Q: Missing iTunes Playlists
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Jun 28, 2016 10:17 PMby Limnos,ASC user turingtest2 help document: Empty/corrupt iTunes library after upgrade/crash - https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6561
If you don't see your content after updating iTunes - https://support.apple.com/kb/HT203225
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Jun 29, 2016 1:01 PMby Limnos,Your playlists are stored in the .itl copies of the library file. They are also in the .xml copy but iTunes makes that from the .itl for other applications to use. You can import a .xml into an empty library and it may or may not have your playlists.
It helps if you expand on "to no avail". What happens? Absolutely nothing at all? You might as well have gone out for a walk and not touched your computer?
I think you mean you restored from Time Machine. Did you go back far enough? You really see absolutely no playlists at all? How long has this been happening?
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Jun 30, 2016 12:23 PMby mdzareas,While appreciate your willingness to help, I do not appreciate your condescending tone.
Moving forward, I did not back up via Time Machine to resolve this issue.
I connected to my external drive via Time Machine with intentions of restoring
my iTunes Library, and discovered that the Library.xml folder was MIA in previous
backups. Unusual, I would say... Furthermore, you are correct. Nothing happened.
The playlists were still MIA, after all attempts which I had tried, previous of your
suggestions. The attempts being the same procedures which you suggested.
I spent over an hour with tech support (Apple), and the tech didn't seem have
a notion of what was happening, or why. In fact, he didn't even appear to know
about the obvious bug with this update. I asked how I could restore my playlists via my
iPhone. He then instructed me to export playlists from my iPhone, and import them to
my MacBook Pro. Some of the playlists are missing music. Of course, the playlists that are missing music,
are the playlists which contain files that were downloaded from CDs. This has also been an
intermittent, ongoing issue with updates over the years, for obvious reasons. Apple would prefer
consumers to purchase and download iTunes, which I do more often than not.
The iPhone appeared to sync with my MacBook Pro during several attempts. Fortunately, it
did not actually sync and my playlists are currently in tact. At this point, it appears I am going
to have to download CDs, again. It also appears that I will have to manually recreate these
playlists. I seriously cannot believe that I cannot back up from Time Machine. I will look even
further back to see if the missing files are there, when I have more time and patience. I went back
about 2 years worth of backups.
If you can think of anything else that could resolve this issue, I am open to suggestions.
Thanks!
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Jun 30, 2016 12:52 PMby Limnos,CDs are not stored in iCloud unless you subscribe to Apple Music.
Apple doesn't have a way for you to transfer non-Apple purchases from a device to a computer. They do not explain the reason but there is the equal chance it isn't Apple deciding this but the media companies who do not want there to be easy ways for people to share media with each other (and who control if Apple can sell their media).
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Jun 30, 2016 4:46 PMby mdzareas,Yes, I updated to 12.4 something. Good to know. Btw, the CD thing is random. Some of them exist, some of them don't.
I suspect some are in the original library due to the fact that one of the bugs of updating to 12 whatever is that iTunes
creates a new library automatically. So, I looked up how to merge libraries and I could not get it to work. It just created duplicates.
I can't find the library with which my iPhone is synced. I am pretty bent out of shape at this point. I work overtime, all of the time and
I don't have time for these shenanigans. I can't believe that tech support was not able to assist with
this issue. Apple should be paying me, for my time, as it has been about ten hours of my time thus far.
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Jul 1, 2016 10:23 AMby Limnos,mdzareas wrote:
Thank you for the effort! I already tried both of the above suggestions to no avail. I tried backing up from Time Machine,
as well. Unfortunately, the Library.xml file appears to be missing in backups.
Did you try restoring the entire iTunes folder?
Just to reiterate, iTunes does not use the .xml. It isn't there because new iTunes preferences deactivate its creation by default. You can re-enable it in preferences but it doesn't make any difference to iTunes.
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Jul 1, 2016 3:10 PMby mdzareas,Yes, that was my latest attempt. Playlists are still MIA, as well as CDs.
The CDs are all 25-30 years old. I am not sure how they are being denied
backup. It is obnoxious, since I paid for all of them. I can't believe that they
don't back up with Time Machine. I am going to have to find a work around,
and just keep them stored elsewhere on my computer for a more efficient import,
for every time Apple creates an iTunes update.
