Updated Tags MMW, Best Practice For MMA Update?

[Chep]

I updated some tags on MMW. In my experience, unless I'm doing something wrong, or have something set a certain way, when I then Sync with MMA, MMA will basically say, “looks good, no changes,” and leave the song file on my phone as it was, with the oldererer tag intact. My expectation is that MMW -> MMA would overwrite the song file on the phone resulting in an updated phone tag. Right now, the only way I can update the phone version of the song is to delete the song from the phone completely and have MMW -> MMA copy over the newererer desktop version of the song. Something in the back of my mind keeps telling me there has to be a different, more elegant way other than manually removing out of date tagged files on my phone first.

What do others do under these circumstances?

Thanks,

[Lowlander]

There is an option to Force files to resync whenever the source file has changed.

[Chep]

Thank you for that, but I must be doing something wrong because syncing after enabling that option in MMW didn't update the tags of the songs on my phone (the ones I could remember altering). The Modified dates in my phone file explorer are still old for those files and if I zip them up and bring them back to the desktop and unzip them (to keep dates from changing due to downloading), the dates are still old and the tags (track numbers in this case) are still the old values.

Now .. that said .. something must have reset things on my phone recently during an OS update because when I launched MMA the other day I got a Welcome / permissions screen. Once past it appeared that everything was as I had left it, playlists were there, etc, but when I synced I noticed that nothing under sync settings was checked, so even the _Recently Played didn't update despite having listened to a bunch of songs (“Everything is in sync”). I re-checked the boxes in Sync settings for what I wanted synced and syncing once again updated playlist contents. So at least that's working.

Is it possible that there's something else that was reset other than the Force Files checkbox that's keeping MMW -> MMA from updating phone files if changed on the desktop / server?

Thanks,

[Chep]

(MMW is 2024.0.0.3082, MMA is 2.0.4.1230)

[Lowlander]

Can you please retry with the latest MediaMonkey 2024.1 release?

[Chep]

Thank you, I updated MMW to 2024.1.03108 and ran another sync, but still no improvement.

Wonder if Force Files is really working - the option makes a point of saying it's “slower”, but I see no speed difference, as if it's not really doing the deep dive I'm expecting it to do.

(side note, is there a way in MMA to view track numbers? It doesn't seem to be displayed when I select Properties, which is why I pulled the phone files back to Windows to view modified dates and track numbers via the Windows properties which showed them to still be old ... viewing on MMA would eliminate a step or two here)

Thanks,

[Lowlander]

The reset may have thrown a wrench in there somewhere. Are you sure the files are selected to be Synced? Presumably you're doing a wi-fi Sync?

Can you try changing a tag that is seen by MMA and the Sync again? Does MMA see the change?

[Chep]

Are you sure the files are selected to be Synced?

What exactly determines if files are selected to be Synced?

Presumably you're doing a wi-fi Sync?

I am, yes.

Can you try changing a tag that is seen by MMA and the Sync again?

Just to make sure I’m getting this experiment correct, I’m to change a tag of a song in MMW and, using MMA sync (which is set up with my MMW), run the sync?

If yes, I think I’ll change a tag property that’s a lot more obvious than the track numbers, something like the name.

Sorry to be so detaily here.

[Lowlander]

What exactly determines if files are selected to be Synced?

The Sync list.

Yes, changing something like Title would do the trick. You should see the change in MMA after Sync.

[Chep]

Thanks - yes, my Sync List (Library -> Device) is set to sync Music, Classical Music, Podcasts, and Playlists. Great.

But something is definitely wackadoodle somewhere. In MMW I changed the titles of two songs, Tracks #2 and #3. Track #2 I added characters. Track #3 I changed the case. I then synced via MMA - I did see the names of the two songs flash by. “Oh good,” I thought. But when I browsed for them with a file explorer, I found that those two song files had disappeared from the directory. The songs now went Track #1 .. and then Track #4, #5, etc... I then ran a search for the track names and nothing came up. I know search is working because search is finding other unrelated songs that have the same word in the title. Thinking that maybe the “where songs are stored” directory was changed, I backed out and searched the phone’s internal memory ... no dice ... but same results suggesting that the search was going through both the internal and SD card in the first place. Songs with the same keyword on the SD card showed up in the results even when starting the search from the internal root.

Feel like I've done something dumb somewhere without knowing what and my MM experience has gone from Great to Bizarro World. So sorry.

[Lowlander]

Can MMA find them?

[Chep]

Honestly, I didn't even think to try that assuming that if there was no file in the directory that MMA would not be able to play it BUT.... not only are the songs listed in MMA, their titles reflect the changes made, and they play (instead of being broken links).

When I look at their properties for Path they now differ from the other song files (I show untouched Track #12 here)

When I file explorer to Android.Data.Com.ventismedia...... it appears empty despite Show Hidden Files being checked but my guess is the two changed files are “in” there somewhere, like light entering a black hole.

Now I have to figure out why the re-route.

Chep

File Property Paths Screen Capture
https://imgur.com/a/mBLX4DH

[Chep]

Sync started syncing to a folder outside the folder I want my music in on my phone's SD card. Set long ago, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to say “Here. This is the ONLY place I want my server library copied/synced to on the phone.”

Lost, I gave up and uninstalled / reinstalled MMA just to get back to square one thinking there'd be a “Where?” prompt .. and while there were Grant Folder Permission popups, I left the setup wizard even more confused since it was putting generic “Music” and “Video” folders out there as well, which I do not want. When MMA said that folders I was trash-canning on the phone would be replicated because they'd been specified in MMW, I tried to uncheck those folders in the sync profile for the SD card in MMW only to get Application Error popups as MMW threw exceptions and prompted restarts. I'm a mess and I'm spiraling.

Can someone direct me to the step-by-step process for telling MMW? MMA? precisely where I want my library copied to on my SD card?

(I promise I tried to solve this myself but hit a lot of walls including “Search found 0 matches: how specify phone destination folder” when I looked for similar posts)

[Chep]

And going with the settings I set up with the reinstall has music now being synced to a “Music” folder, removed from the specified folder my files had already existed in - Destination File Locations has my specified folder right alongside “xxxx-xxxx:Music” and “xxxx-xxxx:Video”. I stopped that sync.

[Lowlander]

It depends on the Android version if you have actual control over where files are Synced.