Switching to MM4 from iTunes+Traktor on MacBook Pro

[dennisparrott]

Hello everybody...

I have hit frustration max w/ the macOS/iOS world so I am switching back to Windows after 10+ years.

I've been using iTunes (since there isn't any other viable choice...) and using the iTunes XML file to link to Traktor. My library has grown to 102K+ entries. It is slow, molasses-in-January-during-a-deep-freeze slow.

I have experimented with MM4 Gold running on Win7 under Parallels but could not get it to sync to my devices. <frown>

NOW... here is the plan+questions I need to settle before I start this migration...

My plan is to migrate my library in small batches to a Windows 10 desktop I bought and put them into MM4 Gold. I plan to put the music files onto a Synology NAS and use MM4 Gold to catalog them. (The small batch migration is so that I can review the stuff I am moving, make rational decisions about what to keep, what to toss, etc. There is something of a mess in there...)

Q: is this do-able? what problems will I face?

With a 102K+ files, there are a lot of different "chunks" of stuff in there; classic rock, punk, jazz, electronica, classical, and on and on... There is an entire chunk with nothing but DJ mixes I've recorded and DJ edits.

My overall plan is to use MM4 collections to subdivide these things. I've seen in other posts how you create criteria that will drive visibility of a particular entry in a collection. This sounds pretty awesome, but...

Q: can a MM4 item in the catalog belong to more than one collection?

This is pretty important. I'd like to be able to create collections of DJ-only stuff that I will export to Traktor.

So now I come to the final part of this transition: the link to Traktor.

Since the main collection will be housed on a desktop (where I will *FINALLY* have a decent backup solution in place... simply copying your music files to a new external every X months [years?] is NOT a backup solution...) I will need to move a portion of the library onto a large-ish USB thumb drive every so often.

Traktor will read an iTunes XML file. If I had a collection of DJ-only music my thought would be to copy that music plus an iTunes XML file onto the external drive and take that to the laptop I will be using to DJ.

Q: can I export iTunes XML for just a collection or is this only available for the entire library? any good suggestions on how to go about this?

In my research so far, I have seen that there is some support for scripting around MM4. It appears that some stuff has been done using Visual Basic [VBA?]. As someone who has written code since the days of FORTRAN (yes, I am _old_. Made $$ writing FORTRAN-IV...) I am interested in the choices I have in the scripting arena.

Q: what sorts of scripting options are supported? (...or maybe just tolerated?)

MediaMonkey seems to have a great rep when it comes to cataloging a music library. Since I own MM4 Gold, my library is going to migrate to MM4 first. (That is, MM4 gets first crack at being the solution...) It is a very large library and I do worry about being able to get my work done quickly (iTunes was frustrating because it had gotten very slow to do simple things).

Q: what are people's experiences with large libraries (100K+ entries)? any suggestions how I should organize things, work with things to maximize performance?

Any other tips, tricks, OMG-do-not-ever-do-this notes, and the like would be appreciated!

Thanks in advance for whatever you all have to offer on this. I really appreciate your help. I need to get the plan straight before I just charge into this.

Thanks!

Dennis

[Lowlander]

Your biggest issue is that iTunes doesn't save all data to the actual files. Which means you may miss some data when importing into other programs. If you had iTunes on the same PC as MediaMonkey some extra data could be retrieved directly from iTunes.

As far as Scripting goes, the biggest challenge will be that MediaMonkey 5 will be different and thus any MediaMonkey 4 script will require conversion (there is a tool) and may require some rewriting. Documentation for MediaMonkey 4 scripting is here: http://www.mediamonkey.com/wiki/index.php/Scripting I don't know about the iTunes XML format, but generally an XML format are relatively easy (there are various report style scripts available).

Collections are Criteria based in MediaMonkey. Thus if a file matches the Criteria it will be included, so a file could be in none, 1, any or all Collections.

You may need to run File > Maintain Library with complete optimization occasionally to improve performance. The biggest slow-down is complex AutoPlaylists in MediaMonkey, otherwise it behaves well with large Libraries. I'd suggest disabling Infer File Properties (Tools > Options > Library) as it can result in tagging issues on import (you can manually use Tools > Auto-Tag from Filename which leaves you in control).

[dennisparrott]

@Lowlander: Thanks for the quick reply!

As for MM4 not saving all of the data that iTunes holds without a copy of iTunes running on that machine... hmmm. I might be willing to make the sacrifice since my library is large and therefore __MUST__ have a lot of cruft that moving things manually might allow me to get rid of... Clearly it will be a lengthy and tedious operation.

What is the buzz on when MM5 will be released? If we're talking May or June, maybe I would wait until MM5 drops before starting this exercise.

Your answer on collections is absolutely what I wanted to hear. I should be able to segment my library the way I need to so I can support my DJing and my listening.

I will pay attention to that performance tip at the end.

I did a search and see that MM5 will use Javascript as its script language?!?! Is this _accurate_? (I used to hack on JS in my last job and am in the process of relearning JS from the ground up... This would make my day!)

Thanks again!

Dennis

[Lowlander]

It's iTunes not saving all data to the file, unlike most media software out there. 2 big ones are Artwork and Rating. (only an issue of iTunes was used to tag the files).

MediaMonkey 5 Addon development: http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... 27&t=81285 As far as a release date, I feel it's still ways of, but: http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... +5#p443491

[Peke]

Hi,
A few more answers.

I have personally used Traktor and was successfully moved complete sets to Traktor by simply creating Auto-Playlists and importing them in Traktor. Also I use Mixed In Key for harmonic mixing whose support for initial key is available in MM5 (Finally) that make my day a lot easier.

Separating collections are easy, although I do not see a need for it as Auto-Playlists can easily simulate collections (and parameters I need) Only difference are already in MMW by recognizing/assigning types.

Scripting is almost limitless in MMW and in MM5 sky would only be a limit.

I have 120k+ Library and have no issues at all, MM5 have Auto Library Backups so you can easily undo your mistakes, along with complete Library rebuild

For Traktor you do not need XML, just only MMW Playlist export where a simple export of playlist (in my case these were complete sets) can make miracles. Also Drag and Drop From MMW to Traktor works. MMW saves all tags in files so you do not worry.

Keep us posted on what you tried and what you find missing or not working as you expected so that we can improve.

Finally all my music is located on QNAP NAS that uses Static LAN IP address an dis scanned like that so I do not trust using NetBios and DHCP servers along with MS design of LAN Master Browser but directly access QNAP over IP.

[dennisparrott]

@Pavle -- !!! Thanks for the extra info...

Can you clarify something? I understand MM4 and MM5 are the two major versions of MediaMonkey. But I don't understand what MMW means...

re: exporting to Traktor... THANK YOU!! for that information about just importing playlists. Being able to completely ditch iTunes XML means Traktor will start up MUCH MUCH FASTER... (...waiting to expand the iTunes part of the Traktor browser tree was painful. I had to fire up the laptop, plug in my external drive, run Traktor and then w...a....i.....t....... ...oh well, I would have time to finish wiring the speakers, amps, etc.)

Your note about maybe not needing collections gives me some food for thought. What you suggest would be a bit simpler to implement.

Since my plan calls for moving the main collection to a new desktop machine, I am thinking that I could use a very large USB stick (128Gb - 256Gb) as the "Traktor drive". Build the playlists in MM4 and then export the results to my "Traktor drive" USB stick. This would really simplify things _AND_ it would result in a system where losing the external drive my music sits on at a gig would not result in shutting me down permanently. I could just rebuild the key...might lose the last bunch of track prep (beatgrids, loops, cuepoints) if I failed to back it up but I would not lose all of my music since it would be in my home. THANKS! Pavle -- this sounds much simpler and much faster and SAFER.

That said, one major pain point I have in iTunes right now is virtually any search is liable to return 1 to God-knows-how-many Christmas themed songs... (I have 6,000+ Christmas songs...) So this leads to a question: if I segregated my music into two collections, Christmas songs and NOT-Christmas songs would a search in one collection mean that songs from the other would not show up? (If so, it would allow me to craft lists without purging Christmas songs when prepping for DJ work...)

Just so that everyone is clear, I won't be starting this conversion until later in April. And YES I will share the results of my work. (I want to be a "good" member of the community and posting your results is a valuable way of enriching the collective hive mind...)

The really good news is that I went to look up my license info and found that I bought a Lifetime license... This removes one possible decision point. I can settle the details of my new office (clean, paint, re-decorate, etc.) and start moving the collection to MM4 Gold on that refurb desktop I bought without worrying about MM5's release date.

I really want to thank you and Lowlander for the info...

One thing I will say is that I have looked at some of the addons and things about using MM4 on the web and found some of the writeups a little under-developed (they assume you know more than you actually do know -- kind of where I am right now...). In my last job before retiring, I often had to write up computer procedures for people to follow and I developed a facility for documenting stuff with screen shots (the Win7/10 screen shot tool is WAY BETTER than the one in macOS...). You can count on any docs I write to come complete with pictures and arrows and annotations... <grin>

[Lowlander]

MMW = MediaMonkey for Windows (ie. MM4 & MM5). MM5 is still in development.

Collections can be set to Filter out certain files (like Genre = Christmas) and the Search scope can be limited to the Collection you're in.

[Peke]

Hi,
You can use External Drive as Portable Device in MMW and have your MMW playlists/sets exported as is.

I can help you with that if needed just send me PM and we can figure out how to do that.

I was active DJ for more than 12 years, worked in clubs, festivals, private parties and even had my own radio station show, online radio station, and also produced remixed tracks for artists all way back from 1989 so I know and (almost) tested many known generations of DJ hardware from turntables, samplers, CDJs Mixers, Trackers, ...

When I found MMW in 2001 my world changed as I found out that things can be simple but powerful.

You are not the first one asking us for help. When I help you can write docs if you want and you should find many people thank you for that.