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[bmp]

installed new mj and new plugin.  the crash thing was fixed, for about 2 instances.  now whenever i left click on the ipod icon it crashes mj... again.

I had the "delete files not in list" or whatever option checked, maybe that was part of the problem...

[bmp]

reformatted with ephpod and now the mj plugin works and has been for a while.  yeehaw.

still hoping for: artist/album check boxes for synchronization; playlist creation from said artist/album additions; drag and drop playlist order

keep it up/.

[Kurt Young]

I reinstalled MJ and the iPod...and now it is showing up under the drive letter, and you are correct, there is no label for the drive except the letter.

However, I'm lost at how to get rid of the XPlay files which obviously aren't formatted the same way as MJ would format.  And for that matter...just how do copy files over and where do you put them.

Xplay made it easy with a folder for Playlists, Artists and Albums and loaded everything into the correct folders when you just dragged the albums onto the Xplay folder icon.

I tried to reformat the iPod as suggested, but when I right click on the drive letter for the iPod I don't get the option to "Format for MJ" or "Rebuild DB from Files", just "Add SubFolder", "Show Queued files only", "Play", "Add to playing" and "Explore".

Any ideas or suggestions?

Thanks,

Rick

Oy Rick,

Something that XPlay does makes the MJ plugin not "see" the iPod as an iPod.  I'll bet you can see the contacts and calendars folder in the tree and the "ipod created example" vcf file on the right.  It's not an oversight, it's just that the plugin isn't compatible with an XPlay-initialized iPod yet.  Two options:  restore the iPod or delete/recreate the iPod_Control folder.  Now, if you do either, the XPlay setup wizard will pop up every time you connect... just cancel it.  Until the plugin is compatible, running that wizard will make MJ think you just plugged any old hard drive in.

[Kurt Young]

New MJ, new plugin...

Plugged in my iPod that I loaded up via MJ last night.  Everything looks great so far, it would have crashed MJ last night.  Good on the fix, sir.  New one for ya now:

Brought up synchronization, nice UI change.  Playlist groups work great, suggest being able to select them as a "root" and have all playlists they contain be also selected.

Anyhow, I hit "select none", put a tick in the "delete files not in list" box and hit OK.  Expected it to basically do a wipe - no playlists, no songs.  MJ blew up.  

Tried a tamer experiment:  made a smartlist with 1 random song and synched it with "delete files not in list" ticked.  Success, 1 song.  Synched again, with the box ticked again.  MJ blew up.    

Tried same thing but without the tick.  Worked great, but now there's two songs on the iPod.  Incidentially, the first song is no longer a member of any playlist, and the new one is a member of the "onesong" playlist.

Keep 'em comin'!!  

[willrmc]

ok, new build.
first off, the plugin seems to be fixed on the crashes thats very nice. now to the new delete function.
i loaded up one playlist onto the ipod. then i deleted one album from the list and added another. i went to sync with that playlist again and checked the delete files box. i hit ok and it just crashed mj. i tried again and it did the same. but we are definately going to the right direction.
second, when i try to load all of my songs by clicking the all music auto smartlist, it doesn't upload any of the songs that aren't on other playlists being synced. and whenever i do a complete library sync, it gets to the end and with like 25 or so files left to transfer an error window comes up and says "failed upload error" or something to that effect. i can't seem to figure what songs aren't going on, but when i sync to the same playlists with ephpod they all load, so its not the files themselves. and i also had this same problem with this error on the last build but forgot to post it.

third, whenever i load large amounts of files, mj still appears to crash, although it doesn't but the progress bar goes away and the program loses its skin and reverts to standard windows looking title bars. also when the progress bar does work, its not very accurate. it usually gets to the end rather quickly and then loads songs with the bar full for another 10 min.

hope this helps, thanks again.

[Rick11]

Kurt,

Thanks for the info.  I deleted XPlay from my computer, but did not reformat the iPod before I did it.

You are correct.  I can see all the files you mention, and I can even copy files to the root directory of the iPod.

My question is...Should I reinstall XPlay on my computer and use it to restore the iPod. Or should I delete the iPod_Control folder from Windows Explorer.  Then recreate an empty iPod_Control folder, and with Windows Explorer?

From what you say, it would appear that I should have XPlay on my computer, and just cancel the XPlay setup wizard each time I start MJ...that is, until it's compatible with XPlay.  And, is the compatibility issue being addressed?  When should there be an expected 'fix'.

I really appreciate your help, as I beta tested XPlay and it works fine for moving stuff onto and off of the iPod.  The I beta tested the plug-in for Music Match, which really sucks!  It takes forever to load anything which totally eliminates the speed of the firewire connection, and it's quite difficult to use (not intuitive) with Music Match.  So after years of Music Match I finally found MJ and love the way it works.  But, it defeats the purpose of switching if I can't use it with my iPod.

Thanks again,

Rick

[Kurt Young]

Rick,

I'm right there with you.  I really like XPlay and don't want to lose it.  I hope that compatibility is on the list, but I dunno for sure.  As for musicmatch, I used to use them too, but it's better on the MJ side.  Smartlists, baby.

Don't use XPlay to restore your iPod, though.  XPlay (as far as I know) will restore it into a Mac-formatted iPod.  Which gets me to thinking... make sure that your iPod's "About" screen shows "Format:  Windows" -- if it doesn't, you have a Mac-formatted iPod, and that could be your whole problem.  (There's no "Format:  Mac", the line is omitted on Mac-formatted pods.)

My advice is to download the Windows restore software from Apple and restore it that way.  I'm not sure what files MJ doesn't like, but deleting the iPod_control folder might work, but I'd go with a restore just to be save.  Nothing like a clean slate.

[ashawley]

Steve:

Results from last nights tests (latest MJ Ver9, latest plugin):

1. The synching option to delete songs on iPod not part of the sync didn't work as expected.  Acutally, it plain didn't work.  When I started a sync w/that option checked MJ just closed (not a crash, just a close of the app).  But you warned us that hadn't been tested yet, so that's cool.

2. Still noticing that the Status bar freezing/losing focus problem isn't fixed.  Also noticed that we have 2 different types of status bars.  One for Synching and one for when you just Upload songs.  From a UI perspective, I'd recommend just having one status bar format.  Myself, I prefer the one you have for synching, but with and added transfer speed indicator.

3. I was NOT able to crash MJ when clicking on the Ipod root like I was able to in the past.  For the time being at least it seems you've squashed this bug.

4. Still waiting for the Artist/Album synch stuff, but I know you're on that  

5. Still waiting for integration the iPod's playcount field w/MJs so that Recently played smartlists can be updated etc.  

Adam

[Rick11]

Thanks Kurt,

My iPod is definitely formatted for Windows, as I'm using the Window 20GB version.

I'll download the restore file from the link you gave me and let you know what happens.

I just didn't want to have to re-install all the MP3 files and create the playlists I had created in XPlay again...but if it will make MJ work with my iPod then so be it.

Thanks,

Rick

[Kurt Young]

True true, Rick.

I haven't used XPlay since the last build... I've got my MJ playlists now.  Before MJ playlist synch, I would use MJ to export all and then use XPlay to synch with them.  So now I'm skipping the middleman, although at this point, it's easier to restore and then re-upload.  I know that MJ'll replace XPlay, but I don't want to lose XPlay (I paid for it, after all).

[brownie]

if you go to windows explorer, what is the name of your ipod drive? it should be< X:IPOD > if you renamed it to something else, then change it back. and go check the date of your portables plugin in the jukebox plugin folder on your harddrive if it is not a recent date manually delete it and reinstall the one from the website.

hey sorry it took me so long to reply to that..  but there is no drive letter associated with my iPod. does this mean i need to map a network drive? but then what should i map it to? i recently had to install a IEEE 1394 bus host controller (or something or other, it had the port i could put my iPod firewire cable in) and slotted it into a spare PCI slot in the back of my PC. the iPod works okayish with Musicmatch, but id really like to be able to use mediajukebox. any ideas?

[SteveG]

Everyone,

There is a new Plug-in posted with some bug fixes for the deletion when synching stuff. Can you check  it out and let me know if you have problems.  It would be a big help if you could list steps to duplicate the problem you are seeing.

Thanks for the help.

Steve

[ashawley]

Brownie:

Your iPod isn't showing up as a mapped drive because of a nifty little feature our friends at Apple had MMJB put in <note reeking sarcasm>.

Basically, you need to "Enable Firewire Disk Mode" in the Devices>Options section of MMJB.  Don't know where this is exactly, but by default this is turned off, so windows doesn't map a drive letter to the iPod.  As such, MJ can't access it.

My recommendation is to get rid of MMJB, MMJB iPod Plugin and the iPod software.  None of it's needed for MJ.

Adam

[mconnell]

MJ 9.0.79 and plugin 3.0.20:
When viewing a playlist, the playlist name is listed in the 1st column along side each track in the main window of MJ. The first 3 chars of the plyalist name are being dropped i.e. my playlist is 'U2 - Fire and Tree' but shows as '- Fire and Tree' in the main window for each track.

[willrmc]

MJ 9.0.80, plugin 3.0.20:

1. Made a playlist with one album each of the following:
-Bright Eyes
-David Bowie
-Elton John
-Run DMC
-Wilco

2. Synced above playlist, did not check delete files. all files transfered fine.

3. deleted -Run DMC from playlist, added -Ben Folds to the playlist

4. synced with playlist again, this time checked the delete files box.

5. results from sync, this is the new contents of the ipod
-Ben Folds
-Bright Eyes
-David Bowie x2
-Elton John x2
-Wilco x2

contests of playlist
-Ben Folds
-Bright Eyes
-David Bowie
-Elton John
-Wilco

contents not in any playlist
-David Bowie
-Elton John
-Wilco

so, it deleted Run DMC from the ipod and added Ben Folds, but then it duplicated every song from the Bowie, Elton, and Wilco so it appears twice on the ipod but only once each in the playlist and for some reason it did not duplicate any Bright Eyes.
i hope i am explaining this right. the progress bar did seem more stable though, but i didn't transfer any large amounts of files. hope this helps.

[bmp]

noticed something, umm, fun with the new sync.

i have two trees in the synchronization menu i use: full albums (for playlists of full albums) and mixes (for general purpose playlists).

it seems that whenever i go to sync, one of those trees doesn't retain the selections from before.  

for example.  
sync1: i check all the mixes in both trees
sync2: full albums is checked, mixes is not, so i check those
sync3: full albums is now unchecked while mixes retains from last synch.

furthermore, and i don't know why this is happening to "mixes" but not "full albums," but for every song in a playlist within "mixes," there are now three copies (one for each time i've run the process.)

Also, i can't seem to replicate it with any certainty, but i still get the "crash MJ when left clicking on the ipod drive letter occasionally.  I just load up ephpod and then close and save and then mj works again.

[willrmc]

ok now i wiped out my ipod and did a complete library sync. it again lost it on the progress bar and looked like it froze, but didnt again. but when it was done again, all the songs weren't there. i checked and there are no duplicate filenames so that can't be it. but my library has 2475 files and after several complete syncs the ipod has 2459 files it is missing 16 files. to test this i added 17 additional songs to my library and did another sync: in my library i had 2492 files and on the ipod 2476, missing 16 again. i'm not sure how to figure out which 16 songs are not making it on the album but whenever i put the files on with ephpod, all of them appear so i doubt it is the files themselves. oh and the last 2 times i ran a complete sync i got the file upload error, but not the first 3 times i ran the sync

[SteveG]

Everyone,

Thanks for the bug reports. Will, the detail on yours was incredibly helpful.

There is now a new Plug-in posted.

Fixed: Bug with deleting empty playlists on synch which caused crashing.

Fixed: Progress bar during synch should display better.

Fixed: Bug with deleting files during synch.

Fixed: When you get the next build of Version 9 (later today?), status dialogues for synching should improve.


Mconnell,

I can not duplicate this. Can anyone else verify this?

bmp,

I think this will be resolved with the next build of MJ v9


Thanks,

Steve

[willrmc]

ok, here it goes. new build. i did the same test i did yesterday and this time it came through with flying colors. it made all of the appropriate changes and did not duplicate any files. the progress bar seemed to work much better and i like the way it counts down the songs now. but whenever i clicked on an open browser window and went back to mj, it couldn't refresh itself and didn't display anything in mj until the sync was complete. then i still got that file upload error and was missing 16 songs, i'm not sure what that is all about i must have some songs mj doesnt like or something. but great build, its getting really close so i guess i will leave you with a list of final touches I would enjoy seeing.

1. fix the progress bar completely so it can display properly even if it goes to the background. and i would still like to see  time remaining and transfer speed indicators which would round everything out nicely.

2. i'm not sure if this is possible or practical but if certain songs don't make it on from the transfer (like my mysterious 16) mj could give you a report of what didnt make it after the syncs completion.

3. i also don't know if this is possible but it would be my ultimate dream. if on sync, mj could update the songs playcounts and adjust the smart playlists respectively. someone told me that the windows ipod firmware didn't write playcounts to the file like the macs does, so if that is true then this would be impossible, but if it did work, very cool.

thats all i can think of for now. hope this helps and things are really looking great! nice work!  

[Kurt Young]

Just a quick note before bed, new build of mj and plugin...  when I synch a smartlist that has the ~sort=random modifier, it will always end up sorted by album, then by track; this is how I have MJ set up to sort.

[jgourd]

I tried the new version this morning. When I checked the box to delete files I was dumbfounded that everything on my iPod that wasn't on a synchronized playlist was deleted.

This basically means that I have to decide if I am going to use sync all the time or not use it at all. There has to be some form of compromise to allow the sync function to delete files but also keep those files that were dragged to the iPod manually.

[ashawley]

Awesome build Steve!  You're so close it's great.

Couple of additions/comments:

1. I thought I had the most recent ver9 build (.80) but I guess there was a newer one after I tried last night because I was still getting the stuck status bar.  Will try again tonight.

2. I also saw Kurt's problem about playlist order when set to random, but for me it only appeared that way when I viewed my Playlist from the Playlist item in MJ.  When I actually viewed it on the iPod it was in a random order.  

Suggestion: Add a sequence column to the iPod>Playlist page so that we can see/verify the playlist sequence.

3. Question: are you still working on a solution for the folks out there that manage their music on their ipod not by Playlists but by Artist>Album?  I hope this can be added to the sync dialog.

4. Said it before, but I'll echo the vote for updating play counts to MJ from the iPod (if it's possible).

5. Not sure I agree w/Jgourd's statement regarding deleting during sync.  To me it worked as expected. And worked well.

6. Minor issue, there are still 2 different types of uploading status dialogs (one for synch on for manual uploads) from a UI perspective you might just want one.  And I prefer the sync window because it seems faster.  The Upload window is slower on my 500mhz clunker because of the need to repaint the screen when each file is uploaded (changing the status).  This is particularly true on large uploads (1700 songs).  Nitpicky I know, but I run a QA dept so I have to be.  

Adam

[graham131]

Steve or indeed anyone!

I have just received notification that my iPOD 20GB Windows version has been dispatched to me.  I should get it Tuesday.  As i am in the fortunate position of having had you guys do a lot of testing I am after some advice.

After I have thrown away the software and instructions that come in the box!!!!!  What should I do to acheive the best "virgin" install possible so as not to encounter some of the issues you may have had.

Thanks in advance

Graham

[ashawley]

Steve:

I've got a doosy (sp) of a bug to report.  I loaded my full library last night doing a sync and checking the "upload all files" checkbox.

Things went fine, but upon listening to some tunes today I ran into a bug.  Certain albums don't play correctly.  For example, I select Browse>Artist>Album, then I select the first song on the album.  My little iPod sits there for a second, jumps to the second song, jumps to the 3rd, 4th, 5th, etc.  It does it REALLY fast, like half a second between songs.  No music plays, it just goes through the songs then pops back to the "home" screen of the iPod.

I know this is of no use to you without my itunes db.  I'll send it to you tonight.

Anyone else see this problem?  

I've also been able to recreate the mysterious skipping of first song problem that is common w/ephpod.  That to me might be more of a firmware issue so I'm not too worried about that but I thought you should know.

Oh, I've done a reset a number of times, it's not that.  I really think something got messed up in the itunes db.

Adam

[Kurt Young]

2. I also saw Kurt's problem about playlist order when set to random, but for me it only appeared that way when I viewed my Playlist from the Playlist item in MJ.  When I actually viewed it on the iPod it was in a random order.

Upon closer inspection, Adam's right on target here.  My ~sort=random smartlists are random on my iPod, they just didn't look random in MJ.  No worries.

One more echo for play count updates while I'm here,

Another echo for Adam's comment about "it worked as I expected" -- synchronization is now working exactly as expected, exactly as I had hoped for, and I love it.  Couple bugs to still hammer out, true, but the feel and the function are dead-on perfect.

Synching with other MJ items (artists, albums, genres, etc) would be extra gravy for sure, but you can make a smartlist with your criteria and synch with it.

Still getting GUI lock from MJ while synching, either within 15 seconds of start of synch, or if MJ loses focus.  Both cause the GUI lock.

Since I've been using MJ exclusively to fill my iPod, I've noticed a LOT more "skipping" incidents.  That is, the first (and sometimes second and third) songs on a list within the iPod (be it a playlist, an album, or whatever) will be skipped.  The iPod will just skip the first song, and start playing the second song.  This happened very infrequently before I used MJ for iPod transfer, but now happens on a daily basis.

[phango13]

hello all--i'm a newbie that could use a hand...

brought home a brand new ipod for windows 10 days ago and have YET to get it to sync correctly...

with the default install, MMJB would load a few songs at a time, slowly, and then disconnect...

upgraded the ipod firmware, and the MMJB software, same issue...

uninstalled MMJB and the MMJB ipod plugin, restored the ipod, installed MJ and MJ ipod plugin...

tried to synch 115 songs, 25 uploaded...tried again, this time 42 uploaded...all the time all 115 were showing up in the right windows when i clicked on the ipod drive 9as being on the drive, not in the queue)...

third time all 115 uploaded but after the third or fourth song i got the following windows error message, over and over:

"Windows was unable to save all the data for the file \Device\Harddisks\DP(1)0-0+3\iPOD_Control\Music\F19\<songname>.  The data has lost.  This error may be caused by a failure of your computer hardware or network connection.  Please try to save this file elsewhere"  

ouch, that last bit hurts after shelling out $500 for the ipod...

so i get one of these messages for each of the subsequent songs but the upload continues, slowly (approx 1 min/sog) and the ipod thinks they're all there but i haven't tested them all...

either way, somethings not right, and any advice/suggestions would be hugely appreciated....thanx, beth

computer specs:

PIII/512MB/40GB HD
win2k
actiontec PCI firewire card
(tried it with both the generic windows drivers and the actiontec drivers, no diff)

[willrmc]

beth, i would go to ephpod.com and download ephpod for free. try to upload songs with that, and if it still gives you an error then i would think it is your firewire card, just a guess though. ephpod right now is probably the most stable program to use though (give mj another week and it will pass it) although it is pathetic that apple wont give us a decent option out of the box.

and i have been experiencing a lot of first track skipping myself, but no more than the first song. the same thing used to happen when i used ephpod, but when i told ephpod to use all 20 music folders it seemed to fix it. mj already uses 20 music folders so maybe it is the non trunicated filenames causing the problems???

[ashawley]

Aw Kurt, you're belittling my most desired feature--synching w/other MJ items (albums, artists etc.).

Man, I really don't want to have to make playlists for all the Artists or Albums I want to keep on my iPod........

Shoot, and I thought I was gonna get what I wanted  .

Steve, I implore you: don't listen to him.  He's probably been tippin' a few back again (you've *heard* about his little problem haven't you?)  

Adam

[TimB]

I'm not a daily iPod loader so this is my first time in 7-10 days using it.

Only one really petty UI kinda thing.

After the word uploading in the uploading progress box, it would look nicer with a colon after the word "Uploading".  So it'd say...

Uploading: Can't Get It Out Of My Head

...for example.  I know its petty but it'd make it look tighter IMHO.

I'd like to be able to sync the Single Artist (Complete) folder with my iPod.  Can I do that with Playlist sync.?  If not then I'm with Adam, otherwise I'm with Kurt.

Right now I'm highlighting the track listing of Single Artist (Complete) and right clicking it into the iPod queue.

-=Tim=-

[phango13]

thanx will--ephpod synced it right up....

only NOW, the ipod won't play...

when i hit play, instead of starting the song it starts cycling thru all the songs in the folder (albums. artists, whichever i started in) and then kicks back to the browse menu...

pehaps a better post for the apple support board, but any thoughts appreciated...

[SteveG]

Hello Everyone,

Thanks for the comments.  No new build today. Let me tighten things up with some of the little requests for tomorrow. In regards to the Artist / Album Playlist, this is a pretty major undertaking. I hear you, but lets wait a little just to make sure other issues are at rest before we rock the boat.

graham131,

You should be able to plug your "Virgin" iPod in and run MJ. Please let me know if this does not work. I would recommend not loading MusicMatch.

JGourd,

Try not selecting the delete and then just synch whatever you want. If you want to remove files that are not in playlists, click on the Playlist column and remove unassigned files.

[Kurt Young]

Aw Kurt, you're belittling my most desired feature--synching w/other MJ items (albums, artists etc.).

Man, I really don't want to have to make playlists for all the Artists or Albums I want to keep on my iPod........

Shoot, and I thought I was gonna get what I wanted  .

Steve, I implore you: don't listen to him.  He's probably been tippin' a few back again (you've *heard* about his little problem haven't you?)  

Adam

Bah!!  I re-:hic:  er, I resen-:hic: er... uhmm.. :hic:  What was I talking about?

Serioiusly, I think that selecting objects in the media library would definately rule, please don't get me wrong on that.  I'm just saying that smartlists are freakishly versatile tools to pick content for your iPod... so much so that you can select ANY subset of your music, based on the smartlist criteria, and synch your iPod with it.

Example #1:  Under iPod synchronization options, select "Pearl Jam" and "Soundgarden" for synch.

Example #2:  Make a smartlist (using MJ 9's new smartlist wizard, of course) that says "Artist=[Pearl Jam],[Soundgarden]" and select that for synch.

It's the same thing, baby.  Well, same effect, at least.  Only difference is that #2 is already implemented, .  Of course, if it can be done, I'd very much dig it, and would definately use it.

Don't forget, though... Steve still has to work in play count downloads, .aa audible support, XPlay compatibility, the composer tag, automatic synchronization when you plug the iPod in, changing the "force convert" to "safety convert" and, most importantly, putting pretty icons in the tree!  I want pretty!  MUST HAVE PRETTY!!!

[SteveG]

Kurt,

You are a tireless crusader. Tell me where I can send beer. If you are liquored up enough you won't notice the icons

[jgourd]

Steve:

I've got a doosy (sp) of a bug to report.  I loaded my full library last night doing a sync and checking the "upload all files" checkbox.

Things went fine, but upon listening to some tunes today I ran into a bug.  Certain albums don't play correctly.  For example, I select Browse>Artist>Album, then I select the first song on the album.  My little iPod sits there for a second, jumps to the second song, jumps to the 3rd, 4th, 5th, etc.  It does it REALLY fast, like half a second between songs.  No music plays, it just goes through the songs then pops back to the "home" screen of the iPod.

I know this is of no use to you without my itunes db.  I'll send it to you tonight.

Anyone else see this problem?  

I've also been able to recreate the mysterious skipping of first song problem that is common w/ephpod.  That to me might be more of a firmware issue so I'm not too worried about that but I thought you should know.

Oh, I've done a reset a number of times, it's not that.  I really think something got messed up in the itunes db.

Adam

Yes, I have seen this problem as well.

[Rick11]

Kurt,

Well, I've tried everything...and I can't get MJ to work with the iPod, except to be able to copy MP3's over to the main directory on the iPod.  Am I missing something here.  Does the iPod require that you set up specific directories (XPlay does that by itself) so the you can use the files copied over to the iPod from MJ?

I just wish that MJ would have an XPlay compatible plugin.

In any case...I thought you said that you can create playlists in MJ and export them so that they can be copied into the XPlay 'Playlist' subdirectory.

How do you do that in MJ, as when I tried it, all I could create was an M3U and XPlay doesn't accept them.

I'll look forward to hearing your thoughts as I'm stumped about using MJ with my iPod and don't want to go back to MusicMatch with their lousy plugin...so I guess I'll just have to keep using XPlay as it works and works well.

Later,

Rick

[ashawley]

phango13:

I think we all found a little bug today that's causing that problem.  Try the "Wipe iPod Clean" feature in Ephpod (under "iPod Tools").  If that doesn't work I suggest you do a restore with the Apple Updater/Restore software, then sync w/Ephpod.

And now for the rest of you drunken fools:

Yeah, yeah, yeah I know, shut up Adam and make your darn Smartlists.  I just wanted to avoid the Artist/Album ones and as for more complex stuff, I just haven't figured out the slick command-line commands yet.  I know, read the Help dummy (sorry, Steve, I really prefer WMP Series 9 implementation of Smarlists, they're dummy-proof maybe the next release of MJ  ).

And as for Kurt's little "workorder" for Steve ( ), well, I'm fine with everything but audible....swap that out for MY feature.  *It's mine, ALL Mine.....*.  If books were meant to be listened to, we never would have invented writing.  So there.    

OK, well, since there's no build tonight, I'm takin' the wife out for mexican and loads of nummy BEER!!  

Adios all!

Adam

[Kurt Young]

Here's what I used to do before I got the MJ plugin working:

• Made lots of playlists and smartlists in MJ -- included everything that I want to hear in these smartlists and playlists.
• Prior to doing the step after this one, I delete the "Auto-Smartlists" that MJ9 provides.  Don't want to synch with those, hehe.
• Used MJ9's "Export all playlists" function to export them to .m3u files in C:\Program Files\J River\Media Jukebox\Data\Playlists.
• Set XPlay to synchronize with this directory.

Here's my step-by-step on how to get your Windows formatted iPod to work with MJ:

• Download the 1.2.1 firmware updater from Apple, and use it to Restore your iPod to factory settings.
• When the XPlay wizard pops up, hit cancel.  If you fail to hit cancel, XPlay will copy files that render it useless to MJ (at this time)
• Uninstall MJ8 if you are running it.
• Download and install the newest build of MJ9
• Download and install the newest build of the plugin
• Plug in, expand the CD, DVD, & Portables tree, and there's yer iPod (with soon-to-be-pretty icons, that's for sure!)

What can I say, it's beta,

[Rick11]

Thanks Kurt,

Gotta get ready for a meeting tomorrow...but after that, I'll try both suggestions.

Question...

Does MJ set up a 'Playlist', 'Artist', 'Album', and 'Songs' sub-directory on the iPod like XPlay does?

If not...where do the MP3's get copies to on the iPod?

Thanks for the quick responses!

Rick

[jgourd]

Here's my step-by-step on how to get your Windows formatted iPod to work with MJ:

• Download the 1.2.1 firmware updater from Apple, and use it to Restore your iPod to factory settings.
• When the XPlay wizard pops up, hit cancel.  If you fail to hit cancel, XPlay will copy files that render it useless to MJ (at this time)
• Uninstall MJ8 if you are running it.
• Download and install the newest build of MJ9
• Download and install the newest build of the plugin
• Plug in, expand the CD, DVD, & Portables tree, and there's yer iPod (with soon-to-be-pretty icons, that's for sure!)

What can I say, it's beta,

The all important step of formatting it for MJ was left out.  After resetting it to factory condition, and canceling the X-Play or MMJB launch, you have to right-click on the iPod in MJ and select "Format for MediaJukebox".

After you do this, the iPod will work with MJ.

[ashawley]

Hey Rick, I'll jump in here and help you out (since Kurt's probably 3 sheets to the wind right now   ).

The Playlist, Artist, Album, & Songs directories that you see in Xplay are actually the way the iPod is organized by the firmware.  So, basically, Xplay just mimics the iPod.  In actuality, the iPod stores all files in directories in the ipod_control folder, these directories are F00 through F19.  Its internal database tells it which songs are in which folders and what Playlist, Artist, Album, Song they are.   It gets this info from the idd3 tags.

MJ does the same thing as Xplay, it reads the database and presents you with the same categories that the iPod does, so you can "browse" your songs in MJ that are on your iPod by Playlist, Artist, Album or all Songs.

OK, I was just kidding about Kurt, I've been giving him a bad time recently.  Kurt I'm here to apologize.   (Shoot, that's probably just the Negra Modelo talking, but what the hey)  

Adam

[Kurt Young]

Aye, what Adam said... you're not actually browsing through folders, you're browsing through a "virtual" folder -- a representation of your iPod's database.

Pretty cool theory, if ya ask me.

Woot!  Page 5!  I think Steve should merge ALL of the threads that we've done into one super long thread.

[TimB]

I'd like to be able to sync the Single Artist (Complete) folder with my iPod.  Can I do that with Playlist sync.?  If not then I'm with Adam, otherwise I'm with Kurt.

Right now I'm highlighting the track listing of Single Artist (Complete) and right clicking it into the iPod queue.

-=Tim=-

Hey folks, any ideas on this one or am I not explaining it well.

-=Tim=-
Hey guys

[jgourd]

Hey folks, any ideas on this one or am I not explaining it well.

-=Tim=-
Hey guys

Tim,

If I understand you correctly then all you need to do is make a smartlist that displays songs from a single artist. Use that playlist to sync with the iPod.

[TimB]

I'll try to explain it better.

Under Media Library there's an option called "Single Artist (Complete)" that allows you to list all the albums that MJ considers complete, ie no missing track numbers, same album-level info and directory.

I'd like to grab that as a Playlist so I can sync it with my iPod.  (a) Is this possible? (b) How do I enter the query?

-=Tim=-

[SteveG]

Tim,

There are a couple of options. If you want synching, right click on Single-Artist(Complete) and select "Send-To" Playlist. Create the Playlist and it will be available for synching.

Alternately you could drag the tree item to the root of iPod and the files will transfer to iPod. If you do this and want them to remain in a playlist, create a new playlist on iPod and drag the tree icon for "Single-Artist(Complete) " to the Playlist you created.

[Kurt Young]

Yeah man, make a smartlist with this code:

mediatype=[audio] completealbum==1

The smartlist will be populated with all of your songs that belong to a "complete" album.  Use it to synch your iPod with and you've got every complete album on your iPod.

Added benefit:  When you update your library, the smartlist updates itself too.  I use about 20 different smartlists and playlists to populate my iPod... haven't modified any of them in months, and I'm still getting a great rotation of music on my pod, in addition to the songs that I know I want to be there.  MJ+iPod is rockin my world.

[SteveG]

JGourd and Adam,

In regards to the track skipping bug, can you duplicate this in any reliable way?

[ashawley]

Steve:

I think I'm able to duplicate it.  I wiped my iPod clean last night and selected all songs for a transfer.  The same tunes are doing it today that were doing it before reformatting the ipod.  So, I'll send you the files that are affected tonight.  Must be a tag thing, but all my songs are tagged using id3-tagit w/id3v2 tags only.  Not sure what MJ does to my tags when I import songs.

New "bug" I found last night.  I was syncing all my songs (got GUI lock when I switched to a different app), and when it was done I received a "File Transfer Error".  Now I highly doubt it's a firewire card issue, because I've *never* experienced a firewire card problem--ever.

When I looked at my iPod I noticed that some of the songs didn't make it over.  Strange thing, even manually uploading would not get the songs on the iPod--oh, they were *there* (as files) but the ipod database wasn't seeing them.

Loaded up ephod to have it check the db.  I found like 10 songs that had "invalid file length", so I deleted those.  Then did a synch, it found 14 "songs that didn't exist" so it removed them from the iPod.

Now here's the interesting part: trying to upload 3 albums that didn't make it in MJ would ALSO not make it over in Ephpod.  Again, they got copied, but the iPod database doesn't register them, so I can't play 'em.

Me guess is that the ol' database is corrupted, so I'll delete it tonight and try again.  But something weird is going on w/MJ.

I'll send you tonight the itunes db and the offending skipping files.

Tim:

I am your biggest proponent.  I really don't want to have to make playlist for each of my Artists/Albums.  I don't want to have to do this for a couple of reasons:

1. Waste of time, since things are already organized that way in MJ for me

2. I don't want a bunch of Playlists on my iPod that are the same as if I went through Browse>Artist>Album

I'm nitpicky yes, but there are a lot of folks out there that aren't Playlist mongers ( ) and I think it'd be a shame to not have that capability in MJ.  It would TOTALLY put it a step above anything out there (even iTunes).

Adam

[jgourd]

JGourd and Adam,

In regards to the track skipping bug, can you duplicate this in any reliable way?

It only did the rapid fire track skipping one time about two weeks ago.

The skipping mode where it simply skips the selected track in favor of the next one happens quite frequently but there isn't anything specific I do to cause it to happen. I'll disconnect the iPod, select an album or audio book and select the first track. Sometimes it skips that track and sometimes it doesn't.

I did find that it was happening very frequently with one particular audio book that was encoded (by someone else) using low bit rate VBR. Email me and I'll grant you FTP access to the book.

[willrmc]

from what i've read elsewhee, the skipping tracks problem happens when the ipod times out before it can find the track and then automatically goes to the next one. which is why supposedly making ephpod put music into all 20 folders and turn the files names into the standard number system helps this problem so the ipod can find it faster?? if that is the case then the time out is much too short an dshould be changed by apple. i find it happens to me very sporadically, sometimes it does it on a certain album, sometime it doesn't. sometimes it does it on a playlist as well. i've never had it skip more than 1 track at a time though.