Anyone up for the task of doing playlists for 1200 folders?

Once I've sorted mine out, I may consider writing a script for Windows, but don't hold your breath whilst waiting

I went down the playlist route earlier in the week for my 1400 or so tracks...took a while but I generated and tweaked playlists for the whole set of tracks plus one for each album or group of albums by artist.

As a plus, it took a lot less time to load...perhaps not as quickly as I'd anticipated but within 10 seconds or so.

The minus - from the playlist containing all 1400 tracks it still only randomly played from those with artists beginning with A, B or C....so no difference to pre-playlist days. I've now just finished removing the artist/album structure after the 9th file level and have put all the tracks in one flat folder (\9). I've updated all the playlists to reflect the new flat file structure, so hopefully in the morning it won't be able to just select from artists beginning with A, B or C as these folders no longer exist. Will update once I've given it a go.

Edited 14 April, 201016 yr by IndianaBlues

Okaaaaayyyyy....so that did nothing at all. Guess that means that the randomiser works off the ID3 tags rather than the file structure itself, as I still just got random play from A, B and C artists. In desperation I'm considering just pasting the text from the .m3u into Excel, generating a list of random numbers in an adjacent column then sorting on that and cutting it back into the .m3u file...means it won't be truly random as it will be in the same sequence each time I play it, but I can always start at different points each time.

Okaaaaayyyyy....so that did nothing at all. Guess that means that the randomiser works off the ID3 tags rather than the file structure itself, as I still just got random play from A, B and C artists. In desperation I'm considering just pasting the text from the .m3u into Excel, generating a list of random numbers in an adjacent column then sorting on that and cutting it back into the .m3u file...means it won't be truly random as it will be in the same sequence each time I play it, but I can always start at different points each time.

Are you saying that if I generate a playlist of all the tracks on the SD card I still don't get random play???

oh FFS!!!!!!!!!!

That's right. The firmware of the Bolero is so badly written it's unbelievable.

That's right. The firmware of the Bolero is so badly written it's unbelievable.

:'(

What can we do about it, who do we complain to ?

Are firmware updates ever issued and can they be flashed using some kind of SD card boot mode or VCDS ?

SFA, AFAIK.

I've found an ID3-Tag library, so will get working on it when I have some spare time.

Okaaaaayyyyy....so that did nothing at all. Guess that means that the randomiser works off the ID3 tags rather than the file structure itself, as I still just got random play from A, B and C artists. In desperation I'm considering just pasting the text from the .m3u into Excel, generating a list of random numbers in an adjacent column then sorting on that and cutting it back into the .m3u file...means it won't be truly random as it will be in the same sequence each time I play it, but I can always start at different points each time.

Right, I gave in and created playlists on a 4GB card I have, big enough to make sure stuff works (it doesn't) but small enough to fill up easily... I copied 45 or so albums onto the card (about 630 songs) and created the playlists.

I wrote a couple of noddy scripts for my Linux box that created my playlists, one playlist that contains every track on the card apart from the short one in the root directory and then in a directory called "albums" a playlist was created for each album copied into place below the 8th level directory so that the Bolero's initial scan can't find the tracks.

So far, so good. I then put the SD card in the Bolero and the initial scan took seconds instead of minutes. This is a good start I say to myself. The single track in the top level starts playing and I hit the selection button and navigate to the albums directory. Again, seconds for the scanning and I can select an album from the 45 available to play fairly quickly. Still winning I says.

Now, I navigate back to the top level and select the playlist that contains all the tracks. The first track in the list starts playing and I hit the dreaded "Mix" button. I then start pressing next on the steering wheel and it chooses a song from a different album.. Looking good still, I hit next again and it chooses a song from the same album (still not fussed as random could easily do so). However after repeated pressing of the next button it would appear that it is only mixing from the first 100 or so lines from the playlist...

I will test this in anger over the next couple of days as I have a meeting in Bristol tomorrow (3 hours or so round trip) and a meeting in Manchester on Thursday (probably another 3 1/2 hours round trip) but I am not hopeful as surely after hitting next 40-50 times I should have seen tracks from the last 500 lines or so of the playlist!!!

This Bolero is beginning to do my head in!!!! Is it to much to ask for a device with a "Mix" feature on it that actually works???

If someone from Skoda is reading this, could they please tell us the maximum number of entries that is supported in a playlist on the Bolero and then find out when new firmware will be available that actually bloody works

I gave in yesterday. Copied the text from my "random" playlist into Excel, added an extra column, generated random numbers in this column ("=RAND") then sorted on it. Deleted the column, copied the text back into the .m3u file. The result, pseudo random music. As long as I stay clear of the Mix button, and just select a starting track at random

I gave in yesterday. Copied the text from my "random" playlist into Excel, added an extra column, generated random numbers in this column ("=RAND") then sorted on it. Deleted the column, copied the text back into the .m3u file. The result, pseudo random music. As long as I stay clear of the Mix button, and just select a starting track at random

Maybe I should put a sort -R in the script then...

Can't believe the effort I'm putting in to get mix working properly... Beginning to consider retrofitting MDI for the iPod...

Can't believe the effort I'm putting in to get mix working properly

I've stumbled across the perfect solution for you:-

Listen to the radio

Just a question,

Can a playlist contain a list of other playlist?

I mean so like there is one big playlist that contains say 100 other playlists, which in turn are all individual albums containing however many songs, say up to 100.

So basically if you could do this, the Bolero would pick an album playlist from the main playlists list of albums, and randomly select a song from the albums playlist.

This should resolve the mix issue, because lets just say the Bolero can only read the first 100 lines of a playlist, then all that is really needed is the main playlist which lists 100 album playlists, that in turn are all linked to all the songs relevant to that albums playlist, making it theoretically possible to read 100 lines/songs from each individual albums playlist.

This would be like one main playlist reading from a list of 100 different playlists (linked to individual albums), that each in turn have say 100 random songs associated to that album. That would make it possible to mix 10,000 songs. 100 albums x 100 songs = 10,000 possible mix choices.

If this makes sense to anyone, I know what I’m talking about. Just wouldn’t know if is possible or not.

Edited 21 April, 201016 yr by Chaosdarkknight

I think you need to get your car to start trying these ideas out Tim

Patience is a virtue!

How's the normal playlists coming along?

I think you need to get your car to start trying these ideas out Tim

Patience is a virtue!

How's the normal playlists coming along?

Done 400 alblum playlists, roughly 5,000 songs, so getting there slowly...only got another 50 albums to go.

I'll just pop out for the bandages for the head & plasters for the fingers.

Just a question,

Can a playlist contain a list of other playlist?

Was thinking about trying that out tonight when I get home... I suspect it will fail miserably, but going to try anyway

I think you're stark raving

I think you're stark raving

I didn't realise you'd met me

Can a playlist contain a list of other playlist?

That will be a big fat

FAIL

Edited 21 April, 201016 yr by Raglits

I didn't realise you'd met me

Well I just created a main playlist.m3u containing about 100 other album relevant.m3u playlists, and I can play all my albums and their songs through the main playlist.m3u.

However this is through my SD card reader on my PC, but I don't have my car yet to test it on the Bolero.

Well I just created a main playlist.m3u containing about 100 other album relevant.m3u playlists, and I can play all my albums and their songs through the main playlist.m3u.

However this is through my SD card reader on my PC, but I don't have my car yet to test it on the Bolero.

I've just been out and tried in the Bolero, it just ignores it... You can go into the playlist the list the playlists within the top level one, but it won't even play those... POS

I've just been out and tried in the Bolero, it just ignores it... You can go into the playlist the list the playlists within the top level one, but it won't even play those... POS

It was worth a try....personally I dont care about mix, I like listening to albums all the way through

It was worth a try....personally I dont care about mix, I like listening to albums all the way through

Don't be saying things like that Tim. Warren won't have anything to moan about if he follows your lead.

Personally though, I totally agree with you.

Simple! I don't have any complete albums in my collection, that's why the jokingly named "Mix" function is so important. :p