new feature request: non-alphabetical custom sorting/grouping

[hiccup]

This is about something many MusicBee users have been trying to accomplish over many years, but failed, and then turned to the forum asking for help to see if there are methods to accomplish it.
It is about being able to have a custom sorting/grouping that is not based on alphabetical values.

A common example:
MusicBee users may have varying types of releases by an artist.
Studio albums, Live albums, Singles, Demo's, Bootlegs, and whatnot.

It makes perfect sense to be able to have them sorted/grouped to a personal preference that doesn't rely on the alphabet.

e.g. have them sorted as:

- Studio albums
- Live albums
- EP's
- Singles
- Broadcasts
- Bootlegs
- whatever

The usual forum suggestion to accomplish this is to resort to using zero-width spaces, adding a certain amount of them in front of the field that users would like to use for custom sorting.
While this will work fine for computer-savvy users, it is most certainly not something obvious or intuitive,
I think it would be good if MusicBee had a feature to accomplish this by having some user-friendly configuration option.

While I do have some (vague) ideas about how an implementation could work and look like, I am curious about other MusicBee users' thoughts and suggestions on this.

[psychoadept]

+1

I can imagine a development of the custom sorting system where you could apply it to any field.

[Haste]

+1

[vzell]

+1

[tjinc]

+1

Good idea. While the example of the release type seems to be the most common, I have previously (sheepishly) suggested the (mis)use of the Composer tag for other data (if not being used) purely for the fact it has custom sorting functionality.

My first thought was also an extension of the current custom sorting, whether for all fields or a select few custom fields.

[boroda]

The usual forum suggestion to accomplish this is to resort to using zero-width spaces, adding a certain amount of them in front of the field that users would like to use for custom sorting.
While this will work fine for computer-savvy users, it is most certainly not something obvious or intuitive

hiccup, have you tried AT&RT 9.2? there you can add zero-width spaces to original tag copy or to original tag itself in the user-friendly way.

My first thought was also an extension of the current custom sorting, whether for all fields or a select few custom fields.

+1 for this.

[Dizza17]

+1

[Steven]

This is done for v3.6 - the custom sort mappings can be edited in the sorting/grouping preferences
https://getmusicbee.com/patches/MusicBee36_Patched.zip
unzip and replace the existing musicbee application files

[tjinc]

This looks like it will be a great new feature so thank you. Custom sorting in the main panel and the Library Explorer panel look good. A couple of comments following a quick bit of test driving:

 • The new custom sort values do not seem to be implemented in the Thumbnail Browser nor the Column Browser. (Note that the tags that previously supported custom sorting do still custom sort in these panels.)

 • For the <Genre> tag, custom sorting does not appear to be implemented anywhere. (Not sure if anyone would want to custom sort Genre but...)

 • Custom sorting rules for the <Album Artist> tag seems to be taken from the <Artist> custom sorting values. The <Album Artist> custom sorting values do not appear to do anything. (This is probably a hangover from the previous implementation.)

[tjinc]

Thinking more about my last point above:

Currently the <Artist>, <Album Artist> and <Composer> custom sorting values are taken from the one list. If these will now be separated into individual lists per tag then current sort values will no longer work - unless and until they are updated or the custom sort values are copied across into the appropriate section.

Not sure what the best way to go on this - probably to leave this alone as long as it can be identified that you need to set custom sort values for <Composer> and <Album Artist> in the <Artist> values table.

[Steven]

Currently the <Artist>, <Album Artist> and <Composer> custom sorting values are taken from the one list.

i have updated the patch version to remove Album Artist and Composer, and rename "Artist" to "Artist, Composer"
Genre and Genre Category should work now (in the parts of the application that custom sorting is implemented)
I will look at the other issues later in the week

[tjinc]

This looks pretty good now:
 • Back to the single list for <Album Artist>, <Artist> and <Composer> which should maintain backwards compatibility with existing Custom Sort Value settings.
 • <Genre> is working (I haven't tried <Genre Category>).
 • The custom sorting is now functioning in the Column Browser and Thumbnail Browser.
Very nice!

One little thing that has crept in:
Right click on track > Edit > Sorting tab > Edit Custom Sort Values button. This opens the Custom Sorting dialogue window but the drop-down list of tags is greyed out and stuck on whatever tag was last selected. (Accessing this window through Edit Preferences still works.)

[Steven]

One little thing that has crept in:
Right click on track > Edit > Sorting tab > Edit Custom Sort Values button. This opens the Custom Sorting dialogue window but the drop-down list of tags is greyed out and stuck on whatever tag was last selected. (Accessing this window through Edit Preferences still works.)

thats always been the case and intentional - its just editing the names for that track

there were still a couple of bugs that are now fixed
https://getmusicbee.com/patches/MusicBee36_Patched.zip

[tjinc]

One little thing that has crept in:
Right click on track > Edit > Sorting tab > Edit Custom Sort Values button. This opens the Custom Sorting dialogue window but the drop-down list of tags is greyed out and stuck on whatever tag was last selected. (Accessing this window through Edit Preferences still works.)

thats always been the case and intentional - its just editing the names for that track

I understand what you are saying, and that was the previous behaviour, but I'll maintain that there is an issue here. To replicate:
  1. Go to Edit Preferences > Sorting/Grouping > Edit Custom Sort Values
  2. Select from the drop-down list any tag other than 'Artist, Composer' (let's say we select 'Custom1')
  3. Close this down (no need to change anything nor save).
  4. Right-click any track > Edit > Sorting Tab > Edit Custom Sorting
  5. This will open the Custom Sorting list for the 'Custom1' field (and the dropdown list is greyed out) - I believe this should be opening the 'Artist, Composer' sort values for that track.

[Steven]

I understand what you are saying, and that was the previous behaviour, but I'll maintain that there is an issue here. To replicate:
  1. Go to Edit Preferences > Sorting/Grouping > Edit Custom Sort Values
  2. Select from the drop-down list any tag other than 'Artist, Composer' (let's say we select 'Custom1')
  3. Close this down (no need to change anything nor save).
  4. Right-click any track > Edit > Sorting Tab > Edit Custom Sorting
  5. This will open the Custom Sorting list for the 'Custom1' field (and the dropdown list is greyed out) - I believe this should be opening the 'Artist, Composer' sort values for that track.

thats fixed now
https://getmusicbee.com/patches/MusicBee36_Patched.zip