itunes is STILL a POS

tentoze

Twangophile
After moving my music folders around some on the remote computer I use for music storage etc., itunes on my main computer went nuts, and created a lot of duplicate song entries. I got frustrated enough with it yesterday, I deleted the whole app and reinstalled it. Well, after over 20 HOURS of grinding to load the library and pull down album artwork, it's done the same damned thing again- duplicates for maybe 70% of the song entries- one of the entries has a valid path to the song, one (the one with the exclamation point, see pic) gives error message saying it can't find the song.

I can't find a command that will let me globally delete the non-functional dupes, and I will have to be committed to the asylum if I have to do them one at a time. Anyone know a way to do this?
 

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About the only way, if you know the file structure, would be to write a small BASIC program to walk through the file and delete any entry with the exclamation mark. I remember doing this for an address file that someone doing the entries had the caps lock key on, was fun for names like McCowan or O'Rielly.
 
make sure the box that says "copy files to itunes music folder when adding to library", is unchecked. otherwise, it will copy everything you move into your library. If you already have the folders organized in the place where your library exists, it will create duplicates. this could also explain why it's taking so long.

Also if your folders are already organized to your liking, you want to uncheck the box that says "keep itunes music folder organized" so it doesn't reorganize everything.

not sure if this is helpful, I can't quite explain why it can't find the dupes, but I've had similar trouble reorganizing and/or rebuilding my library. these two settings can make a huge mess if they're not chosen appropriately first.

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I prefer Media monkey myself. It plays flac files, and you can clear, maintain, or remove duplicates from you library.
 
make sure the box that says "copy files to itunes music folder when adding to library", is unchecked. otherwise, it will copy everything you move into your library. If you already have the folders organized in the place where your library exists, it will create duplicates. this could also explain why it's taking so long.

Also if your folders are already organized to your liking, you want to uncheck the box that says "keep itunes music folder organized" so it doesn't reorganize everything.

not sure if this is helpful, I can't quite explain why it can't find the dupes, but I've had similar trouble reorganizing and/or rebuilding my library. these two settings can make a huge mess if they're not chosen appropriately first.

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I don't let it copy files. It's a bit late for unchecking the keep organized box- I'm damned if I'm going to go through another 20 hours of this crap with a fresh install.
 
I prefer Media monkey myself. It plays flac files, and you can clear, maintain, or remove duplicates from you library.

I don't actually use itunes for anything but updating the S/W on my ipod. But since it has to be on the computer at all, I'd like for it to at least reflect reality as far as the library is concerned.
 
Sympathy for you here. I remember my old installation of iTunes doing that exact same thing. Drove me near-bonkers, too, deleting all the extra posts... only to have it start doing the whole duplicating thing all over again. I didn't know about those settings then.

I've since replaced the hard disk and downloaded a newer iTunes, which hasn't been used much. So far, no problems, but after reading this I'm definitely going to double-check those settings. That duplicating stuff was a nightmare!

I'd like to find a better program that would do flac files on a PC, anyway, so before I get too much music in this "new" computer, I'll research and get something else, anyway.
 
Amen. I will probably never run itunes again, and may never get an ipod, at least not until they run FLAC files natively.

For me it is EAC Secure Mode > FLAC > Foobar2000. Using MuvunderCover to add album art tags, and Allway Sync to back up.

There's not much doubt that ipods are the nicest portable players available. Since I am boycotting Apple, that is posing a problem for me. I had a lot of problems trying to install different firmware on a Sansa portable player so it would play FLACs. Never could get it to work right. So due to my stubbornness, I'm still without a portable to play my FLACs...
 
Well, I bit the bullet- think I found the library files,deleted them, unchecked the manage files box, and am adding my music files back in. With some luck, this will only take the 4 hours, and not the extra 20 to find the album art again, since I left that file alone. Who knows. I'd like to have Steve Jobs' head on a pole in my front yard right about now.
 
As much as I've liked Apple software historically, I am not a fan of iTunes. IMO, it's the most non-intuitive software they've ever produced, and that's my perspective from running it on a Mac. I'd hate to think of what it's like ported for other systems.
 
Did you try:

List View File > Show Duplicates View> View Options> check "Date Added" (hopefully to further sort the duplicates by date added in order to allow you to delete the duplicates in large groups by selecting multiple rows much in the same way as you would delete multiple rows in Excel)

The missing links to the music and artwork can be corrected by selecting "Consolidate Library" in the file menu - after you have deleted the duplicates.

Bear with me if I am stating something that you already know. I have only recently spent a good bit of time with iTunes working with the same problem(and others!) that you have and am still learning. I still have a long way to go before pretending to be proficient with it. Hopefully others that are more knowledgeable than I am will chime in and either verify or correct what I mentioned before you make things worse.

iTunes could be so much better if they would only attempt to make it more user friendly for those that want to use it for more than simply downloading MP3s from the iTunes store to play on their iPod. I have to believe that some very useful features that are lacking in iTunes are missing intentionally. That open the door for competitors but makes it a PITA for iTunes customers.
 
Did you try:

List View File > Show Duplicates View> View Options> check "Date Added" (hopefully to further sort the duplicates by date added in order to allow you to delete the duplicates in large groups by selecting multiple rows much in the same way as you would delete multiple rows in Excel)

No, I didn't try that, or even find it as an option- with any luck, rebuilding the library and telling itunes to keep its grubby paws off managing it will eliminate the issue.

The missing links to the music and artwork can be corrected by selecting "Consolidate Library" in the file menu - after you have deleted the duplicates.

If I'm not mistaken, if you elect to do that, itunes will copy every file into its own directory structure, leaving the same files in 2 different places, and I certainly don't want that- wouldn't have room on this HD even if I wanted to do that.
 
Amen. I will probably never run itunes again, and may never get an ipod, at least not until they run FLAC files natively.

With the older ones you can run Rockbox to play FLAC, but not the newer generations, at least until someone gets around to coding it :(
 
If I'm not mistaken, if you elect to do that, itunes will copy every file into its own directory structure, leaving the same files in 2 different places, and I certainly don't want that- wouldn't have room on this HD even if I wanted to do that.
I don't THINK that it does that. I do think that the "Consolidate Library" function just builds an index in the iTunes folder so that iTunes knows where the music files and the art files (and who knows what else) are located so that they all work together properly in itunes.

Again, I am just a novice at all this so please don't take what I mentioned as gospel.
 
How are you making out there Mr. Toze?

I've decided that Steve Jobs can take this shitty piece of software and jam it up his grommet. Sideways. Wrapped in razor wire. The only reason I'll keep it on one computer is to update the firmware in my ipod. I'll do everything else from winamp.
 
I feel your pain. I'm a dedicated iTunes user.

It's too late for me. I'm fully dependent on iTunes flags for "compilation" and "disc number". There's no going back now, with a hard drive full of MP3s already encoded using these fields. Doing away with them now would be an organizational disaster.

Is there any way to get Foobar or another program to recognize these iTunes-specific fields?
 
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