sort by added date bug?

[skim1124]

I just added an album.  In Tracks view, it shows up correctly at the top of the sort column as the most recent album, but in Album view (album art), it shows up in a random place far down the list (but not at the very bottom).  Any reason why this is happening?  All the metadata looks normal to me.

[hiccup]

You use the word 'bug'.

So do you mean that you have set sorting to 'date added', but MusicBee ignores that and sorts randomly?

[skim1124]

I just figured out what was wrong.  A few years ago, I'd added a single track from the album that I added today.  And after I'd added the full album today (in a completely different folder), for some reason in the Tracks view, the full album was correctly showing at the top of the sort by added date, but in the Album view, it was sorting using the date when I'd added the single track.  I don't know if this is a bug or not, but it's certainly inconsistent in a confusing way.

I solved it by deleting the single track and then restarting and rescanning.

[hiccup]

I don't know if this is a bug or not, but it's certainly inconsistent in a confusing way.

And you are using 'date added (album)', and not just 'date added'?

[skim1124]

Correct: date added (album) in both views.

It works without any problems normally for Tracks and Albums views, so I was puzzled as to why this album wasn't showing up at the top of the list for the Albums view.  As far as I can tell, it's because I'd added one track from the album a few years ago, which somehow seems to affect only the Albums view.

I don't see why a whole album I just added shouldn't show up at the top of the date added (album) sort list in whatever view.

I'd call it a bug (albeit a very minor, rare one) simply because it'd be such an odd feature, one without any redeeming value I can see.

[Steven]

Date added (album) will use the oldest date added for the tracks in the album.

[skim1124]

Thank you for the explanation.  Now I understand why that one old track was causing it to not show up at the top of the sort list.

[hiccup]

Now I understand why that one old track was causing it to not show up at the top of the sort list.

I think I still don't understand.
If all these album tracks have their tags consistent with the 'how files are grouped to an album' setting, I would expect the album is kept together when specifically using 'date added (album)' and the date of the track with the oldest 'date added' is used to position the album as a whole.
What am I missing?

[skim1124]

I don't actually understand the underlying technical reasons for why that one old track caused the problem, but I simply deduced that it must have been that old track that caused the problem because everything else was the same. 

This is my process:
1) After adding files to a folder (artist's name), I then scan folders for new albums.
2) After import is complete, I usually edit the genre, album artist, artist fields as needed.
3) In Tracks view and the Albums view, I have these settings checked: Sort By--> Date added (Album) (Desc) and "Sort (ascending)". 
4) In Albums view, Group by shows "No grouping".  In Tracks view, Group By is set to Albums.
5) With these settings, the album I just added always shows up at the top of either view.

This process has worked countless times, which is why I was puzzled when the album I most recently added showed up at the top of the sort list in the Tracks view, but not in the Album view.  It seems that because I had added one track from this album years ago, and because it had been tagged with the same album art and the album name and the album artist, I'm guessing that MB used this track's added date when sorting in the Albums view.  When I deleted this old track (because I didn't need it anymore), then the album showed up at the top of the sort list in Albums view.

Does that make sense?

As I said, I don't really understand the technical stuff.  I'm just a user.