I found this thread elsewhere in the general section of the forum http://mediamonkey.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=33788. It explains how to convert the path for the music in the DB from a mapped drive to the UNC name. I did discover that this is important to do if you are running MM from a network drive. If you don't make this conversion, the network version of MM won't work on any computer which has the network drive mapped to a different letter than the computer from which the music on the network drive was added to the DB. I wish I had found it earlier, because I did it by starting from scratch with a New DB and adding the music that was on my network server by using the network path in the add/rescan dialog window. My way worked, but this is obviously a way to do it without starting with a new DB and losing everything in your old one.

Thanks. I used the MM back in the day on a shared USB drive, but that never included simultaneous access to the db. Sounds like you've got two computer hitting it at the same time without it falling over. I have my library on domian-based DFS with replication to handle mirroring and a fairly rigorous backup scheme off that dfs share. I don't want dfs replication kicking in on the db writes and so will need to host the app separately but that might be as simple as another dfs node that only has one target, which is then also backed up to prevent loss.

I have set up MediaMonkey in a shared network environment with the program, DB, ini and music files on a network drive on my home network. I have access to MM from four computers, but have not tried to use more than two simultaneously. I haven’t run into any problems using two computers simultaneously. My library currently has 13,000+ FLAC files. I have had this running for a few weeks now and haven’t had any issues, however, that doesn’t mean that some might not develop, but so far so good.

Basically, I followed the MediaMonkey Tips and Tricks Wiki on portable media monkey ( http://www.mediamonkey.com/wiki/index.php/Portable_Mediamonkey ) along with other searching on the forum and help from members. Since that was written primarily for a portable external drive and not a network drive, I added a few comments on some issues I came across completing my installation related to shared file access and path naming in the ini files.

The advantage of this install configuration, I think, is that you only have to maintain one executable version of MM, including related plug-ins and scripts. If you just use separate network client versions on each machine, all scripts and plug-ins need to be installed and maintained on each machine. The disadvantage is that this configuration has all users sharing the same ini set-up, not customized for each user. That was fine in my case, because I wanted the same set-up each time I accessed MM. However, there may be a way to keep the executable and DB as shared but the ini’s separate, I haven’t tried to do that.

I started by installing a new version of MM to a folder I named Program Files on my shared network drive named WD-NetCenter. All my music is in a Folder named Music on the WD-NetCenter. The MM DB file was moved to the Program Files folder of the WD-NetCenter. And my old ini file was copied to the \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\MediaMonkey\ folder (the same place as the MediaMonkey.exe file from the install). Here were the steps I took to finally successfully complete the install. My music files were already on the shared drive and were accessible to all computers on my network. If yours aren’t you would need to complete that step as well which might cause you to have to re-find them for the DB.

[i][u][b]Note: As pointed out in Wiki, all path references to the shared network drive should use the UNC network name not a mapped drive letter. For example, \\WD-NetCenter\ not z:\. This eliminates problems if the shared network drive is mapped to different drive letters on different network computers.[/b][/u][/i]


1. Install clean version of MM3 to the folder \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\
2. I copied my old Plugins folder to the \\WD-NewtCenter\Program Files\MediaMonkey\ folder replacing the newly installed folder so that I didn’t have to reinstall any plugins
3. Move the MediaMonkey.db file from it’s old location to the \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\ folder.
4. Move the MediaMonkey.ini file from its default location to \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\MediaMonkey\ folder. (Same folder as the MEdiaMonkey.exe file)
5. I’m not sure if this next step is necessary, but based upon the ini file, I thought it might be. Copy the Winamp folder from the c:\Program Files\ folder to the \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\ folder.
6. Edit the MediaMonkey.ini file as follows:
a. Insert a new line in the [System] section that reads:
DBName=\\WD-NETCENTER\Program Files\MM.db
b. Change the following lines in the [System] section that read:

WinampPath=C:\Program Files\WinAmp\WinAmp.exe

TempDir=C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Temp\

CacheDir=C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\MediaMonkey\VirtualCD\

PreviewDir=C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\MediaMonkey\Previews\

To the following:

WinampPath=\\WD-NETCENTER\Program Files\WinAmp\WinAmp.exe

TempDir=\\WD-NETCENTER\Program Files\Temp\

CacheDir=\\WD-NETCENTER\Program Files\VirtualCD\

PreviewDir=\\WD-NETCENTER\Program Files\Previews\

Without these changes, you get error messages upon start-up on other machines saying the Temp, Virtual CD and Previews folders can’t be set-up unless there is an identical C:\users\<username> folder set-up on all computers on the network.

7. On each new computer, create a short cut to the MediaMonkey.exe file in the \\WD-NetCenter\Program Files\MediaMonkey\ folder.
8. Upon first launch on a new network computer, you may have to reactivate your Gold License for that machine.

While this is currently working fine, I am concerned that the “my computer node” still shows the music as being on the network drive mapping of z: in addition to the network node that gets to the same drive, \WD-NetCenter\. I hope that doesn’t cause a problem in the future.

I’ve gotten a lot of help on this forum so I thought I would take the time to share how I got this network configuration to work. Good Luck! I welcome any comments or suggestions. :-?

Thanks. Yeah, you install it on all client machines and edit the ini file to point to the network resource for the db file, and all the tracks are on a the same network share... I just wasn't clear if the application was able to simultaneously open the db file or would run into locking issues or simultaneous writing issues making it not feasible to run the application on two computers writing to the db at the same time.

Thanks.

Yes it's supposed to work correctly. It's a shrared database meaning the the client computers are modifying the same database simultaneously. Like said in the faq, all tracks files must also be shared to be visible by MM.
BTW MM is not a network application, only the database can be shared. So MM must be installed on every client computer.

any help?

Oops, here's the FAQ I meant.

http://www.mediamonkey.com/support/index.php?_m=knowledgebase&_a=viewarticle&kbarticleid=49

I have read the faq posted and it's referenced materials but what I cannot figure out is if Media Monkey will work as expected when two network clients are accessing the same database on the server at the same time? Will additions to playlists and play counts be merged? Is there a last writer wins model? Or does MM simply not start up when trying to access a db file that is already in use?