Problems with browse menu for classical music

[Chris_S]

Hi - excuse the newbie question.

NB. I did post re: this problem in the tagging section, but I thought I would try here.

I have set up a browse menu for classical music as per the instructions here:

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/Setup_browse_menu_for_classical_music

However, none of my music (in FLAC, and tagged) shows up in the browse menu. When I look in the menu, the message is "No matching songs, albums or artists were found". Can someone who has done this please advise as to what I am doing wrong? I have followed the instructions in the wiki and have double-checked the settings but there are no albums shown.

If I have posted in the wrong place I apologise in advance.

If someone can help I would be most grateful.

Thanks in anticipation.

[erland]

In the future, it's better that you post questions related to third party plugins in the 3rd party plugins sections, at least if you like the developer to find your question.

Anyway, some questions:

1.
Are you using Multi Library plugin ?

2.
If you are using Multi Library plugin, what does the "Number of songs: " value to the right of the library in Extras/Multi Library menu in the web interface say ?

If "Number of songs" is 0, it means that the problem is in the Multi Library plugin library configuration, if it isn't 0 it means that the problem is in the Custom Browse menu configuration.

3.
If "Number of songs" is 0, exactly how are the parameters set in the library configuration ?

4.
If "Number of songs" is not 0, exactly how are the parameters set in the "Custom Browse" menu configuration ?

[Chris_S]

Hi Erland,

Firstly, my apologies for posting in the wrong section.

I am not currently at my home PC, but I can answer the first question. Yes, the Multi-Library plugin is installed and is being used.

I will check back on the other qusetions and post later.

Thanks for your assistance.

[Chris_S]

Hi Erland,

In answer to your other questions,

2. The "Number of Songs" is showing a value of 56.

So, from your information, the problem lies with the "Custom Browse" menu?

There are 4 custom browse menus (The parameters are set in the Custom Browse menu configuration as per the attached file). I hope this is good enough (and what you need) to give you an idea of the setup.

Thanks again for your help and your patience.

[erland]

Does all the menus only have empty parameter values ?
Didn't you configure the values according to the description on the wiki ?

If you used space in the "filename" parameter when configuring the menus, try to redo it but don't use space in the "filename" parameter. I've seen that space in the filename might cause problems.

[Chris_S]

Hi Erland,

I have checked the menus against the parameters listed in the wiki and they all appear to be me to be identical i.e. I believe that I have transferred the parameters in the wiki accurately to the setup parameters of the menus that I have created. Can you see any parameters tha are incorrect?

I have checked and there is no space before the filename in the menu. I assume you mean that there should be no space before, for example, the filename "composersbygenre.cb.values.xml". I can therefore confirm that there is no space before any of the filenames.

Hope that this helps and once again thanks for your assistance.

Happy Christmas!

[erland]

Can you see any parameters tha are incorrect?

Could you post the menu configuration as .jpg files instead ?

I don't have Microsoft Word on my Linux and Mac machines, so I suspect the issue is that it doesn't display the *.doc files correctly in Open Office. On my screen all parameter values were empty in the *.doc files you attached.

[Chris_S]

Hi Erland,

I hope you had a good Christmas.

Apologies for assuming that everyone lives in a "Windows world"! You are also correct - I tried viewing the files in open office and they have no formatting associated with them.

I am posting the parameters as jpg files, as requested.

Once again, thanks for your patience.

[Chris_S]

Remaining two files.

[erland]

As far as I can see, there is nothing wrong with the menu configuration. It will only show tracks that have either:
- WORK and COMPOSER tags
OR
- WORK and COMPOSER and GENRE tags

But I'm guessing this is the case with the songs in your library ?

If it is, the error has to be with the Custom Scan configuration.

Could you try to:
1.
Click the "Scan All" link in Custom Scan settings page and see if it makes any difference after both the "Mixed Tag" and "Custom Tag" scanning modules have finished.

2.
If it doesn't make any difference, try to install the "Database Query" plugin and click on it's query called "Custom Scan Statistics". The interesting part is the statistics counters called:
- Number of songs with mixedtag attributes of type COMPOSER
- Number of songs with mixedtag attributes of type WORK
And also:
- Number of songs with customtag attributes of type WORK

If any of these is 0, there is some problem with the Custom Scan configuration.

If the counters seems to be wrong, look through the Custom Scan configuration of the Custom Tag and Mixed Tag scanning modules. If you can't find anything, you can post your configuration. The issue could also be the file format if you are using something else than MP3 or FLAC, I think custom tags in Custom Scan should work in other file formats but I'm not sure it works in all file formats supported by Squeezebox Server.

3.
If the above counters seems to be correct, you can in "Custom Browse" create a new menu based on the menu template "Custom Scan Info". This menus will make it possible to browse into a track and see if there are any "mixedtag" or "customtag" tags found on one of the tracks that is inside your library. If point 2 above seems correct, I'm guessing that you aren't going to find the WORK or COMPOSER tags on the specific files which is part of the library when you look inside this menu.