Wrong sorting by album duration in playlists

[Jonas100]

One of the ways I like to sort my library is through the Album Duration custom sorting. This works fine in my main library, and it ascends in album length to the longest albums last. However in playlists, this sorting method seems to randomly sort the albums, by what seems to be somewhat alternating between the shortest and longest albums? No idea what's happening, but I'd like to know if anyone else has spotted this bug too?

[psychoadept]

This sounds similar to the bug I'm experiencing: http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=20523.0

[Jonas100]

This sounds similar to the bug I'm experiencing: http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=20523.0

Ah yes that does seem to be a similar problem, especially the 'it works fine in my main library', which is the same for me too. Not quite sure what it could be. I've checked with some more sorting types and they all seem to work fine in playlists, but it's just this one strangely, and now yours too which seem to act differently in playlists.

[Steven]

i cant reproduce the reported issue. A screenshot might help and also are you refering to static or auto-playlists.

Also i cant reproduce psychoadept's issue

[Jonas100]

i cant reproduce the reported issue. A screenshot might help and also are you refering to static or auto-playlists.

Also i cant reproduce psychoadept's issue

Right sure. Sorry should have clarified but this is for static playlists.

Here's one of my playlists sorted according to Album Duration, in ascending order. The Misfits EP on the far right is 14 minutes long, followed by the 1 hour 11 minutes Mos Def album, and then back to a 51 minute Burial album, and so on. A 25 minute Stereolab EP is also seen further down. There are numerous other large albums such as The Beatles White and AEnima by Tool among smaller albums. So this doesn't seem to make much sense in terms of sorting the albums by Album Duration, and I can't seem to find any reasonable pattern for it doing so. Hope this clarifies it a bit. Also I'm on Version 3.0.6190, and I think this has started since Version 3?

[Steven]

i still cant reproduce any incorrect behavior. Could you temporarily display the album duration field (click the Albums header/Customise Panel...) so we can check that MB is using the correct value

[Jonas100]

i still cant reproduce any incorrect behavior. Could you temporarily display the album duration field (click the Albums header/Customise Panel...) so we can check that MB is using the correct value

Ah that explains it. I should have noticed, but it's sorting by Album in alphabetical order, as for some reason all the albums have 0:00 as their times. In the bottom right it shows the correct time for "Heroes", the first album there.
For reference, here is my music library (not in a playlist) correctly sorting the album.

I may have found the problem though. I placed Heroes into my main music library as well (it wasn't previously in it), and after refreshing the playlist, Heroes is at the bottom of the playlist with the correct time underneath it. After removing it from the music library, it still has the correct album duration, and is still at the bottom when sorted by album duration.  This is shown below.

However when reopening musicbee after removing it from the music library, it reverts back to the 0:00 time. Keeping it in the music library and reopening musicbee keeps it at the correct album duration and correctly sorted at the bottom of the playlist. This may be why you can't reproduce it? I have a few playlists containing albums not in my main 'Library', as I use playlists to sync only a few albums to my phone. May likely be the cause of the problem.

[Steven]

thats right. MB only calculates album duration for files that exist in the library or the inbox. Any files that only exist in a playlist would not have a duration calculated. Its not something i plan to change for technical reasons

[psychoadept]

Huh.  Glad you all figured that out.  Apparently not related to my problem at all!

[Jonas100]

thats right. MB only calculates album duration for files that exist in the library or the inbox. Any files that only exist in a playlist would not have a duration calculated. Its not something i plan to change for technical reasons

Ah I see. That's a shame. Still, appreciate the help, and the wonderful program.

Huh.  Glad you all figured that out.  Apparently not related to my problem at all!

Ah it's a shame this wasn't related. Hope you find the problem with yours!