Well, here go some very specific issues I have with iTunes, perhaps if someone knows how to fix these issues I could maybe use it more. I have turned all organizational options off.

1) It is not hip hop friendly. Hip hop is a genre where it is very common to have someone featured on a track or album. This could be the beat, a chorus, the actual emcee, sampling, etc. iTunes likes to make these songs their own albums and is confused on who the real artist is. For example, I have an album by GZA, and each track in itunes is identified as a separate album. I find this very very annoying. It doesn't happen with just hip hop either, it happened with a Bruce Springsteen album of mine, I guess iTunes thinks it's the Boss!

2) Comps and Collections, same as above for the most part. I have a Motown collection of about 6 CDs, and iTunes grabs every artist and puts them into 3 or 4 songs from that album. In some cases I own the album as well, so it duplicates itself in that artist's album, instead of under the collection album's name.

I might as well turn off the fancy UI because it really does nothing for me other than add tons of extra albums, and I don't like the look of huge chunks of missing or unknown album cover art. Also, I don't know if this is true or not, but I think sometimes iTunes botches your preferences when you update it. I have noticed some of these funky organizational issues after running updates; I noticed that they get worse or bigger. I can't confirm this, it is just my suspiscion.

My other issue is that I think it can be a resource hog as well, but I only see that when I am beating the crap out of my machine.

If anyone knows how to remedy this issue let me know, because I would like to give iTunes a chance, but things like this annoy me enough to not give it a full chance.

http://www.atpm.com/8.10/images/itunes-tags.gif

Check the box indicating that the song is part of an album compilation.

Trevor

The Compilations sorting is easy. iTunes->Preferences…->General: Check "Group compilations when browsing" Exit Preferences. Select a compilation album, File->Get Info: In the Compilation drop down menu (bottom left), select "Yes." iTunes will now see the compilation as a single album. In the Artist browsing pane, it will be found under "Compilations." Also, in your iTunes Music folder, the album will be located in a single folder (iTunes Music->Compilations->[Album Title]).

I'll have to come back to the hip-hop sorting when I have more time, although they can be listed as Compilations as an easy workaround. Also, you can select the album and Get Info, and list an album artist. iTunes considers artist a song property, and album artist an album property. For example, in my library, the artist for each song on the Natural Born Killers soundtrack is the artist who performs the song, but the album artist is listed as Trent Reznor. In your music library, you can select album artist in addition to or instead of artist.

That should get you started. I'll try to come back with more artist sorting options when I have more time, if no one beats me to it.

That's a very different view than I get with 7.4.2 (4). How did you get that window?

Nah. I point VLC at a directory containing the style of music I want to hear, and unleash it in Shuffle mode. Just like we did in the Western days when I was growing up. I sort my music the way I want to, and since I have my ***** together I only need to sort it once, so then I can just enjoy the ride without a presumptuous app making unauthorized changes. I know some ppl need that help, but I don't.


No, that's just one line of inquiry we got off into. Remember, I also dislike iTunes for lack of configurability, meaning its very presentation, and the assumptions underlying that. So it feels like it is in control... not me. That is backwards.

Relax trevor, I am not trying to start an argument, although I've had plenty of chances here. Yes, I did ask about iTunes, but that was because I am uncomfortable with it. And notice that I am now testing VLC, so I am indeed trying to not use iTunes? This may be offensive to some here, but the mere act of me living is offensive to some, so WTH? Don't read this if you don't like it.

Remember, I have always been the oddity/curiousity on this forum. I used to help people here and actively helped advance the general state of knowledge, but it turns out that I do not live up to the forum's standards as per hayne in an older post, who scolded me for cultural differences. So I've stopped helping, and mainly take now; although you'll notice in this thread I still couldn't help but to contribute a few things.

mooo? Unless you suspect you are part of the herd, you will not take that as an insult. I doubt you are part of the herd trevor, but please take off that copper's hat in defense of hayne's scolding post. I don't fit in with the crowd; let's just accept that. The question is how the forum treats anacronisms?

I cede the floor to tlarkin.

I will try that compilations selection, do I have to enter it for every comp record? Or is it just a switch that recognizes?

My problem with hip hop is that lets say for example I have a song from Ghostface Killa that features a biggy smalls sample, he doesn't even rap on the song, but in the ID3 tag it is listed as a feature. It lists the song as a biggie smalls song. I don't like that, how do I stop that? I don't even own any biggie smalls records.

I also wish that iTunes had the play folder option, loading 50gigs of music into your library can make itunes run clunky. Especially when you are trying to work at the same time.

Maybe my problem is that I don't use itunes to rip music, I use other applications on different platforms. Perhaps iTunes cannot translate a third party tag of the music properly?

Have you spent any time using Smart playlists? I don't see you doing anything that couldn't be done with them, and probably a whole lot easier than the way you're doing them now.

I can't speak for him, but for me, where I have already organized over 80 gigs of digital media, much which I have slaved over ripping from my own personal vinyl, I have no desire to oragnize my music again. My current method works on my windows and Linux machines flawlessly, itunes I have issues with. I am not against iTunes, I am just trying to learn to like it is all.

Smart playlists I run into the same issues. Am I doing something wrong?

I don't know. Maybe. It may be that I'm less picky about the order I listen to my music. I'm probably more likely to use Party Shuffle as I am one of my own playlists.

It also takes some getting used to to set up the right Smart playlists. To get boolean capabilities, for example, requires using two or more Smart playlists inside a controlling Smart playlist. It's not perfect, but it is powerful.

So you use VLC and do manually what iTunes can do automatically? Sure, pretty much everything iTunes does can be done without iTunes, using Finder, and a more limited third party app such as VLC, but it takes longer, and requires the user to spend their valuable time keeping their files organized. I can push my car, but it's easier to get in it and drive.

Personally, I have WAY too much music to try to keep organized myself. It has only been recently that I have acquired a single hard drive large enough to contain it all. I know how to organize it, it would just be too tedious, when I can get iTunes to do it exactly how I want it, with no fuss. Plus, my music tastes are so varied, I can't usually limit most songs to a single genre, and iTunes doesn't require me to. If I have to use smart folders, I might as well use smart playlists.

:eek: Your kidding, right? If not, have you even explored iTunes' configurability? It is certainly not a one size fits all solution. Thus far every iTunes complaint presented in this thread (and ~99% of other internet threads complaining about iTunes) can be remedied by adjusting user preferences.

Personally, I don't care what you use to listen to your tunes; use WMP 9 for Mac if you want. But if you're going to complain about iTunes' capabilities, you might try first investigating the difference between iTunes' limitations and user limitations. I'm not saying that iTunes is perfect; there is a lot of room for improvement. Overall it is, in my experience, superior to every alternative I've tried.

iTunes was not designed with you in mind. It was designed for the ignorant masses, of which 75% of computer users belong to.

Let your Object Oriented mind create something to fill the void, and then enlighten us all with it's grandeur.

I think each album must be done individually, but to be honest, I've never tried doing them all at once. iTunes may be smart enough to realize that they are not all part of the same compilation album, even if you select all your compilation tracks simultaneously. Try selecting two or three compilation albums at once and marking them as part of a compilation album. Let us know how it works. (I'd try it, but I haven't migrated my tunes to my iTunes library on my MacBook yet.)

Have you checked out Doug's Applescripts for iTunes? He has many, many timesaving Applescript solutions for iTunes. If he doesn't have one that will do what you want to do, he probably has one you can modify to get your desired results.


I do wish iTunes offered more options here, or at least easier options. I'd like to go in the other direction. For example, B.B. King and Eric Clapton recorded an album called Riding With The King. I'd like to be able to get the album to list under each Eric Clapton and B.B. King in my library, without duplicating the tracks in my iTunes Music folder. Just because I haven't figured it out yet, doesn't mean it can't be done!

When I had ~60GiB of music in my iTunes library on my G3 iBook, it was never slow, unless I was actually messing with the music files while playing music. My C2D MacBook with a tiny <4GiB library doesn't seem to be any faster. It might be something other than iTunes causing your slowdowns. C'mon tlarkin, you know you like to troubleshoot! :D

About half of my music was ripped via iTunes. I can't tell any difference between it and the stuff that was ripped with third party software.

Sorry for the confusion. That's a screenshot from an older version of OS X and an older version of iTunes. It's someone else's screenshot, not my own.

But the checkbox in question still exists.

Trevor

This is true. So we end up creating several "sub"-playlists first... and
then make our masterpiece from the pieces. One might think it better
to have a stronger Smart Playlist editor (allowing all sorts of complex
boolean relations) in the first place, but that's not necessarily superior.

This is where using playlist folders comes in: to house many simpler
playlists. That way, there isn't a long, long list of them filling the main
window, which would necessitate endless scrolling.

I have folders such as:

• 'CDs for burning',
• 'simple categories',
• 'smart searches', and
• 'special sets'.

Each of those folders contain many playlists - that form the foundation
and building blocks upon which to construct far more precisely detailed
Smart Playlists. [Those -- for the most part -- remain in the main list.]

It may take getting used to (and even seem more time-consuming initially),
but I now appreciate the wisdom of the 'small steps' approach... and having
those "sub"-playlists available, to use in future playlists is a side benefit.