A better use for playlists

[beckfield 90]

Emby's recognition and use of  .m3u playlist files is a major advantage over Plex.  I think they could be better used, though.  Currently, all playlists are accessible via a Playlists 'library' on the Emby home page, or the Playlists view within a library.  But all playlists, no matter where the .m3u files reside, are gathered together in one monolithic page.  If I want to find a Dvorak Symphony to play, I have to sift through the entire list.

 

I think it would be a better, more usable model, if it worked something like this:

 

I have a box set of all 9 Beethoven symphonies.  Since each symphony consists of 4 or 5 tracks, I created a .m3u file for each symphony.  It would be nice if, when viewing the Album Detail page, I had the option of seeing the discrete list of tracks (the current view) or a playlist view, which would look something like this:

 

 

There are cases where a CD may have a 4-track symphony as well as some single-track works.  I attempted to show how this might appear in the mock-up.

 

I can think of 3 ways to go about this. 

• My mock-up includes buttons for 'Disc View' and 'Playlist View.'  The Disc View button reveals the current discrete track list.  The Playlist View button reveals my proposed view.  Emby should remember this selection on a per-album basis.
• There could be a Library-level setting to enable/disable Playlist view for the entire library.
• Since discrete tracks are displayed the same way in either mode, there may be no need for the buttons at all.  If at least one .m3u file exists in the media folder, the UI displays it in the new format.  Would people want/need the option to switch views?  I don't know.

I would also expect that the 'shuffle' function would keep playlisted groupings (like entire symphonies) intact, so Beethoven's 9 intact symphonies would be played in random order, but each symphony is internally not shuffled.

 

What do you think?

 

 

[Luke 37008]

Hi, it's a neat idea although perhaps a little too specialized? Could you do something similar now by creating playlists, and then collections of playlists?

[adamstewiegreen 147]

@@beckfield - I completely agree that better sorting for music is needed in Emby but wouldn't tags be better suited? I'm still getting my box sets into Emby (some are 160 discs) and I can't imagine creating a playlist for every work.

 

I use the classical plugin for Musicbrainz Piccard and it has a tag called "group" which records the title that the movement belongs to, Emby going that route seems easier.

[beckfield 90]

@@beckfield - I completely agree that better sorting for music is needed in Emby but wouldn't tags be better suited? I'm still getting my box sets into Emby (some are 160 discs) and I can't imagine creating a playlist for every work.

 

I use the classical plugin for Musicbrainz Piccard and it has a tag called "group" which records the title that the movement belongs to, Emby going that route seems easier.

 

I hadn't thought of that, and yes, that might be easier.  I'm more concerned about the end effect than how we get there.    I focused on .m3u files because Emby already supports them.  I happened to have created my .m3u files long before I started working with Emby, and was pleasantly surprised when Emby just picked them up from the start.

 

The ID3 specification does have three frames for titling a track.  It should look like this:

 

Currently, I believe Emby only displays TIT2, and ignores the other two (Plex is the same way).  It may well be easier to add support for TIT1 and TIT3 and use that rather than .m3u files. 

Edited March 12, 2019 by beckfield

[beckfield 90]

Hi, it's a neat idea although perhaps a little too specialized? Could you do something similar now by creating playlists, and then collections of playlists?

 

This wouldn't appear on Album Detail page.  At least not currently.

Edited March 12, 2019 by beckfield

[Luke 37008]

If the album detail screen were to show playlists and collections that the album has been added to, then it would. That is something that we're planning on adding.

[beckfield 90]

If the album detail screen were to show playlists and collections that the album has been added to, then it would. That is something that we're planning on adding.

 

That would definitely be useful.  Can playlists or collections be combined in such a way as to allow intact symphonies to be shuffle-played?  That is, 5th symphony played completely, then the 1st, then the 3rd, etc.?

[Luke 37008]

 

 

Can playlists or collections be combined in such a way as to allow intact symphonies to be shuffle-played?

 

Not quite, your best bet would be one large playlist or collection that you could shuffle.

Alternatively you could play one and then queue up the rest.

[beckfield 90]

Not quite, your best bet would be one large playlist or collection that you could shuffle.

 

But that would shuffle the individual tracks as well. I'd like to be able to shuffle the symphonies, but play each symphony unshuffled (Symph. 5 trck 1 2 3 4, Symph. 1 trck 1 2 3 4, Symph. 3 trck 1 2 3 4, etc.)