Wrong order of tracks after sync

[Bastiaan]

I have some 400Gb sync'd from MMW to MMA. Works mostly very good. I have an issue with my 'Best' collections (Alternative, Pop& Rock, Symphonic, Classical, etc.). These collections are identified by Album name and only contain tracks without track#. The file names all start with the artist name. The album artist is always 'Various Artists' in order to create one album for each 'Best' collection.
After the initial sync everything is perfectly OK: the tracks within the albums are sorted on Artist name. But when I add new songs to a collection/album and then do a sync, these new songs will always appear as last tracks in the albums (so: the track list within the albums becomes partly unsorted). I also use Bubbleupn and there these new songs also appear at the end of the albums. I understand that the information for the album listings are derived from the Android Media Storage, so during syncing it seems that MMA creates an event that adds songs without track# at the end of the albums and not in alphabetically order of the Artist.
I have found a workaround: I delete the specific album with Google files (MMA will remove the album automatically). Then I re-sync the complete album again, and everything is alphabetically again on Artist. But some collections are over 300 songs (more and more in 24/96), so that takes more and more time with wifi.

(latest MMA/MMW builds, phone on Android 14, tablet on Android 11)

[rusty]

Hi Bastian,

So you're saying that these 'Best of' albums aren't actually official albums with Track #'s but rather that you're labelling them as 'Best' for your own management purposes and that's why there are not track #'s assigned?

-Rusty

[Bastiaan]

Yes, that is correct.

I regularly add new tracks to my personal best albums. If I use track#'s then it is difficult inserting new tracks.
Without track# they appear in MMA sorted on Artist name. In my 'Best classical music' collection/album I have not filled in the Artist name and these tracks are displayed/sorted by Title (with Unknown Artist). Which is fine with me, because I always start the Title with the composer name.

In both situations new tracks will always be sorted/displayed at the end after a sync.

[rusty]

In the intermediate term, we plan on adding sorting functionality to various views that would address this issue.

In the short term, your best bet would be to use AutoPlaylists in MMW to achieve the same objective.
e.g. For Best of 'The Beatles': create an AutoPlaylist 'Best of the Beatles' where Artist=The Beatles and rating>=4* sorted by Title (ascending).

By taking this approach, playlists will automatically be updated as your rate tracks, and they'll play according to whatever order you specify. Would that work for you?

-Rusty

[Bastiaan]

Nice to hear about the sorting option in the intermediate term. I had never before used Autoplaylist, but I've just tried it for the first time. Although it looks very nice, I don't think it provides a short term solution for me. I will resort to my own workaround (first delete the complete album on my phone, and then do the re-sync). My largest collection/compilation is 17 Gb. Takes some time to re-sync over wifi, but since it's a process that needs no human intervention it's Ok with me for the time being.
Thanks for your quick response!