smart playlist help needed-sorting by least played.

Tamar_m wrote:

Oh, I'm really sorry. I'm feeling pretty stupid, but I can't figure out how to create another parameter that says Last played or chooses that to not be in the last two days. The options under the drop down menu include:
Random
Album

Artist

Genre

Name

Highest and lowest rating

Most and least recently played
Most and least often played

Most and least recently added

Hi Tamar,

That dropdown you are looking at is only for "Limit to." You do not need it at all. Just make your rules look like the below.

(After you enter the first rule, click the plus sign and it will allow you to enter the second.)

Tamar,

"Least played" and "least recently played" are two different things. The former will look for the lowest play count, while the latter will look for the oldest "last played" date.

If you just want to play everything once before getting a repeat, you don't really need a smart playlist. Just turn off shuffle and let it play down the list. Would that meet your need?

Tamar_m wrote:

Very good to know. It is actually important that the music shuffles, unfortunately. I am referring to my playlist that I use during work doing massage therapy. I have an extremely varied selection of music and some of it is a bit more upbeat than the usual new-agey massage music. It wouldn't be great if all of those types of songs played in a row from a certain album.

Tamar - OK, here is a suggestion:

First, create a playlist with the suitable music, and call it "Massage Music." If your genres are reliable, this can be a smart playlist based on genre. Otherwise, it can be a regular playlist and you just drag a bunch of suitable tracks and albums into it.

Second create a smart playlist called "Today." It needs two rules:

"Playlist" "is" "Massage Music," and

"Last Played" "is not in the last" "2" "days."

Now you can just shuffle through "Today." After each song plays, that second rule will cause it to temporarily vanish from the playlist, so you don't get repeats.

By the way, keep all your music checked.

Note added 5 minutes later: Make sure those two smart playlist rules have a "Match All" relationship.

Hi Tamar,

iTunes updates the song's "last played" date/time when the song plays to the end. If that song in fact played all the way to the end on Monday, the smart playlist rules should prevent it from even being in the smart playlist.

Anyway, sounds like things are on the right track. Enjoy the music!