How to completely ignore directory structure when scanning?

[fuxoft]

Hello,

I've got a problem. I had the same music (about 15000 tracks) both on my harddisk and online on Google Music. It was fairly well categorized, tags filled in, album art, etc... Then I lost the harddisk.

"No problem", I said to myself, I'll just re-download my music from Google Music to the new harddisk and let Squeezebox use that.

However, when I downloaded all my music, I discovered that it's sorted into subdirectories as follows: "ARTIST / ALBUM / TRACK.mp3".

That means, when a single album contains songs by three different authors, the mp# files are actually split into 3 different folders - "ARTIST1 / ALBUM/", "ARTIST2 / ALBUM/" and "ARTIST3 / ALBUM/".

When scanned by Squeezebox server, this structure produces three different albums, each with different Artist.

Can I tell Squeezebox server to completely ignore the directory structure and just use the tags in MP3 files to determine what song belongs to what album?

Or do I have to use some software to re-organize the directory structure (which would probably take a lot of time).

I am using Ubuntu Linux.

[aubuti]

Others in the forum have more expertise than I on LMS's logic, but I'm pretty sure compilation albums are the one case (or at least the most common case by far) in which the directory structure matters. Meaning that you'll need to wrestle them back into place.

I recommend using mp3tag. It has an excellent feature that allows you to create folder and filenames based on the data in the tags. You specify the pattern you want, and it does the rest. And if you ever need it, it also does the reverse, ie, generate tags based on folder and filenames.

As always when doing mass operations on tags or directory structures:

1. make sure you have a good backup
2. be on the lookout for inconsistencies in your naming or tagging
3. test it on a few cases before you let it rip on 100s or 1000s of tracks
4. make sure you have a good backup

Just noticed that you're using Ubuntu. mp3tag is a Windows program, but it runs under Wine. Or you could try puddletag, which is native Linux tagging program that looks and feels a lot like mp3tag. I'm not 100% sure it has the tags-to-foldernames conversion feature, but I expect it does.

[audiomuze]

Just noticed that you're using Ubuntu. mp3tag is a Windows program, but it runs under Wine. Or you could try puddletag, which is native Linux tagging program that looks and feels a lot like mp3tag. I'm not 100% sure it has the tags-to-foldernames conversion feature, but I expect it does.

puddletag can very easily move your files for you. Just load the lot, sort by filename then folder, in the patten combobox (top left of screen) enter /path/to/where_you_want_files_stored/%artist% - %album%/%track% - %title% and then click on the F (Tag->File) button. Your files will be moved with the necessary folders created on the fly. Be careful with compilations - select them seperately and use a pattern like /path/to/where_you_want_files_stored/VA - %album%/%track% - %artist% - %title%.

More detailed help is available here: http://puddletag.sourceforge.net/docs.html

[fuxoft]

puddletag can very easily move your files for you. Just load the lot, sort by filename then folder, in the patten combobox (top left of screen) enter /path/to/where_you_want_files_stored/%artist% - %album%/%track% - %title% and then click on the F (Tag->File) button. Your files will be moved with the necessary folders created on the fly. Be careful with compilations - select them seperately and use a pattern like /path/to/where_you_want_files_stored/VA - %album%/%track% - %artist% - %title%.

More detailed help is available here: http://puddletag.sourceforge.net/docs.html

Thanks for suqqestion but I am afraid this does not help me, because after such renaming the single album will still be split in several different directories, called "ARTIST1 - ALBUM/", "ARTIST2 - ALBUM/" etc... And when I don't use the "artist" tag, I get two different albums with same name (i.e. MATRIX the movie soundtrack and MATRIX the guitar ballads) mixed together...

[audiomuze]

You should end up with a single folder for each artist:
artist - album, inside of which you should find:
01 - tracktitle
02 - tracktitle
...

As with any tagging tool you cannot blindly select everything and start renaming, which is why I said watch out for VA albums - the same logic would apply to soundtracks etc. where more than one artist is represented.

Also, if there's no artist tag, it'll return a null where you specify %artist%.

[fuxoft]

You should end up with a single folder for each artist:
artist - album, inside of which you should find:
01 - tracktitle
02 - tracktitle
...

As with any tagging tool you cannot blindly select everything and start renaming, which is why I said watch out for VA albums - the same logic would apply to soundtracks etc. where more than one artist is represented.

Also, if there's no artist tag, it'll return a null where you specify %artist%.

Ah, then I probably misunderstood you. The point is: I have everything sorted perfectly in Google Music. Logically, there must be a way to just run ALL MY FILES through some script (although rather complicated) to get everythingg sorted AUTOMATICALLY for Squeezebox, just using the tag values... To sort 15000 tracks by hand AGAIN is not an option.

[garym]

You can easily automate this with mp3tag.

[audiomuze]

Please re-read carefully what I stated above, both mp3tag and puddletag can automagically do what you want, the only thing you need do is load all the files, sort by path, select all the non-compilation, non-soundtrack stuff and do what I showed above. Then select all the compilation albums incl. soundtracks etc. and do what I said above re VA albums. It'll take you all of two minutes and it's all done, finished, finito, complete. That's really all there is to solving your problem.

[aubuti]

Thanks for suqqestion but I am afraid this does not help me, because after such renaming the single album will still be split in several different directories, called "ARTIST1 - ALBUM/", "ARTIST2 - ALBUM/" etc... And when I don't use the "artist" tag, I get two different albums with same name (i.e. MATRIX the movie soundtrack and MATRIX the guitar ballads) mixed together...

Exactly. So don't use the Artist tag, and that will take care of all of your cases that don't have two albums of the same name. I expect that will solve 90% of the problem. Then go back and take care of your "Matrix", "Greatest Hits", and other cases manually. There is no magic script that will be able to distinguish which Matrix is which based solely on your tagging and your mucked up directory structure.

[fuxoft]

There is no magic script that will be able to distinguish which Matrix is which based solely on your tagging and your mucked up directory structure.

Actually, on Google Music, my two "Dune" albums (one soundtrack for the film, one soundtrack for the game) are clearly differentiated using "Album Artist". However, I don't see "Album Artist" tag in puddletag at all...