Author Topic: More custom tags?  (Read 21071 times)

Zak

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I'd always thought that the first level should have been populated with your 10 most frequently used items and the less used items went into the Other fields context menu.
That would be easier to implement, but also implies enough people are toggling the displayed columns often enough to warrant it. I would assume most people set it up to display the columns that are most relevant to them and then rarely change them again, but who knows?

But what really irks me is the Virtual/Custom 10 thru 16 appearing before the 1 thru 9! All that work and not full alphanumeric sorting  ;)
I didn't notice that - that should definitely be fixed!


While I think of it... why are the Other Fields menus on the track browser heading, track details heading and search bar all different?  ???
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Roadrunner

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Having just seen the new context menu arrangement my immediate thought was "That makes so much sense, why wasn't it always like that?". You won't convince me that this is in any way less user-friendly than having up to 32 additional arbitrary menu items on the Other fields context menu.
You and I use custom tags very differently: You a lot of them and me just a few. The result might be the different point of view, I would have only a handful additional used menu items and the menu is only too large because of 20 something unused tags. But even for you, you and everyone who uses your MB has to know, where to look for a specific tag, is it an MB, a custom or a virtual one?

Of course if most of you prefer the new way, I could accept it. However, whichever will be the final solution, it should look all over the same way.

I suppose you could hide virtual tags that don't have a formula in them, but there would be no way to temporarily hide an item - you'd have to delete it and recreate it each time, which limits its usefulness.
You wouldn't have to delete those custom items, one idea (next to the automatically recognizing one, which indeed could be tricky) was to indicate in the preferences menue if you use the tag. At the same place where you give the names. It could even be switched automatically at the moment when you give it a name or remove it. Or it could manually be activated/deactivated and the default would be to show for example the first 9 custom items. Or something similar.

But what really irks me is the Virtual/Custom 10 thru 16 appearing before the 1 thru 9! All that work and not full alphanumeric sorting  ;)
No need to do something like that, if they wouldn't be visible...
Last Edit: January 08, 2013, 07:17:56 PM by Roadrunner

Steven

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i have improved the name sorting and fixed the "Group By" menu.
I will leave the general idea of splitting Custom and Virtual tags as done now - it seems not everyone will be completely happy but i do think it will improve the discoverability of the Virtual and Custom tags feature
Last Edit: January 08, 2013, 09:14:36 PM by Steven

psychoadept

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I do think it will improve the discoverability of the Virtual and Custom tags feature

That's an excellent side-effect!
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Bee-liever

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But what really irks me is the Virtual/Custom 10 thru 16 appearing before the 1 thru 9! All that work and not full alphanumeric sorting  ;)

It's fixed!  ;D Thank You

But I see that everything is lumped together as "Other Fields" in the searchbox menu. No separate "Virtual/Custom Tags" sub-menu.
It's certainly a long list of fields  :)
Last Edit: January 08, 2013, 10:58:54 PM by Bee-liever
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paq

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First off:
* Steven, thanks for the extra tags!
* Zak, good idea about the menu grouping! I like it, but then I am also one of those who uses a lot of tags.

Next, I want to share my humble opinion about the "don't see unused custom/virtual tags"-topic:
My suggested solution is, along the lines I stated earlier in this thread, to let the user decide how many virtual/custom tags he or she wants. A flexible approach where the user simply clicks a "+"-button to add a new tag and a "-"-button to remove one, similar to how you create rules for an Auto-Playlist today.

Then a user who doesn't use that many tags wouldn't see extra ones and a user who does would simply see exactly the amount of tags actually used.

Now, having programming experience I can totally see the cost in implementing this - a lot of code regarding virtual/custom tags would need an overhaul and then along with that is the potential for many bugs which would need time fixing. Some would say, "why fix something that isn't broken?"

However like the quote below, there's nothing saying 16 is a final number and we won't ever see more tags added in the future. Although the cost of implementing my suggested solution could be high, it could be beneficial doing this once rather than adding a fixed number of tags several times.
(personally I would be happy with 12 of them)
Until you have 12. Then you'll want 16. Then you'll want 24...  :P

Now get me right, this isn't something I want to be of a high priority but rather a consideration for the future development of MB. I hope at least it will be given some thought before we hear "I have added support for 20 custom/virtual tags" :)

Roadrunner

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Thank you Steven! Not my favorite, but I can live with that. The better sort order, the similar grouping in all parts are fine, the "Define new tags" a great idea!

Sorry, but some more small notes concerning the new version:
  • The better sort order should be used anywhere:
    • Custom tags in "group by" are the old way round
    • All custom and virtual tags in listboxes (in the view configuration) as well
  • "Define New Tags" under "Custom tags" opens the "New Custom Tag Definition" window which sounds quite logical at the first moment. But shouldn't it open Preferences -> Tags (1) instead?
  • The possibility of defining new tags directly out of the right click menue improves the discoverability indeed! So, no more reason to show the many unused tags. You could even start with zero, like similar things in MB as custom search, custom sorting, custom view... Maybe with the need of an internal maximum for programming reason, but otherwise as paq described. I agree with paq, that this is not a short-term goal, but would be worth to think about for the future

Now, I have to go to rename all unused Custom-Tags to something like Z-Custom, to move them downwards... ::)

paq

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Ordering issue: Using version 2.1.4756 I can confirm the order issues RoadRunner mentioned. I also want to add Preferences > Layout (1) > Configure Fields to the list of where custom and virtual tags don't order up correctly.

Small request #1: Could "Other Fields" be renamed to "Other Tags"? Or is that not in line with how MB uses the terms tags and fields?

Small request #2: Not so sure about this myself, but if anyone else agrees, could "Other Fields" appear above "Custom Tags" and "Virtual Tags"?

redwing

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This is a slightly off-topic request, but it would be very convenient if "Other Fields" sub-menu supports mouse scroll wheel.

Zak

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My suggested solution is, along the lines I stated earlier in this thread, to let the user decide how many virtual/custom tags he or she wants. A flexible approach where the user simply clicks a "+"-button to add a new tag and a "-"-button to remove one, similar to how you create rules for an Auto-Playlist today.
I also think this would be the best implementation. That it isn't done this way already leads me to believe it would be a major change.

Still, I think custom/virtual tags are one of MusicBee's most impressive features and worth expanding on. How many times has someone asked a question/requested a new feature on the forum, to get the reply "You can do that with a custom tag...". ;)
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Steven

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hiki

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I have to agree that basically unlimited custom tag support would be a major benefit.
Being a long term foobar user I tried out MusicBee and I am really happy with it. There are only two things missing, and one of them is custom tag support.

Maybe you can find a way to not include it in the UI as a named item, but let the user specify what he wants to use. Like make a "Custom tag..." menu entry which pops up a dialog where you can enter the tag value or chose one of those already defined in the preference dialog there using a dropdown.
for search queries als these tags should be supported.

When you have extensivly tagged your music like some of us did, you need more tags than a predefined number. I myself have tagged stuff like who played which instrument and the various people involved in the production. I don't need to see this obviously in the UI, but I need them to perform search queries.

Steven

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see the latest v2.1 update from the weekly updates topic. There are now 16 custom tags (no more will be added though)