Author Topic: I have confusion in my mind. Several menu, similar function. Can you help me?  (Read 2111 times)

lordlance

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  • Posts: 22
Hi people. I'm trying to better understand the MusicBee behavior. In particular, I'm interested in having a folder with all my music files, automatically organized, and another, different folder, when I put new "temporary" files, that seldom I let MusicBee check, so it can import in my organized folder.
I always used MusicBee this way, however now that I upgraded to v.3, I had some problem (maybe related to network paths, but this is another topic...). So I decided to "clean up the whole thing", keeping my library intact but re-building the physical folders, reorganizing the files, changing the naming structure etc.

Ok, here's the issue. I see different menu scattered around MusicBee, and I'm not sure how I have to use them.
1 - In EDIT > PREFERENCES > LIBRARY > AUTO-ORGANIZE MEDIA FILES > ORGANISATION it says "MOVE (music) / ON DRIVE / TO FOLDER"
What is this operation? From what I can understand, every (music) file the software finds in the DRIVE that is specified (no subfolders), it's copied into another drive/folder as I can specify in the TO FOLDER box. Correct?
2 - In FILES > ORGANIZE FILES I find another similar to the former menu. What differences there are between the two menus?
3 - In FILES > SCAN FOLDERS FOR NEW FILES I can specify a path. If MusicBee finds (music) files in that folder, it adds to my Library. Does it physically copy the files into my auto-organized folder? I need to be sure of it (in the older version it was true), and eventually I'd love to understand what other option I need to check to tell MusicBee to do that (in the aforementioned menu, I see no check box that tells me "copy/move the files into your music folder".
4 - In FILES > LIBRARY > REMAP MUSIC FOLDERS I have other options for moving my main music folder (I think), however the text in the menu tells me that MusicBee doesn't move the files into the new location (??). So what I need this menu for? Why I can simply set new path into menu 1 or 2 that I described before? Why I need to create a new folder, manually moving all the files, then go into this menu, change the path, and then what? I need to go into other menus to tell again MusicBee that the new folder is my main folder and that I want it auto-organized?
5 - In TOOLS > ADVANCED > RESCAN ALL FILES I have the possibility to make a full rescan of my auto-organized folder (I think). The question here is: why I should do this, if MusicBee should already check that folder and auto-organize the files? Maybe because if I (for example) go thru windows explorer and I delete some music file, MusicBee cannot check this operation, so it can't understand that I removed some file? But if it's keeping my main music folder organized, why it shouldn't feel the changes in it? Or maybe this is an emergency tool just in rare weird-behavior-cases?

Thanks a lot for the attention, I hope you can help me to clarify my mind, actually I feel very confused. Also, I think I'm not the only one with all those doubts about the matter.

redwing

  • Guest
I'm not sure why you keep trying to (mis)read "Move" as "Copy". Copy source files to library feature was removed years ago and I think you know that. If you don't remember, read you question and my reply again: http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=11172.msg73943#msg73943

REMAP MUSIC FOLDERS command is useful when you have moved your music files to a different drive with the same folder structure so you only need to change drive letter, etc. It's not for organizing library files.

RESCAN ALL FILES takes quite long since it reads all tags in files, not just which files are missing or whether they were updated or not. It's mainly used when you did lots of edits externally or when you changed tag codes, etc.

lordlance

  • Jr. Member
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  • Posts: 22
1st of all, thanks for the reply. I'm simply trying to better understand the software.
About the old topic you gently quoted, I have to say that I "ignored" your reply, because after your post Psychoadept gave me a good solution, as you can see in the following page: http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=11172.45
That method worked as a charm, and until now I had no problems. Side note, I never thanked Psychoadept for that reply.

About 2 years are passed, and as you can see I never spammed other questions, because I had MusicBee ok.

Now, when I have more time, I'll keep doing tests, and try to better understand the mechanics of all those menu and of the auto-organized music folder. If someone have other hints to give me, please add your experience and your knowledge.

redwing

  • Guest
Now, when I have more time, I'll keep doing tests, and try to better understand the mechanics of all those menu and of the auto-organized music folder.

The best way to learn it is install (another) portable version of MB with its own test music files, and try all kinds of crazy things with them.

lordlance

  • Jr. Member
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  • Posts: 22
Absolutely, Redwing, I think I made an error, using the "standard" installation. Also, my goal is to have MusicBee database library in a NAS folder, and music files in another NAS folder. Untill now, I had it working, and I installed several MusicBee in several PCs in my network, and they shared the same library and music folder. All it was working, however I suppose that I could simply have one portable MusicBee directly located in the NAS.
I return to the test! :D