Organising Digital Libaries

[Dj Shuflz]

Hi, umm been quite perplexed as of late with my decision to reorganise my libary of music. ive been making use of the mixed in key software i quite like it and have been renaming all my files with the key in it but thats besides the point. my real problem is i want a piece of software that i can search for a certain track using keywords such as the album track name, key artist... wotever ur fancy, but what i dont want is for it to just find the track but rather show what folder, or playlist the track is located in, that way when playing out and theres a track i havent plaid in ages but know i have somewhere in my libary i can quickly no where in my cd wallet to venture and snag it. i got excited about both itunes and the mixed in key software however all they do is just find the tracks and if u want to find its location u have to right clik the file and open location or get info wotever. another shit thing about mixed in key is that because it renames ur files (upon my wish) the libary cannot locate the file stored in ur collection section.

YES i know massiv rant and alot of pointless mentionings of problems im sure we all have, main thing i want is just a great piece of software to organise stuff.

[m1kest4r]

You can set Mixed In Key to store the key information in the ID3 tag, not in the file name (assuming you are using MP3's) - as an fyi.

Set yourself up a spreadsheet or database with all the appropriate info you want, then search it. :)

[slackas]

Have you tried rapid evolution, its a freeware alternative to mixedinkey, and it has a library part.

You can sort in all different ways, key, blah blah etc etc frog fish dog bored...

anyway, check it out.

[ezywarp]

Hi, umm been quite perplexed as of late with my decision to reorganise my libary of music. ive been making use of the mixed in key software i quite like it and have been renaming all my files with the key in it but thats besides the point. my real problem is i want a piece of software that i can search for a certain track using keywords such as the album track name, key artist... wotever ur fancy, but what i dont want is for it to just find the track but rather show what folder, or playlist the track is located in, that way when playing out and theres a track i havent plaid in ages but know i have somewhere in my libary i can quickly no where in my cd wallet to venture and snag it. i got excited about both itunes and the mixed in key software however all they do is just find the tracks and if u want to find its location u have to right clik the file and open location or get info wotever. another shit thing about mixed in key is that because it renames ur files (upon my wish) the libary cannot locate the file stored in ur collection section.

YES i know massiv rant and alot of pointless mentionings of problems im sure we all have, main thing i want is just a great piece of software to organise stuff.

You can set mixedinkey to not write into the file name, you can also set it to write the key in the comment field then, open view options in iTunes, select comment and beats per minute if you click the top comment/bpm fields theyu willarrange in ascending/descending order.. This is good for making playlists and arranging the programming of your sets.. It doesn't need to be 100% that way but it helps..

If you want to get really specific you could look into creating smart playlists in itunes, they give you the abilityu to have a playlist that automatically updates itself depending on the behaviour you set it to eg: all tracks that contain "house" in "genre" go to this one... all tracks containing 1A in comments and 133 in bpm and dj name in artist go to this one..
Check the apple site for a video on smart playlists

[ezywarp]

also you do know you can drag files straight ouit of itunes without showing its location dont you?

[base615]

If you're on PC, just searching in explorer shows you the folder location. For example, I searched for Eyerer and got this;

http://www.creepycat.net/craig/search.jpg

[underhousearrest]

Serato Does it, but u have to add the file location field to the search box. and it's an index search! and it's free!

[Dj Shuflz]

yeah i can do that the searching through windows but its not really efficient.

The excel spreadsheet is good but effort to construct.

Currently i have my itunes setup with differnt playlists for each disc, but when i search for say "show me love" it locates the song name, however it dosent tell me from what playlist or folder it is located :( of course without right clicking and properties.

[base615]

I don't understand what you're trying to achieve. Are you playing out with CDs but have your laptop set up just to search which CD a certain track is on? Sounds like a strange workflow.

[Bracko]

yeah, i can't really understand why people just don't use windows explorer.... :?

"oh, i can't remember the title or the artist... but fuck, i'm sure it was in c-minor... dammit, i wish i could search for my c-minor bomb :mad: "

:crazy:

[mmc_79]

yeah i can do that the searching through windows but its not really efficient.

The excel spreadsheet is good but effort to construct.

Currently i have my itunes setup with differnt playlists for each disc, but when i search for say "show me love" it locates the song name, however it dosent tell me from what playlist or folder it is located :( of course without right clicking and properties.


What do u mean looking at the properties? If u search a song, right click then hover over "show in playlist" (or something) it will show u which playlist the song is in and take u to that playlist if u want.





Unless that's what u mean thus making my post a waste

[Dj Shuflz]

What do u mean looking at the properties? If u search a song, right click then hover over "show in playlist" (or something) it will show u which playlist the song is in and take u to that playlist if u want.





Unless that's what u mean thus making my post a waste
yeah i know u can do this but i guess what im requesting is just a sort of customised databasing system whereby u enter search to find whatever track ur looking for, be it the key, bpm or title of the track ==> see list of songs that correspong to your search ==> then if you clik it just takes you to the playlist that it is contained in at the same indicating which cd you should refer to in order to find that track, i know u can go "show in playlist" but the right clicking when your beatmatching and sorting through ur wallet can in certain scenarios be time consuming i just wish that in one of the id3 tags there was a "playlist" tag. that would make life so easy

[m1kest4r]

You'll need to make such a database yourself, microsoft access might be a better option than spreadsheet if you know how to use it.

[quantum8]

^ that's a bit of an overkill for something like this

like others said, put it all in one location and use windows search. hell, use google desktop search if need be...those are ready to go databases!

[ShuffleStuff]

Need SQL server imo.

[Dj Shuflz]

nah yeah i agree the SQL was massif overkill especially for me a novice with it, i mean for a greater cause i could master it eventually... but umm yeah ive gotten used to the whole right-click -> show in playlist [itunes]... that seems to be treating me ok between cuts just hope it dosent land me in a messy situation.

[ezywarp]

I find a good thing to stay on the safe side while you DJ is to make sure the iTunes volume control is all the way down that way if you do accidentally play something it will be silent and you wont have a massive collision of trains.

[Bracko]

is anyone going to address my question?

p.s. have over 5,000 digital tracks never have seen the need to use anything but nero and win explorer

[ezywarp]

you didn't actually ask a question...

[Dj Shuflz]

[QUOTE=ezywarp]you didn't actually ask a question..

Mate there is no trace of a question there:
"yeah, i can't really understand why people just don't use windows explorer....

"oh, i can't remember the title or the artist... but fuck, i'm sure it was in c-minor... dammit, i wish i could search for my c-minor bomb ""

thats a statment...

secondly if you had read my post properly, my query wasnt about failing to recall the title of a track but remembering the key it was recorded in. I just wanted a fast way of seeing what playlist (hence what cd) a track was located in, for example a 'custom-id3 tag' that would be displayed in itunes would work great.
Reason i dont use windows explorer is it tends to bring up album art, and i think itunes is great aside from this hurdle.

*no disrespect intended*:thumb:

[ezywarp]

Like I said you should look into smart playlists..

There is a very good explanation on iTunes library organisation that can be found on the mixedinkey forum.

Not sure if you need to be logged in for this link to work but anyway.

http://community.mixedinkey.com/Topic.aspx?ID=5553

[Dj Shuflz]

thanks bud, ill give it a geez as soon as i get a chance.

[Dj Shuflz]

ok yeah smartplaylists are great i like the look of em, one thing i cant understand is why apple wouldnt construct itunes to recognise the "initial key" id3 tag, i can only assume this is a windows v.s. mac compatibility oversight.

[ezywarp]

I don't get what you mean.. mixedinkey can just overwrite your comment field then there you have it.. key is always in comments forever.. just pretend it says key instead of comment. Does the job perfectly.

[Dj Shuflz]

yeah i know its just me being anal about things :P, btw i in case ne1 cares i figured out how to solve my dilemna, i made use of the id3 tag "grouping" in itunes so like once i searched for songs in key say "12a" i can easily find out wot cd, wallet, or wherever it is located in. without the hassle of right clicking for the file properties.

just in case that helps ne1.. but yeah works great thanks for the help guys :)