Thanks for extensive explanations - no offense, but it seems to me that some not too great design decisions have been made early on and now it’s impossible to reverse them, short of re-writing the whole thing
No, of course not. But think about it ... only because you set your system to Show Hidden Files you see it, and because of that you want to know, and with some answers you want to change it. But there's no reason really. It just takes a couple of hours to change it, but even a couple of hours are a waste of my current time, if only nothing is really wrong with it. And there isn't.
Also note that these kind of things spring from not wanting to have an official install (it is just a copy to a folder - done), that by itself allowing for having more versions running next top eachother. Maybe it doesn't do too much to you, but to many it does.
I’m not sure I buy the whole Unicode story: why in the world do I care what is filename like if it is a perfectly valid WAV? I just wanna listen to it for Christ’s sakes…
It is not as simple as that. Think about it ...
We're dealing here with the strange combination of a person sitting in a country (with Country Code and all) working with data from all over the world. Normally these things solve themselves by binding the Unicode set used to the Country Code. Here that cannot be, or otherwise you'd be changing your country code per album.
The point is, this data is flowing over data files (which by itself is unavoidable because of the loose running player (XXEngine3)) and files are bound to a country code, or Unicode version if you want. The insight is : Unicode can contain the "languages" for all over the world, but the individual characters (with double/triple ascii value) need to be interpreted differently per country. So there is no way one denoted set can suffice for all.
This problem turns into a real problem when you'd see that file names are identifiers, and when passed over a data file, the other side (the other program) needs to know that interpretenation again, and it doesn't exist. Oh, it does, but not by means of ONE means. So, pass a track name via a file, and the other program can't find it. Not when (visual, that's how you can look at it) characters are in there, not belonging to your country code.
To get the idea, get some data of an album from Amazon (via XXHE I mean). Get the reviews, and get the from all Amazon sites. Now look at the German reviews. Unreadable. This is the same problem. Amazon can't solve it, I can't solve it. But please go ahead; take such an HTML and try to convert it to the proper "code pages". May you succeed, now make a general means for that one HTML page you see from the different countries. Chinese we won't understand anyway, but dutch/german/frensh we will. If you succeed I will be the most happy to implement that means. Ok ?
Anyway, I am getting a bit frustrated with XX: everybody in the world understands the concept of playlists, yet, you seem to suggest that XX playlists are different and should not be used at all or only for really small amount of files – Instead, you say to use ‘galleries’ which I totally don’t dig why (again past design decisions, i guess) but OK, if that solves my problem I’m all for it.
Josef, it is not clear to me why to get frustrated, shout about it and suggest I don't know what I am doing, before even understanding the problem, while I explained about it anyway. So, you just didn't try yet, clearly.
Maybe you are just a bit fast on the trigger, and did not take the time to combine your "everybody in the world" with the "about nowhere in the world" and thinking of sound quality. Remember, it is all about that. Go look in thius forum, search for it, I don't mind, but you will see exactly nobody complaining about these things, or the user interface for that matter (which would be a justified first to come up with all over). On the other hand, you may be the first who honestly talk about this in here openly, while usually this does not happen in here. So, it is appreciated in the mean time, BUT, what's always on top is sound quality.
Of course, if you desire to ignore the Unicode problem, many arguments spring from that "ignorance", but that does not mean they are justified. The problem just is there and it had to be solved. Well, this is the result, and with some good hints there's no problem.
Following responses like not being from the 21st century are beyond mee, then.
Btw, it would have been more fair and useful to justify your apparent slow dat file manipulation, or for that matter, why you think a 1000 of them take tens of minutes to create. IOW, who knows what here ? I do ... (test me).
So, how do I create a playlist/gallery thingy that contains all music so I can just click Play and have XX randomly pick a track?
Is that possible at all with XX without 1000’s of file copies or somesuch?
It doesn't work like you think. Not here. And might you find the procedure awkward instead of beneficial, that's ok with me. However, it would indicate that you don't understand or did not take the effort to try (yes, I am talking like you now, agitated ...). But by all means, once you tried and don't like things, put forward suggestions for improvement. That is what I'm open to. Quite less to shouting.
Allright. A "Gallery" is a subtract from any means of physical music data, or from a Gallery itself. It is meta data.
The most easy example would be getting a random selection of albums in the Library Area, select a bunch by means of normal Windows selecting means, rightclick, and choose "Add to Gallery ...". From there you can create Galleries, or choose an existing one. It's just folders.
This example works at the Album level.
Once you have created a Gallery, you can pick that as a main "folder" in the Library Area again. Normally you'd do that by choosing from the Embedded Explorer at the left (the Library Area being active). Don't forget to press the Search button at the bottom.
The albums (remember, we were working at the album level) you see appear can be subject to many means of other selections, and one of them (the most used) is just typing next to the Search button. It will narrow down the list.
Now, from the albums eventually remaining, you might pick one or two by means of Windows selecting again, and click Load. This causes them to go into the Playlist Area, and now they are ready to play.
Keep in mind : in the Playlist Area you again can select by Windows selecting means. Only the selected will play, or if none (or only one) is selected, they will play all.
Now, for working at the track level, the most easy example would be rightclicking a selection (or one only) in the Playlist Area, rightclick (the row must be completely blue for it) and choose "Add to Gallery ..." again. So, now you are adding individual tracks to a Gallery, or when you selected all tracks from an album it will be the same as a complete album (or leave one track out if it, etc.).
A more "difficult" way of explicitly creating playlists at the track level, is going to the Library Area again, but replace the "A" in the box next to the textbox where you can enter stuff for narrowing, with a "T". Now, whatever means you use for Search, individual tracks will be shown. And, after they are there, you can narrow them down via the usual way, and you can select again for adding to (other) Galleries.
Note that this little box can also be filled with time boundaries, to e.g. select tracks of e.g. 6 minutes at least, or 3 minutes at most. See the ToolTip on it.
And once you have created your Playlists by this means, you can again ask for them, and load selections of it into the Playlist Area.
Note that more options exist at rightclick on a selection in the Library Area, and some Randomize functions are in there as well.
Btw, a most convenient "randomize" function is the small "R" button, which just puts forward one of the items in the list, no matter how the list itself got there. The little "D" button might give you your newly ripped albums (or tracks) from the last 20 days, ... whatever.
Well, I never find myself with a list of 1000 items in the Playlist Area, just because I am working in a kind of more dynamical way perhaps. With this I mean that I never use any same (saved) Playlist, just because it would always be the same. However, I do have "playlists" saved as a Gallery, and from there I select again, always. Now, whether 1 or 2 or 5 albums remain from that whatever selection, it won't be a 100. Why ? because I am not going to listen to those 100. This is obvious. Well, for me it is. I try to sleep once in a while.
Keep in mind that the Galleries can be treated recursively. Thus, you can make Galleries of Galleries endlessly.
But also note that the exact same principle allows to copy albums. Or copy to FLAC and maintain the FLACs where the FLACs already were there. And the other way around.
Then, try to see through the mechanism of this being your opportunity to make one logical drive of all your TB disks. Galleries do that. Copying, hence backups, use that too (obviously, once you got the grasp of it).
And oh, before you come up with it yourself, if you go around the XX means of maintaining etc. the Galleries by means of Explorer (also the Embedded one), that won't work. Not yet. XX will not know you did it, and things get mixed up. Just not finished here ...
Lastly, don't forget to drag the right side of XX to the right;
When you ticked "Show data", visible at the bottom with the Playlist Area active, more coverart is visible there, if you have it. There too you can select and rightclick. It's self explanatory.
Well, I hope this gets you started a bit, and don't forget : I am open to everything, and the wishes I did not fulfill can be counted on one hand for just not being done, and possibly two fingers because it was really rejected. But always with good reason, although in that one occasion it could my my own reasons. Some of it is future strategy which I know only. If people here disagree, I expect them to come forward now. We'll see what comes from that.
But Josef, please be constructive. Ok ?
Peter
(not checked for typos)
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