Music Folder: Is it meant to work like this?

[Dodgy Bob 45]

Hey everyone,

 

Again, I'm not sure if its just the way I have the server configured (probably!) or if this is something unusual (to me!) that I have stumbled across. . . .

 

So the way I like to do things with MB3 Server is to have all my media laid out to me via media folders, like so:

 

Then I click on the media folder I want and off I go.

 

With the 'Music' folder however, when I click on it, I do get taken to my music collection but it is displayed by Album Artist and Album Artist only - I cannot change the view...

 

But if I go into my music collection via the pop-out menu on the left, via the menu button in the top-right >> 

 

Then I get the screen I'm after and I get all the options I'm after!

 

Is this how it is meant to be?

 

I just checked now to see if this was only happening with 'Music' folders, but the same does also happen with the TV and Movies folder.

 

Kind regards,

Dodgy Bob

[Beardyname 195]

That's how it's supposed to work, since folders are just showing the layout of the files and not doing anything fancy like trying to show albums or genres.

 

Is there something your don't like about the views? maybe we can help you transition away from the folder view i mean

[Dodgy Bob 45]

That's how it's supposed to work, since folders are just showing the layout of the files and not doing anything fancy like trying to show albums or genres.

 

Is there something your don't like about the views? maybe we can help you transition away from the folder view i mean

 

Hey Beardyname,

 

Yeah maybe!

 

In all honesty, I haven't played around with trying out different views of how the media gets served. I've been trying to keep it as simple and as straight forward as possible, as thats what seems to work best for the wife and kids    And having [insert-media-folder-name-here] in your face and then click -bam!- theres all the media, has been working a treat so far.

 

I guess - for me - if the same entrypoint was applied to clicking on a media folder as what currently happens when clicking on a media folder's name in the menu, that would be tops  

 

Kind regards,

Dodgy Bob

[Beardyname 195]

Well that's exactly how the "views" are supposed to work

 

You can bind a view to do exactly that, that's how i use the views anyway (menubar  --> movies, or homepage --> movies) Gives me the exact same result!

[Dodgy Bob 45]

Well that's exactly how the "views" are supposed to work

 

You can bind a view to do exactly that, that's how i use the views anyway (menubar  --> movies, or homepage --> movies) Gives me the exact same result!

 

!? !? !? I think I'm getting confused and lost now. . . . I think what I need to clarify and confirm first is this:

 

from the menu bar

 

the entry points into my media

 

 

should the very next screen be one and the same and have the one and the same functionality as if I were to not go through the menu entry points but instead just click on one of the poster/thumbnail icons for whichever media folder I wanted to go into?

 

I have things working this way, because my collection is reasonably static. I don't download, so the only time that new movies or TV shows get added to my media is when we buy up movies or TV shows, or birthdays or what have you roll around and we are gifted movies or TV shows. So having the view set to 'Latest' or 'Next Up' or any of those is not ideal for our household and just means extra clicking where there does not need to be any.

 

Perhaps I need to go back into the user account 'My Preferences' and see if there is another way to setup / layout the home screen/page.

 

Am I making any sense? I feel as though my wording is letting me down and that I should do up a video presentation instead!  

 

Thanks for bearing with me folks.

 

Kind regards,

Dodgy Bob

 

 

EDIT = for layout reasons!

Edited March 16, 2015 by Dodgy Bob

[Dodgy Bob 45]

Ok, I've got things to work a little different now...

 

So while logged in as the user, if I go into 'My Preferences', then click on the 'Web Client' tab, under 'Home Page', if I set 'Home Page Section 1:' to "My Views" (instead of Media Folders, which it was originally), then I get into whichever collection exactly the same, whether it be from the menu or from directly clicking on the poster/thumbnail icon for the collection.

 

Before:

 

After:

 

Right. I seem to have myself sorted in that regard now.

 

I guess this begs the question though: What (well, not so much what, but why?) is the difference between 'My Views' and 'Media Folders'? I mean apart from the obvious, what I've just found out. Were the 2 options put in simply so one could have a "plain/regular directory view" of their media and the other is for a directory view, but with features applied, e.g. boxsets, etc..

 

Regards,

Dodgy Bob

[CashMoney 94]

I guess this begs the question though: What (well, not so much what, but why?) is the difference between 'My Views' and 'Media Folders'? I mean apart from the obvious, what I've just found out. Were the 2 options put in simply so one could have a "plain/regular directory view" of their media and the other is for a directory view, but with features applied, e.g. boxsets, etc..

 

That pretty much answers it In my household, if I was to do what you have done, I agree my wife would like it. My kids however would look at me blankly and say "Why bother using MB at all? Now it's just the same as using Windows ...." I get it (but prefer to use MB views rather than folders), my wife would get it, my kids wouldn't. More importantly, MB gets it and provides a choice. You can even set it up differently for different users.

 

I'm not 100% on this, but I believe if you were to go into preferences once more and uncheck the boxes for grouping your media you would get similar to what you have now, the bonus being that you could then group your music to get the additional views you want ... I think. I've not really played with grouping and ungrouping my media, and I don't use separate libraries for same media types (Movies, Kids Movies, etc.) so I could be completely wrong

[Beardyname 195]

CashMoney explained it well

 

Views allows for more customization and is able to do fancy stuff, but some ppl just wanted to have the folders view and the dev's listened

[Dodgy Bob 45]

Hey folks,

 

First up, thanks for bearing with me     It's all turned into a case of not completely understanding certain aspects -and- not knowing what I don't know -and- coming to the table with preconceived notions of how these certain aspects should work.

 

Secondly, please don't hear what I'm not saying and that is that I'm hating on or am disgruntled with MB3 Server or anything that has been implemented into it by the devs. I'm loving it and I am just trying to get my setup working the way I believe is best for me and my own and at times that may lead me to get a little frustrated! Like you said Beardy, its good to have those allowances for extra customisation. After all, we aren't all the same  

 

So this is what I've figured out for myself so far:

 

CashMoney, like I showed, I did try out the 'Home Page' setting on the 'Web Client' tab in 'Preferences' from 'Media Folders' to 'My Views' and both times I chose to not "group" my folders as you can do under Preferences>Display>My Views, as that was what I was doing from the get-go. However, I did try grouping to see what effect it would have. Short story, if you have two (or 3 or 4, etc.) libraries setup in the backend as movies (for example) and chose to group them by checking the related checkboxes via Preferences>Display>My Views, then the backend (or maybe its just the Web Client working wonders!) performs said action and you end up with, instead of 2 folders, just the 1, with all your movies in it. That's cool. For me though, I like to have my media collections split up for (in my mind!) easy navigation, so no grouping for me I'm afraid.

 

To me, I likened this to a secondary pooling of data, if you like. The first is when you setup 'Libraries' in the MB3 Server dashboard; you point physical folders with certain data at virtual folders, that is, your Media Folders. Then to cut down the amount of Media Folders you have, you can apply this secondary pooling by "grouping" via preferences. I can kind-of understand doing this, but I guess, being stuck in my ways and knowing that my media collection is not all that dynamic - rather static really! - and because I would like to lay out the way to go, I prefer ye olde folders with no grouping.

 

So... I have made the switch from 'Media Folders' to 'My Views' and that does give what I was wanting to achieve, but yeah, because I didn't fully understand and I didn't play around with this other view, I had no idea.

 

Yes, the displaying of my media is now working much more how I would like it to  

 

Thanks again folks,

Dodgy Bob.

 

 

PS - Looks like I'm going to need to ask something of the dev's now and see if I can get one other little thing implemented into MB3  

Edited March 17, 2015 by Dodgy Bob