Change in procedure to rename a track

[James Boyden]

Hi,

The problem described below (last August) seems to have returned with the 22 October update.  

Best,

Jim

With the latest software upgrade, it seems no longer to be possible to open a track to rename by simply clicking on the track in the web interface.  Instead, clicking prompts a blue-line box around the track and to rename, one must go on to click rename (on the dots menu).  This adds a step for no apparent reason--or am I missing something?

[williamsi...@btinternet.com]

Yes… I encountered exactly the same problem a couple of days ago. The shortcut really did make a difference so I hope it can be restored,😐

[Mark Fishman]

Instead of "go[ing] on to click rename" on the dots menu, why not just start there? It seems futile to keep clicking on the name when you know already there's a slightly different place to click that always works.

[Daniel Taylor]

I have B2B Oct 22, 2021 software.  When I click on a track name in the WebUI, it puts a cursor (vertical line) in the name where I clicked and I can rename.  I'd never tried that before, I'd always just clicked on the three dots.  But since I wasn't really sure about some of the things described in this thread, I tried it.

Let me be more clear.  When I click once on the track, nothing appears to happen.  When I click again on the same track, but not too fast, it puts the cursor where I clicked.  If I double click on the track to begin with, it highlights the word I clicked on and it's in edit more.

[Daniel Taylor]

If it's already in edit mode, from editing another track, it only takes one click to position the cursor at the desired point in another track name.

[lesliebr...@gmail.com]

I think when you've been used to one way of doing something you tend to want it to stay the same. If you double click on an artist is the middle window on the UI, or an album in the top RH window a rename box opens to allow the change. Surely the rename track should work the same, as it did prior to the latest update.  Yes you can still edit the info as it now appears as Daniel and Mark point out, but just for consistency could it be corrected. Just me being pernickety in old age. Love this wee machine. Does what I want it to do. Had mine just over 4 and a half years now and it is used everyday. Martin, Paul and Co. keep up the good work. "Let There Be Music"  - Orleans 1975.

[Jim Ericson]

This change is causing real problems for me. I ripped Linda Ronstadt's "Duets" and wanted to add the other singers to the track names. Once I do one or two tracks, the third track disappears entirely, and the same has happened when I start all over. Also, with no "okay" to confirm, it's very easy to accidentally change things. 

Can we please get a fix or a link back to the last version please?. 

[Rik]

I’ve just tried to rename an album which did not show up on the database. I renamed track 1 by clicking the three dots to the right and when I clicked OK in the track renaming window the track disappeared.

[fred.w....@gmail.com]

Just for the interest, what happens if you run a "Scan Disk", does the track re-appear?

Fred.

[PMB]

Hi Rik,

Or refresh the web UI page.

If you remove the track number it will get shifted to the bottom of the track list.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[PMB]

Hi 9app...,

There is a 170 character limit for any title (Album, Artist or Track) - do you think you may have gone over this with the additional singer info?

Paul

Brennan Support.

[Rik]

 I see the track at the end of the list as you say. It was too far down the page earlier. It’s a Schumann work and I wanted the title of the piece in front of each track number and name. Probably I’ve never renamed a work quite the same way. It won’t do, I realise, as the other two pieces will appear in the wrong place.

I see that renaming the other tracks will bump No 1 up to the top and they’ll all end up in the  right order. 

Thanks for replying to a silly problem and to Fred for reminding me that ScanDisc often helps.

[Tim]

Yes, I really miss the ability to rename a track by clicking on the track.  I am undertaking a large track re-naming exercise and it takes a lot longer using the 3 dots.

Tim

[fred.w....@gmail.com]

There is another way to skin this cat :-

I connect my B2 as a NAS and then use my PC "File Explorer" utility to edit directory and file (track) names - this is the easiest way if you want to add a constant string (the title of the piece in front of each track number and name) to all the track names. Just do it for one track then highlight and copy the text you want  then go though all the rest of the tracks and "insert" the string. 

HOWEVER after doing this via the NAS ---- remember to "Scan Disk" s the B2 will not know what you have done otherwise.

Fred

[PMB]

Hi Tim,

If you click on the Track name twice it places a cursor in the existing title and if you click a couple more times it highlights the current title, ready to type or paste the new title in.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[JFBUK]

Hi Paul,

there does still seem to be an intermittent bug , as described by Rick, where a track is deleted from the B2 using the double click edit function.

I captured this in these screenshots from the Web UI and WinSCP viewing the B2 as NAS.

John

Original folder contents

Edit of Web UI

after a few seconds in edit mode of track 3 , track 2 just vanished (deleted) !

Confirmation that it was deleted and that it is not just a display issue

[JFBUK]

Just to add - I did everything via the web UI and did not need to run a Scan Disk.

Interestingly when I restored the deleted track and other one I edited, it places them at the end of the track listing in the b2db file.

I'm guessing a scan disk will re-order them in the correct order in the b2db

John

[Mark Fishman]

Does any of that buggy stuff happen if you use the "three dots" method?

[Tim]

I have experienced inadvertent track deletions a couple of times  in the way which John describes above by using the double click edit function.  So I only use the "three dots" method.  It is why I miss the old method of clicking on the track.

Tim

[JFBUK]

The three dots method has been stable for me but as it spawns a child window and thus, I assume, a different branch in the code this is not that surprising.

John

[Tim]

The three dots method has been stable for me too.  The current alternative method is "buggy" and I now steer clear.

Tim

[Jim Ericson]

Respectfully, this is a real bug that includes track deletion with the added problem of no "confirm" function through an "okay" button. I don't dare touch it now, which is a real setback for me. What is the downside of restoring the old version?

Thanks,

Jim

[Daniel Taylor]

Until the bug is fixed, you can use the NAS capability to edit the file names as you would on any other hard disk.  Just remember that you must run the Scan Disk command after every editing session.

[PMB]

Hi JFBUK,

Thanks for the detailed description of the issue, which I will pass on to Martin B.

It looks like everyone should use the three dots method to rename Tracks until this bug has been identified and fixed.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[PMB]

Hi JFBUK,

I managed to reproduce the bug but it appears to only happen once for the same Album and/or the first time you edit. In my case 02 Track 2 (one of my test Albums) disappeared after highlighting another Track to rename but I couldn't make any other Tracks disappear by repeating the process. Have you observed the same?

Paul

Brennan Support.

[Tim]

Hi Paul

Yes, it was always track 2 which disappeared.  

Tim

[Brennan Support]

Hi Jim

Martin here - apologies I was working on a new bulk track editor and my work got interrupted (global chip shortage) and it looks like I prepared that software release with the work in progress.

I don't want to release new software generally right now but I have created an experimental release - see the Latest Software page on the website - on the left.

This should rectify the track rename facility. From memory it also has fixes for Sonos systems with a lot of speakers and also some more memory for track names for a specific owner with a huge music collection.

Martin

[Jim Ericson]

Thank you Martin! 

The responsiveness of this forum is admirable. Best of the season to you and yours.

-Jim

[PMB]

Hi All,

Just to add that the Experimental Software is for B2B versions only.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[Jim Ericson]

Just to update. I followed Martin's instructions above and successfully installed the "experimental" update. Everything appears back to normal and I'm able to proceed confidently again! 

Happiness restored! 

Thanks for this, it helps me greatly.

[AndyC]

May I add my name to the list of those who had a track disappear when I double-clicked the name rather than using the 3 dots to rename it. The track name was short, as was the album, everything else was stable and I was a bit shocked by it, to be honest. Scan disc confirmed it had gone completely, in an instant, with no warning prompt etc.! I had to delete and reload the whole album, which was a bit irritating.

I now just rename via the 3 dots for safety. This is somewhat slower for bulk renaming e.g. when a brand new album release isn't yet in MusicBrainz eg ELP's excellent Out Of Thios World: Live box set. Yep, that's 54 tracks to rename manually & slowly!

My software is B2B Oct 22 2021, i.e. up to date.

So, is it now safe to rename by double clicking the track or is the 3 dots method safest?

All the best, Andy

[fred.w....@gmail.com]

Hi Andy

You are still running the Brennan software with the "rename" problem. So it is not        --       " So, is it now safe to rename by double clicking the track or is the 3 dots method safest?"

Martin has released a patch that fixes the problem (that can not be installed by the "Web Upgrade" method at the moment) for people who are willing to - to test prior to release.

If you do not want to be part of the testing then you will need to wait fore a "formal" release of the updated software which will be announced (along with a description of what is fixed and or improved) here

Fred

[JFBUK]

Hi Andy,

if you have a computer that can run music tagging/naming software you could save yourself a lot of time when CDs are not recognized by using it.

Lots of help on here if that's a route you want to pursue.

John

[Jim Ericson]

One new development (or coincidence?) since installing the "experimental" file is that the aux input has stopped working altogether.  HDD playback is unaffected.   I've not yet migrated back to the 10/22 version to test for sure, but please forward this to be sure it's tested in the next release.  

I have made a habit of ripping obscure albums directly to my B2 via my analog stereo. I've loved the results and convenience of having a digitized track (even if the sound contour is changed slightly) when I don't have it in me to take down and cue a particular song on LP. I'm aware I can rip LPs to computer with an interface and a proper phono preamp, but I prefer the method I've used to date.  Ironically, it's the edit bug that caused the most headaches in my LP ripping. 

Thanks again for this great responsive forum. 

Regards,

Jim

[JFBUK]

Hi Jim,

when you say not working can you provide more detail ?

When you switch to Aux is the B2 re-booting as expected ?

John

[William Ellison]

Hi Forum,

An interesting conversation, this, and relevant to me as a B2 novice (or does three weeks' ownership make me a veteran?) For info, on the Double-click vs Three-dot-menu methods of renaming, I also lost tracks using the double-click method and am now very wary of doing so any more.

One post early on in this conversation that made me sit up a bit was Paul's information (13 December) about the  "170 character limit for any title (Album, Artist or Track)". If only I had known about that three weeks ago! I had seen several of my tracks - and a few albums - suddenly disappear from view while editing their names, and I eventually found out the reason by accident (substituting "and" for "&", or something similar), so it's useful to see it confirmed by Paul.

Should I have known about the character limit from published information?  I don't remember seeing anything, but I'm sure there's a lot of info on the website that I haven't yet read.

Although 170 characters sounds quite generous, from my point of view it can be miserly, particularly for albums - my collection of CDs is mostly classical, and there are many classical albums where it's difficult to list all the information I want to include (e.g. Composer(s), Titles of compositions, names of soloists, conductors, orchestras, etc) without falling foul of the character limit. (An example - please skip this if you're already bored - Shostakovich : Concerto No.1 for piano, string orchestra and trumpet, names of two soloists: Concerto No.2 for piano and orchestra, name of a different soloist; Poulenc: Concerto for 2 pianos and orchestra, names of two more soloists, name of conductor, name of orchestra).

One other aspect of the naming procedure that I find  disappointing is the disappearance of non-alpha-numeric characters from my carefully-crafted album re-name as soon as I hit the OK button: examples are question marks, asterisks and quotation marks, all of which I frequently want to use. It seems odd that they appear as expected as they are typed into the rename panel, but then vanish when the re-name is confirmed.

Comments on either of these whinges would be very welcome. Keep up the good work!

Bill

[Mark Fishman]

Bill:

in no particular order (so don't attach any importance to sequence...):

 -- in most operating systems, Linux -- which is what the B2 runs "under the hood" -- among them, some characters have "special" meaning, i.e., they aren't just ordinary text. Asterisks are "wildcards": they can be used to mean "it's OK to substitute any number or any characters in this spot". Question marks are also wildcards, but for single-character substitutions. Quotation marks, of the typewriter variety, can be used to mean "what's inside these marks is all one thing, so don't break it up into multiple bits wherever there's a blank space"; the single back-quote -- on my keyboard it shares a key with the tilde (~) character -- can mean "evaluate the following expression and give me back the result for the prior command to operate on". And so on for some other special characters, including both forward and backslashes. That's why, whether we're talking Windows, macOS, Linux, or something else, there are characters that you shouldn't try to put in filenames.

 -- My collection is also mostly classical. As bad as the usual tagging systems are -- they were primarily designed around music where the basic unit is the "song" -- having to cope with a rigid three-level hierarchy nominally referred to as artist > album > track is often worse. The truth is that consistency, and some clever use of playlists, are your fri3ends. You don't have to insist that an "album", for example, is always the same as the physical CD that was issued with multiple works. You don't have to insist that an "artist" must refer to the performers. And you don't always have to list everyone, no matter how minor, if you're unlikely to search for them.

My approach has been to use last names only, where that is unlikely to lead to confusion. For example, Klemperer, Leinsdorf, Bernstein, Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, all have "most likely" referents. If I really mean Elmer Bernstein (film composer) instead of Leonard, I can put E or Elmer; if I really mean Leopold Mozart instead of Wolfgang I can put L. And so on.

I also, except in cases of multiple short, related works, such as a disc of Rossini overtures, have decided that an "album" really means a complete classical work. Rachmaninoff's 2nd piano concerto is an album, even if it came in a box with the other 3 concerti and the cantata "The Bells".

If I have multiple recordings of a work, say, Beethoven symphonies conducted by Szell, Leinsdorf, Klemperer, Karajan, Furtwangler, Toscanini, I know I can search for "Beethoven" regardless of where I put that, but I might want to know, while listening to an album (in this case a particular symphony), who the conductor is. So (for example), "artist" might be Karajan, Philharmonia Orchestra; "album" might be (Beethoven) Symphony 1 in C major Op21 (Karajan, Philharmonia); and the tracks don't need any more than a number and a tempo indication. [NB: in this particular example, I have to put a short form of the orchestra in the work title because Karajan also recorded Beethoven symphonies with the Berlin Philharmonic, 3 times; for those I might put Berlin Phil 1963, or 1977.] I am unlikely to be searching for Jon Vickers, though, so I don't have to list him for every opera in which he has a role -- if I want Peter Grimes, I'd be looking for the Colin Davis recording.

Daniel, on this forum, uses playlists to gather his collection by genre. For some things I have been known to put a genre in front of an artist if (s)he does some  things that are clearly of a seasonal nature. I have a whole bunch of artist entries that start with {Xmas}, and some of those artists also show up elsewhere without the genre designation because those specific albums aren't Christmas music.

Abbreviations are your friend. The internet, specifically online database searches, are your friend. You don't have to put every detail in every field.

If this helps, great. If not, ignore me. :)

[PMB]

Hi 9app...,

I have just tried Aux In mode with Dec 15 2021 (experimental) version software and it appears to work OK, so please check your software version and Aux In again.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[William Ellison]

Thanks Mark for a swift and comprehensive response - I will digest it and perhaps come back to you in due course. Bill.

[Jim Ericson]

Hi Paul,

I've been a long time absent due to family issues and just getting back to speed. I believe the subsequent update left everything working, including aux. Will dive back in soon and keep you posted.

Thanks,

\Jim

[PMB]

Hi Jim,

Thanks for the update.

Paul

Brennan Support.