Family PC setup

[phit42]

Hallo, hat schon mal jemand ein Setup hinbekommen, bei dem alle lokalen Nutzer eines PC ( Familien PC) MediaMonkey für sich selbst nutzen können, und vielleicht dabei sogar auf die gleiche Datenbank zugreifen, die die Mediendateien aus öffentlichen Ordnern oder Netzwerklaufwerken darstellt?
(Ich habe natürlich viele Aufwände in eine ordentliche DB investiert.)
Wir synchronisieren alle unseren mobilen Geräte mit MM, und so könnte sich jeder seine eigenen Playlist en etc zusammenstellen / zurück syncen etc.
Danke.

[Peke]

Hi,
I have. It is bit more complicated than you put it. In order to help you more I would need few more details on how would rest of family behave:
- Do you manage files eg. Auto-Organize, tags, ...
- Do you wish that they have Read-Only access or full Access of files
- Where files reside eg. PC HDD, NAS, Other PC on Network, each of you have own files and folders and also shared files
- Would you like that Play statistics are shared or each of family member would like to have own

The Simplest answer for current information would be to install MM as portable (migrate MM.DB to portable installation) and then create shortcuts on each of family members Desktop. That would result that you will have shared Library and any everyone could change it.
Regarding Sync each device already have own settings so that are separate, but play counts are shared if synced back.
Regarding Playlist in this case I would suggest that you create simple Playlist for each family member and educate them how to create sub playlist that would be easier to select on sync.
Regarding Sync I would suggest that as they have own playlists they sync only playlist from their folder and deselect other files/playlist so that no additional files are synced to devices.

If you need further help let me know. Hope I cleared at least something.

[phit42]

Hello Peke,
thank you for your help already.
Maybe I try to answer each question so that you get a better picture:
- Do you manage files eg. Auto-Organize, tags, ...
I am the only one adding and organizing files, enhancing meta information etc. I am sometimes "auto-organizing" files as well, meaning using that function manually to rename and move files.
- Where files reside eg. PC HDD, NAS, Other PC on Network, each of you have own files and folders and also shared files
Almost all files are currently in the public folder of the user section of Windows. I am sync'ing the whole folder onto a synology NAS, but only for usage with other media player devices in my network, all organising and sync'ing happens on same family pc. (I would be happy to try a stable mm server/container setup at some point in the future:)
- Do you wish that they have Read-Only access or full Access of files
I am happy with read-only access to files and metadata. Our setup is to sync from here to the devices, my eldest is starting to receive music files from friends on his phone though, so maybe I should rethink that so that they are sync'ed back as well.
- Would you like that Play statistics are shared or each of family member would like to have own
No particular opinion, I guess separate is fine.

Not sure I understand this setup yet:
Regarding Playlist in this case I would suggest that you create simple Playlist for each family member and educate them how to create sub playlist that would be easier to select on sync.
Regarding Sync I would suggest that as they have own playlists they sync only playlist from their folder and deselect other files/playlist so that no additional files are synced to devices.
I am currently using generic playlists like "new music" (containing things like recent "now that's what I call music" just as an example) or topic/genre-related playlists to "load" the mobile devices with their music files, some are auto-playlists, and enhancing that with for example user-specific "favorites" playlist and/or a device-"favorites".