[Chromisdesigns]

I got accustomed in iTunes to making playlists that consisted of a set of albums, rather than just a set of tracks (like m3u files contain).  When I started migrating my collection to FLAC for the new Squeezebox Touch, I was frustrated by the inability to create this kind of playlist.

After some discussions on the dBpoweramp and MediaMonkey forums suggested there weren't any supported playlist formats to do this, I eventually found a workaround, of sorts.

I create a new folder in the music library for each "album playlist", for instance "_Rockabilly"...then drop a shortcut to each of the albums I want to include in that list into the folder.

Works pretty well -- although they don't show up in the "playlists" pull-down on the SBT (not being a recognized playlist format), I can use the music folders menu to see them when I want to.  Then they work just fine; clicking on "_Rockabilly" pulls up the list of albums, etc. (The leading underscore in the folder name makes them sort to the front of the list for easy access.)

It works equally well using shortcuts to the artist folders; in this case, clicking on the playlist opens a list of artists, click on one to get the albums, etc.

I suppose I could have done this another way by adding my own genre tags, but this is less work and more dynamic -- I can change how I define the membership of each play list on the fly just by adding or deleting shortcuts.

However, if any of you know of a playlist format that supports more than one level of indexing (tracks), and works with SqueezeBox, please let me know!

Regards,

Bob

[JEaton]

What's the difference between a 'list of albums' style playlist and a common playlist containing the tracks to those same albums? Other than the internal representation, don't they do the same thing?

You can easily create playlists from Squeezebox Server by adding albums to the current playlist, then saving it. Or, you can use some other software and move/copy the playlist into your server's playlist folder.

[Chromisdesigns]

What's the difference between a 'list of albums' style playlist and a common playlist containing the tracks to those same albums? Other than the internal representation, don't they do the same thing?

You can easily create playlists from Squeezebox Server by adding albums to the current playlist, then saving it. Or, you can use some other software and move/copy the playlist into your server's playlist folder.

In the "common" m3u playlist, it ONLY has a list of tracks, they are not grouped by album and/or artist/album; at least not any way I could find.  When I make a new playlist, in, say Media Monkey, I can indeed drop albums into it.  But when I open the playlist on the SBT, it's just one long list of tracks.

Is there another way to do it?

Edit:  I should say, they are not VISIBLY grouped by album or artist / album.  The tracks are in the right order, but you can't see what that is!

[JEaton]

Right, an m3u is a list of tracks, but if the tracks of an album are kept together and kept in their original order, then it's an 'album'. So I still don't quite understand what you're getting at.

If you add albums (which adds their tracks) to a playlist in a certain order, then the tracks will be added in track order and the 'albums' will be played in the same order that they were added. Some better playlist editing software lets you easily drag and drop to reorder the playlist, so you could highlight and grab an album's tracks and move them to somewhere else.

Or is it something more specific to the playing of playlists that you're looking for?

[JEaton]

Edit:  I should say, they are not VISIBLY grouped by album or artist / album.  The tracks are in the right order, but you can't see what that is!

If the playlist contains full file paths, then I can easily see who the artist and the album are. Here's a quick playlist that I just created from Winamp, consisting of three albums:

Code: [Select]

#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:438,Horace Silver - Song For My Father
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\01 Song For My Father.flac
#EXTINF:370,Horace Silver - The Natives Are Restless Tonight
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\02 The Natives Are Restless Tonight.flac
#EXTINF:511,Horace Silver - Calcutta Cutie
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\03 Calcutta Cutie.flac
#EXTINF:467,Horace Silver - Que Pasa
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\04 Que Pasa.flac
#EXTINF:325,Horace Silver - The Kicker
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\05 The Kicker.flac
#EXTINF:421,Horace Silver - Lonely Woman
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\06 Lonely Woman.flac
#EXTINF:235,Horace Silver - Sanctimonious Sam
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\07 Sanctimonious Sam.flac
#EXTINF:339,Horace Silver - Que Pasa (Trio Version)
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\08 Que Pasa (Trio Version).flac
#EXTINF:327,Horace Silver - Sighin' and Cryin'
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\09 Sighin' and Cryin'.flac
#EXTINF:231,Horace Silver - Silver Treads Among My Soul
O:\Flac\Horace Silver\Song For My Father\10 Silver Treads Among My Soul.flac
#EXTINF:166,Joni Mitchell - Court And Spark
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\01 Court And Spark.flac
#EXTINF:202,Joni Mitchell - Help Me
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\02 Help Me.flac
#EXTINF:182,Joni Mitchell - Free Man In Paris
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\03 Free Man In Paris.flac
#EXTINF:135,Joni Mitchell - People's Parties
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\04 People's Parties.flac
#EXTINF:177,Joni Mitchell - Same Situation
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\05 Same Situation.flac
#EXTINF:182,Joni Mitchell - Car On A Hill
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\06 Car On A Hill.flac
#EXTINF:338,Joni Mitchell - Down To You
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\07 Down To You.flac
#EXTINF:264,Joni Mitchell - Just Like This Train
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\08 Just Like This Train.flac
#EXTINF:186,Joni Mitchell - Raised On Robbery
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\09 Raised On Robbery.flac
#EXTINF:240,Joni Mitchell - Trouble Child
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\10 Trouble Child.flac
#EXTINF:141,Joni Mitchell - Twisted
O:\Flac\Joni Mitchell\Court and Spark\11 Twisted.flac
#EXTINF:252,The Neville Brothers - My Blood
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\01 My Blood.flac
#EXTINF:244,The Neville Brothers - Yellow Moon
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\02 Yellow Moon.flac
#EXTINF:238,The Neville Brothers - Fire And Brimstone
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\03 Fire And Brimstone.flac
#EXTINF:223,The Neville Brothers - A Change Is Gonna Come
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\04 A Change Is Gonna Come.flac
#EXTINF:214,The Neville Brothers - Sister Rosa
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\05 Sister Rosa.flac
#EXTINF:398,The Neville Brothers - With God On Our Side
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\06 With God On Our Side.flac
#EXTINF:201,The Neville Brothers - Wake Up
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\07 Wake Up.flac
#EXTINF:267,The Neville Brothers - Voodoo
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\08 Voodoo.flac
#EXTINF:347,The Neville Brothers - The Ballad Of Hollis Brown
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\09 The Ballad Of Hollis Brown.flac
#EXTINF:316,The Neville Brothers - Will The Circle Be Unbroken
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\10 Will The Circle Be Unbroken.flac
#EXTINF:277,The Neville Brothers - Healing Chant
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\11 Healing Chant.flac
#EXTINF:199,The Neville Brothers - Wild Injuns
O:\Flac\Neville Brothers\Yellow Moon\12 Wild Injuns.flac


[Chromisdesigns]

Right, an m3u is a list of tracks, but if the tracks of an album are kept together and kept in their original order, then it's an 'album'. So I still don't quite understand what you're getting at.

If you add albums (which adds their tracks) to a playlist in a certain order, then the tracks will be added in track order and the 'albums' will be played in the same order that they were added. Some better playlist editing software lets you easily drag and drop to reorder the playlist, so you could highlight and grab an album's tracks and move them to somewhere else.

Or is it something more specific to the playing of playlists that you're looking for?

Ok, I guess I'm not making myself clear.  I listen almost exclusively to full albums, and I have my own "unique" way of classifying them that does not correspond well to the conventional genres.  For instance, If I decide to create a class of music (album playlist) for "Cat petting music", I would like to be able to drop my favorite Def Lepard, Metallica, and Clash albums into it for future retriveal next time I find one of the cats on my lap, without scrolling through hundreds of artists and albums in the basic library.  But I don't want to listen to ALL those tracks every time!  Maybe today is a Clash day, rather than a Metallica day...

Well, you get the idea.  (and though I am not a metal fan, this example really isn't as far fetched as it might be, as both of the cats are stone deaf, so ANY music is cat-petting music to them.  Heavy drum and bass is a actually a positive for at least one of them, who seems to sense the vibrations.)

I AM a rockabilly fan, though, and that's not a common genre tag.  Far easier to make a playlist with the rockabilly albums than to go and edit tags on all of them.

[Chromisdesigns]

If the playlist contains full file paths, then I can easily see who the artist and the album are. Here's a quick playlist that I just created from Winamp, consisting of three albums:

OK, but what do you see on the SB display when you select that playlist?  A list of tracks, a list of albums, or a list of <album>/<track> containing all the tracks?  I would like to see the list of albums, by preference, then be able to click down the tree as desired.

[JEaton]

I would like to see the list of albums, by preference, then be able to click down the tree as desired.

Ok, now I see what you're getting at. Your solution is probably best. Yes, you could also get something similar by using custom genres, but the shortcuts method is probably easier to manage. I'm not aware of any other type of playlist supported. Squeezebox Server can import iTunes playlists, but I doubt that you'd get the type of browsing behavior you're looking for, or even whether the type of playlist you're talking about can be imported.

You may want to take a look at erland's Custom Browse plugin. I'm not sure that it can be used for this problem, but it does give you some flexibility in browsing by making other hierarchies possible.

http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27043

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/Custom_Browse_plugin

To install, go to the web interface Settings > Plugins and tick the 'Show all 3rd party plugins' checkbox to see it in the list.

[Chromisdesigns]

Squeezebox Server can import iTunes playlists, but I doubt that you'd get the type of browsing behavior you're looking for, or even whether the type of playlist you're talking about can be imported.

You may want to take a look at erland's Custom Browse plugin. http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=27043

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/Custom_Browse_plugin

Thanks for that plugin suggestion, I took a brief look and will consider trying it.  Maybe I can make the file extension go away when browsing through "music folders"...!

Actually, iTunes playlists work pretty much exactly the way I want -- if you create a playlist and drag albums into it, it opens at the album level.  If you drag artist folders in, it opens at the artist level.  Then, in either case, you can drill down through the tree.  However, iTunes won't handle FLAC, of course, and after some deliberation I decided not to wed myself to Apple forever by ripping everything to Apple lossless.

If I can't improve on it, though, what I have now will work OK for me.