Q: opening in windows explorer

Iwulak wrote:

 

hey everyone

 

I quit using iTunes for about one year, and now after some updates I cannot find one option in the newest version. The option I am talking about is "show in windows explorer" (or something like that, I use the Polish version) after right-clicking a song or an album. Is it gone or just hidden?

Right click > Show in Windows Explorer works fine here.

Chris CA wrote:

 

Right click > Show in Windows Explorer works fine here.

Well it's gone for me.

I've also lost ~100GB of podcasts

I've copied the files back to the itunes folder but I can't get them to display in iTunes. I also tried going back to the "C:\Users\(Username)\Music\iTunes\Previous iTunes Libraries" folder but it's empty.

It seems iTunes updated itself to version 11.1.3.8 without asking (I was runing a 10.x version and didn't want to upgrade to 11.x because of other issues) and it totally screwed the pooch.

Most of my saved podcasts went back 5+ years and are no longer available, as the producers either took down the entire series (ie went out of "business"), or limit downloads to the last podcast (1 week to 1 month depending on the podcast).

I've spent years carefully collecting tutorials and audiobooks podcasts to now have iTunes wipe them away in a single day.

I'm devistated.

And it only happend in the last few days as I watched a podcast 3-4 days ago. I always use VLC to view podcasts, clicking them in iTunes -> show in windows explorer, then double clicking the file to load in VLC. The built-in media player in iTunes (QuickTime?) always stutters and drops frames on my PC while VLC is sliky smooth.

Chris McMahon wrote:

Well it's gone for me.

 

Because it is not on your computer.

Click the cloud icon to download it.

Anything with the cloud icon is not stored locally on your computer.

Except it IS on my computer

Along with the 10 other episodes of that particlar podcast, and the 1,000s of other episodes of other podcasts that iTunes has "lost".

Chris McMahon wrote:

 

Except it IS on my computer

 

You wrote, "I've copied the files back to the itunes folder ".

iTunes doesn't know it is back on your computer.

You generally can't mess around inside the iTunes folder without it messing up iTunes.

Double click that file in Windows Explorer and it may get relinked in iTunes.

Chris CA wrote:

 

You wrote, "I've copied the files back to the itunes folder ".

iTunes doesn't know it is back on your computer.

You generally can't mess around inside the iTunes folder without it messing up iTunes.

But the whole issue was caused by iTunes deciding to delete thousands of podcasts without asking me. If I didn't restore the files from a backup they'd be lost forever.

Unfortunately I only have 2 daily backups of my main boot drive (the one with the iTunes library files on it - why can't iTunes keep it's library file WITH the actual music/video files?!) and both have a copy of the library after all the podcasts were deleted, so I can't just restore the library to how it was.

Double click that file in Windows Explorer and it may get relinked in iTunes

Didn't work. The files are associated with VLC media player.

Right click - Open using... iTunes.

Chris McMahon wrote:

why can't iTunes keep it's library file WITH the actual music/video files?!)

It does. The iTunes library.itl file is in /Music/iTunes/ and all the media is in /Music/iTunes/iTunes media/

Chris CA wrote:

 

Right click - Open using... iTunes.

 

 

Chris McMahon wrote:

why can't iTunes keep it's library file WITH the actual music/video files?!)

It does. The iTunes library.itl file is in /Music/iTunes/ and all the media is in /Music/iTunes/iTunes media/

Not on my system.

My iTunes media files are > 1TB. My boot drive is a 128GB SSD. I physically don't have space to keep everything on my C: drive and I'm not buyin a 2TB SSD just to fit my iTunes library on it, so I told iTunes to keep the media on my 3TB D: drive

iTunes keeps some program files in:

C:\Program Files\iTunes

more program files in:

C:\Program Files (x86)\iTunes

and more random stuff in:

C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\iTunes

It keeps it's library files in:

C:\Users\(username)\Music\iTunes

The preferences file is in:

D:\iTunes

And the actual media files in:

D:\iTunes\(various subdirectories)

It's a pig's breakfast.

Since my D: drive takes about ~18 hours to backup, I only back it up once a week. Which, thankfully, meant I still had a copy of all the files iTunes deleted sometime < a week, > 2 days ago.

I'm going to try "File -> Add folder to library" to see if iTunes will pick up the extra files in the Podcast directorys.

Chris McMahon wrote:

 

I'm going to try "File -> Add folder to library" to see if iTunes will pick up the extra files in the Podcast directorys.

Seems to be working. It's picking up the files and the metadata they contain. It's slow, doing one directory at a time, and it is giving dupes here and there, but it is working.

2 directories down, 156 to go.

Why don't you use File > Add Folder to Library > D:\iTunes to import everything in one go?

For the future see my make a split library portable post and this backup tip.

tt2