How to find out which .mp3 files from folder are NOT added to current playlist?

[pstein]

Assume I have a playlist which evolved over the recent years to now around 800 entries. All songs are added as *.mp3 files from one folder.

Unfortunately the number of items in Playlist is smaller than the number of files in the corresponding folder.
So I must have (accidentally) not added some *.mp3 files or deleted some playlist items later.

How can I find out easily which files are NOT added?

[karbock]

Create an auto-playlist with the following conditions:

match all the following rules:
Path / starts with / (your folder)
Playlist / is not / (your static playlist)

[frankz]

You can also, in tracks view, add the "Playlists" column, which lists the playlists that a file is in.

If the goal is actually adding all of them rather than just seeing a list, you can make sure Edit->Edit Preferences->General->warn when duplicate tracks are added to a playlist is on and send all of the tracks to the  playlist.  A warning will pop up for the ones that are already in the playlist, and you can click that you do not want to re-add them.  The remaining tracks will be added.

[phred]

You can also, in tracks view, add the "Playlists" column, which lists the playlists that a file is in.

This will only show static playlists. If a track is in an auto-playlist, it will not appear using this method.

[frankz]

You can also, in tracks view, add the "Playlists" column, which lists the playlists that a file is in.

This will only show static playlists. If a track is in an auto-playlist, it will not appear using this method.

Yes, this is what OP asked about.

[phred]

Yes, this is what OP asked about.

Hmmm ... I didn't see "static" in the OP and just wanted to make sure all the facts were there. Re-reading the OP I can see that an auto-playlist is not likely what they're asking about.

[Zak]

Am I missing something obvious?
Can't you just remove all the tracks from the playlist and re-add them from the folder?

[tangotonyb]

There's a few ways of doing this - the easiest way to look at a folder for items in the collection or not, is view the column Category which displays "none" for items in a folder which have not been added to the library.

Of course they could be in the library, but not in the playlist....

Something I've done which is immensely useful is add a "Filter" field under Custom Tags, set to store in the MusicBee database only.

In your case I'd use this column by going into the playlist and editing every entry to set a value in this field. You can then view the folder and easily sort by Filter to view the entries you need to add.

[pstein]

Can't you just remove all the tracks from the playlist and re-add them from the folder?

This would destroy my previous manual (!) sort order and probably the assigned Ratings

[pstein]

You can also, in tracks view, add the "Playlists" column, which lists the playlists that a file is in.

Adding the column "Playlist" (or "Category" like suggested in another post") does NOT help.
What does it help if  I open the playlist "myplaylist123" and the column "Playlist" shows the value "myplaylist123".
I KNOW that!

If I click on the playlist then only songs are listed which are already added.
I am searching songs which are NOT added (or later removed)

[pstein]

Beside my two previous comments I can think of a solution like:

1. create new, second Playlist "temp"
2. add (drag) all *.mp3 files into it
3. perform a compare playlists operation which shows differences

BUT: Where is that "compare playlists" operation?

[MotleyG]

See post #2 for the best solution.

[Zak]

Can't you just remove all the tracks from the playlist and re-add them from the folder?

This would destroy my previous manual (!) sort order and probably the assigned Ratings

Fair enough.

Your end goal is to identify missing tracks.
So ignore the fact that a playlist contains tracks or file paths or whatever, and the problem becomes a simple task of comparing two text files.

1. Your playlist has a manual sort order, so first create a copy and display the File Name column so you can sort them alphabetically.
2. Export the playlist in .M3U format.
3. The exported playlist will include the full file path, so open it in Notepad (or any text editor) and do a Find and Replace to remove the folder path so you just have a list of file names.
4. Open a Windows Command Prompt.
5. Change to the directory containing your music files and generate a directory listing of the files in it.
     If you're not familiar with DOS commands, enter the drive letter followed by a colon to change drives, then CD to change directories.
     e.g.

Code

M:
CD "Music\My Playlist Folder"
DIR *.mp3 /b > "Folder Tracks.txt"

This will create a plain text file in the same folder that contains all of the file names.

5. Now use a file comparison tool to compare the file names in the playlist with the file names in the folder.
    I recommend WinMerge:

WinMerge

[hiccup]

And for as far I understand the challenge here:

A solution on file level could perhaps be:
Select all the files in the playlist.
Edit a (custom) tag none of these files uses, by e.g. entering 'ABC', save all the files, and removing 'ABC' and saving again.
Now if you check the folders that contain the tracks you are interested in, using Windows Explorer, looking at Date Modified will show you which songs are, and which ones are not in the playlist. You can then probably simply drag the ones with the older dates to your playlist?

(I can imagine a solution in MusicBee exists too, but I haven't read all the interesting replies and suggestions yet)

[pstein]

Wow, al lot of cumbersome solutions.
But thank you anyway.

I think the best is:

Create an auto-playlist with the following conditions:

match all the following rules:
Path / starts with / (your folder)
Playlist / is not / (your static playlist)

Works although "Refresh Now" button in Auto-Playlist setup does not work (after modifying conditions)
I had to exit + restart MB to really show differences.

Thank you again to all.