there is no sync button to get JRemote to sync the list you're looking at (which is the album of the new song).
Hours can go by and the song does not appear. You can force quit JRemote, reconnect to MacHost, and drill down to the album with the new song. It's not there. You can connect JRemote to a different host, come back to MacHost, drill down to the album with the new song, and it's not there. You can hit every sync button on the way down to the album view. Nothing works.
Interestingly, when JRemote is in that state where is doesn't show the new song in the view of the album, JRemote *does* show the song in the list of the artist's "All Albums".
Even if the newly added song is on an album that's not currently in your library, that new album *sometimes* doesn't show up in the Artist's list of albums for quite a while (10 minutes or more), even if you hit the sync button when viewing the artist's list of albums. I.e. add a song by an artist who you have other songs from, but the new song is from an album you don't have. Navigate to JRiver's list of albums for that Artist, the new album doesn't show. Hit sync, and it (sometimes) still doesn't show. This one is not as repeatable as the "new song on an existing album" case but I still see it regularly.
So, I'd request:
1. The view of songs in an album definitely needs a refresh button, like most other views (list of artists, list of an artist's albums, top-level Playlists, playlist folders all have refresh buttons).
2. In lieu of a situation where syncing "just happens" automatically, everywhere (which - believe me - I understand is not realistic) - how about one big master "sync the entire library" button or command somewhere on JRemote? Even if this "full sync" took a few seconds, it would be worth it to me.
Thanks!
iPad Air 2 iOS 12.1.1
JRemote 3.26
iMac, macOS 10.14.2
MC 24.0.72
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Topic: JRemote sync problem when adding new song to host library (Read 562 times)