My iTunes preferences/media folder location keeps going to default

So I did some further testing on importing playlists. I do have a quandary but first a couple of things to confirm. Of course, this is doing the XML update, removing the second forward slash after localhost.

1. If I add music (or delete I assume) to an existing playlist and import it into Plex, Plex with pick it up on the playlist.
2. If I create a new playlist and import it into Plex, again, Plex updates it.

The quandary is that if I rename the playlist in iTunes and try importing it (again doing the update to the XML, refreshing the NAS, turning off PMS, then relaunching it after I update the XML), it will take any changes (per #1 above). However, it is not picking up on the changed name. I did a search in the XML file itself and checked. Here's an example:

Original playlist was called: A - FUN FLOW. That playlist is in Plex. I renamed the playlist in iTunes to "A - FUN FLOW MUSIC." In the XML that playlist is there but not A - FUN FLOW. And it doesn't matter if I made any changes within the playlist or not - I tried both ways just to see if that helped. So when I do all the steps to import the newly named playlist, Plex is not picking up on it.

If it picks up the name of a new, never in Plex before, playlist and I use the overwrite existing files, and the XML has the updated playlist name, I wonder why Plex is not picking it up?

Do you have any thoughts? Maybe it has to do with some sequencing order of things? I've tried scanning library files first before doing the import iTunes playlists, or just doing the import on its own, but it doesn't matter. Perhaps I need to leave Plex Media server running? Not log out of Plex on the website?

I'll search the forums and see if there's anything there but it's doubtful that there is.

It should be noted that all 932 playlists remain intact when I change/update the XML. No playlists are lost. I've sorted in different ways to see if the playlists somehow were listed somewhere else but that wasn't the case. The other day I lost all but 80 playlists when I was importing an updated XML and I freaked out. I quickly realized I had forgotten to edit the file to remove the second slash after localhost and once I did, they all came back.

I'd really like to figure out how to successfully import renamed playlists as I desire.

Any thoughts??

Thank you as always!!!

I reread some of our exchange related to the playlist import. Since my couple posts above have not been resolved/figured out by me, I noticed a couple of things and wondered what you think.

I did successfully rename a playlist after re-importing it, (after updating the XML etc.) but can't figure out what I did. I thought maybe it was my changing the order of the playlist in iTunes and then importing again into Plex, but was not able to replicate it. Any other attempts have been unsuccessful. I can add a new playlist and it will import that. I deleted a playlist in Plex and then did the "import iTunes playlists" and it brought it back so that also works.

I'm wondering about the XML path in the iTunes plugin. That was left blank as part of getting all the playlists to import originally. Should I try removing it, shutting down Plex Media Server and doing those steps again? Seems to me the path should stay and that somehow I should be able to get the playlist name change to get recognized in Plex.

The one thing I've not done is refreshed the metadata. Per my post above, I'm pretty nervous about that but hopefully that will be what gets it to work?

I've checked the XML itself and the renamed playlist is there and the original one isn't (the one that is in Plex but I'm importing the renamed one, if you follow). But the renamed one won't import and the original stays.

I've covered this above I know but the last unsolved issue is when I change the name of a playlist in iTunes, and how I can get that to update in Plex. And the main reason is that in Sonos - with the Plex app - many of my playlists are too long and hard to know which is which so I want to change the name to make them more identifiable.

If I delete the long-name playlist in Plex and then import iTunes playlists again with updated XML, it will bring it in. So that's doable, just not as functional.

Any thoughts?

Thanks for the replies!!!

YOU SAID: ou can test this by making an edit to say a track title. You'll get a little active padlock. Deselect the padlock and refresh the metadata and Plex will read back the unchanged tag.

ME: I did as you suggested. Changed a song title from "What's Up" to "What's Up DEAR." I saved it. Plex put the padlock on it as you said. I then clicked the padlock, leaving the "What's Up DEAR" title the same and saved it again. I then refreshed the metadata for the song and it came back with just "What's Up" so that works as you suggest.

YOU SAID: I can't be certain if the periodic scan updates metadata, or only accounts for new/moved/deleted files. I think it might only do the latter.

ME: I agree. I think it's just for new/moved/deleted files.

YOU SAID: I don't know how it works under the hood. Did you make changes to lists in Plex or only in iTunes? Since you can make lists in Plex it might be that touching a list in Plex dissociates it from the iTunes import. Either that or the overwrite existing option isn't foolproof for all types of change.

ME: I did not make any changes to playlists in Plex. Only in iTunes. Or changed the name of the playlist in iTunes. I think you're right that it isn't foolproof in Plex. I'll keep trying and see what I can figure out (a consistent way to affect it so a changed playlist name in iTunes would carry forward when I import an itunes playlist again with the updated XML.

YOU SAID: Not sure where I saw moods now, but I have spotted an additional area in the Plex album layout called Style which must be from their database rather than the tag. As for ratings could Plex be treating manual and auto-ratings differently?

ME: Plex is showing me song ratings for individual tracks. I've noticed that where they don't, it's not on the song itself when viewing in Windows. Much like Artwork or those missing album titles, this is another place where it doesn't carry it in because it's not on the Windows files themselves. That's the same for other metadata too such as comments or Genre, etc. I might take the time to go song-to-song in Windows one day and update all the files there.

Thanks. I'll reply to your other comments next.

YOU SAID: Thinking about the workflow here is the iTunes library generating its XML file in the same path that you're using when you get Plex to import the XML file? Probably best to avoid a situation where Plex can read an updated XML file that hasn't had the extra slashes removed.

ME: I mentioned that I accidentally put a new XML file that I forgot to update and put it over the existing one on my NAS and all but 80 playlists disappeared. (Not sure why they all didn't?) But I quickly fixed the XML and imported again and they all came back. At least I know I can get things back if I ever make that mistake again.

YOU SAID: If you know that a certain type of edit doesn't get reflected properly, e.g. a renamed playlist, then you can either manually mirror the edit in Plex, or delete the old version of the list before reimporting lists from iTunes.

ME: I can't make edits to the names of a playlist in Plex unfortunately (though that's probably a good thing so iTunes and Plex stay copacetic). The best way I know of would be the arduous task of editing the name in iTunes. Then before importing, deleting the playlist name in Plex and then importing the newly named one. That would work.

THANKS!

OUR EXCHANGE:

I've checked the XML itself and the renamed playlist is there and the original one isn't (the one that is in Plex but I'm importing the renamed one, if you follow). But the renamed one won't import and the original stays.

YOU: Is it just the name that doesn't update? I.e. if you change the order in iTunes and import playlists does Plex get the new order, or does it stick with the old one?

I just tested this. In Plex, the test playlist was called "#1 songs" and was sorted by Title. In iTunes, I see it's also by title. I then sorted by Artist, copied the XML, edited it, made the changes there with the forward slash, then copied it onto the NAS (or upload/overwrite onto the NAS, it works both ways). I imported itunes playlists but the order stayed Title first. I also had scanned the library and tried it again, but it didn't put it by Artist instead of title. Weirdly, I noticed a playlist that I was testing the name on yesterday had updated in Plex. Wouldn't do it yesterday. I wonder if it could be the "date" has to be different? But then there are other playlists that I changed that still aren't changed. If the behavior was consistent, it would be easier to track down.

YOU SAID: Concentrate on the clean up in iTunes. Shorter meaningful names that will display properly in Plex, then tear down all the lists in Plex and import fresh. Or keep Plex and iTunes running side by side and make any necessary edits/deletions in Plex after making changes in iTunes.

ME: Yes, if I can't figure it out, then that's about the only thing I can do. I would tighten the playlist names in iTunes and then delete the ones in Plex first before importing the new updated, shorter playlist names into Plex. And I would only do a certain number at a time just to make sure before I did a whole bunch of changes.

Let me ask a couple questions related to all this iTunes/Plex stuff.

If a user has their iTunes library on a windows machine for example and does (or doesn't) have a NAS, if they simply changed the XML file to show "volume1" before the rest of the info like the example below, would that keep all the iTunes data in place when they add the library to Plex without having to actually physically move the music?

<key>Location</key>string>file://localhost/volume1/Music1/Beach%20Boys/Little%20Duece%20Coupe/Beach%20Boys%20-%20409.m4a</string>

In other words, their library still is in its current location, but they just add that library to Plex, will all the data stay in place? I used the CustomRenamer in my case, while also making the "volume1" in the system32 file (I think that's the one) so I could browse to it on my NAS.

I'm just curious as to whether that would work or if a user would have to move all the music like I did for iTunes to keep track of everything?

This is all such fun for me to learn. I don't understand it to any degree like you do, but it is interesting to try and understand how a user would approach it.

I'm still searching and trying things on Plex on the renaming of playlists. It's obvious it's picking it up here and there as some test renaming of playlists is coming through (like the one today that didn't come through yesterday), but I'll be danged if I can figure it out.

THANKS as always!!!

Quick question, if I want to use Apple Music in a car down the road (I don't have a car with it yet), will it change all my music to lower baud as I've read? Will it replace my versions with theirs if same artist/title? I worked hard to edit the silence out of the ends of songs so I don't have the 2-3 (or more sometimes) silence at the end of tracks. My music fades and then it is immediately over - no waiting for the song to end in silence. Are there ways around this?

I have two iTunes libraries right now: 1) My "Y" mapped drive and 2) The volume1 NAS one. Can I use the mapped drive for Apple Music?

Any other things I should be aware of? How can I best protect MY music but get into that world such as Apple TV with that on it for example?

Thanks!!!

I gave that a try (Copy to Play Order) after I changed a column sort order of the playlist. Updated the XML and then imported to NAS. Then logged back into Plex. The sort order remained the same as it was before. I had changed from a random looking list of songs in the iTunes playlist to being in alpha order for Artists. But it stayed random. I also tried rescanning the library. Neither worked.

In another item, I noticed that some Beatles albums that I have mono and stereo versions of have lost their split. Meaning that for some reason, Plex put the mono and stereo into the same album. So I split those out and now I had two versions as I should have. I would just select the mono ones for example, and then edit it to say "Revolver (mono)" and it would make a new album so to speak and leave the stereo tracks in place for "Revolver". I had to go back and redo about 6 albums or so.

Just to test this metadata issue, after I redid those, I refreshed the metadata and it went back to combining them. I checked the Windows files for the album which I can view under Network / DS720 and the right album name is on each song within the album, meaning there's "Revolver" and "Revolver (mono)" on the respective tracks but in two different folders so I have no clue as to why it's pulling in the data for both of those. VERY strange. These are the actual albums, not the playlists.

Interestingly, I do have playlists for those each and I just checked and they're separated there.

Plex is extremely challenging. It's not user-friendly at all. This is why I'm worried about doing a library metadata refresh because I fear it will change things there just as it did on the Beatles albums as a test case. I had modified those last week so it was fresh in my head so for some reason I decided I'd go check and sure enough, it didn't save the changes.

To check further, I made the change back again on one of the several Beatles albums and then scanned the library instead of updating metadata inside the Beatles, and it did not change it back. So it appears nearly for certain, that I'm going to have to not do any metadata updating.

I changed/tested various Agents inside Plex and other things to try and nothing worked. Oddly, some of the changes I made stayed on a couple of Beatles albums (keeping stereo and mono separated).

There are several confusing elements. For example, when you set up your library you can choose a scanner and agent. Scanner choices are "Plex Music or Plex Music scanner." I have used Plex Music as it's recommended because it's newer. And for Agent, choices are Plex Music, Personal Media Artists or Last.FM. In testing, it seemed to work best for Plex Music to be the choice.

What is so amazingly confusing is under Agents in Settings, you have other choices and order to choose. They have Movies, Shows, Artists, Albums, and Photos. For Artists for example, they offer two sub-groups: Personal Media Artists and Last.Fm. Then underneath are choices of Local Media Assets (artist) and Personal Media Artists. You'd think Personal Media would be "my music" but they advice using Local Media if you have good ID3 tagging but only if you have it very well organized.

So I tried some things but nothing kept the mono and stereo albums as separate albums. That leads me to believe I have some settings not right and/or that maybe some ID3 tagging isn't right. Thought, as I said, the album title is correct on each in Windows on the song files so something is amiss.

So anyway, frustrating but at least I have playlists and that alone is a godsend.

If you have any thoughts, I'd love to hear them. THANKS!

With so many album titles missing, I went back to the original MP3 files which I used to change over to the ALAC files. Using Export/Import, the data should have been carried over. I'm noticing that many of the album titles are on the original MP3 files but not on the ALAC files. I'm wondering how/why that happened? And if there's anything that can be done. I went to look at about ten files that Plex show as missing (and are missing on ALAC) and nearly every one had the album on the MP3 file ID3.

Is there a way to get the data onto these files. I'm up to the "K's" for artist's albums missing the name. It sure would be helpful if this data had stayed on the files. But because it didn't, Plex isn't seeing it either which makes sense.

Any script or other that you can think of that could be run? Plex shows 72 artists left with unknown album titles. Sometimes there are several within an artist which makes it quite a bit of work.

I also noticed some genres and ratings missing as well that were on the MP3s before I used Export/Import which didn't make it onto the ALAC in Windows. That said, the data for the artists/songs I'm checking is populating in iTunes on the ALAC so it did carry over there, it just didn't on the actual Windows files. And remember, the data was there before running the script so it should have carried over, right?

Any help here would be greatly appreciated!

I don't know of any way to do this except to go one-by-one in Plex. I'm wondering if I should do the same on the ALAC files now being utilized in my library.

Hi!

I noticed that songs that were unchecked in my iTunes library (so they don't copy to my iPod or play in my library) ended up on Plex. Do you know how I might keep those from getting onto Plex?

An example might be a song that's the same but one might have a different mix, or is better quality, but that I don't want to delete from my library.

Let me know your thoughts on my other few posts when time permits. As always, it's greatly appreciated!

One more quick one for you.

I have two iTunes libraries now:

1. Mapped drive on Y:
2. Volume1/Music1 on the NAS

The NAS is my main library. I've been doing quite a bit of work fine-tuning and wondered, is there a trick to update the Y: drive with those changes without using the XML (which - if I copied it, (I think) - it would change the location to the Volume1 on the songs?

I'm going to be doing some things like this as I go through the years where I'll add a couple of albums to my main library and will then want to do that on the Y: (but not necessarily replicate the work). I can do that as that should be more manageable. My biggest quandary right now is with the fine-tuning I've done on the Volume1 that isn't reflected yet on the mapped Y drive.

I've done quite a bit of Export/Import work for example on about 100 titles, as well as updating some playlists (I noticed a whole set of Steely Dan albums that weren't in playlists for some reason). So it's that kind of thing that I'd like to avoid replicating if at all possible.

Any input would be greatly appreciated. Where would I be without you in my life??? Man!