"Various Artists" ripping question

[mbeedub]

I organise my library with directories for each artist and then within those subdirectories for each album.

This works fine when the album is by a single artist but for various artists (i.e compliations) I have a "Various Artists" folder with the albums listed under that.

This method works well for me as it allows me to keep albums as physical entities on the file system.

I've just switched to dMC and it seems to take a complilation CD (where each of the tracks lists a different artist) and create a folder for each of those and then puts a folder in for the album with the one or two tracks for the artist - thus physically splitting the album up all over the place.

I've tried playing with the file creation settings but can't seem to get it to do what I want.

Is it possible to have dMC create a single folder for the album as I've done with previous converters?

Cheers

[ChristinaS]

It's defined in how you set the file naming convention - if you use \ anywhere that makes a folder at that point.

Look in dMC Audio CD Input > Options > File Creation > Set and adjust the file name mask to remove the slashes you don't want to have.

[Spoon]

There will be some automation for R12 (being written), there will be profiles in cd input, and a compilation profile will autoselect if is a various artists cd.

[mbeedub]

Thanks - as I understand it then. If I have a CD with multiple artists, at the moment I have to go in and manual reconfigure the file naming convention?

Then set it back for single artist CDs?

Yes it would be great to automate this somehow as is done in other converters.

For example how about allowing for an "Album Artist" and creating a folder based on that as well as allowing "Track Artist" and creating folders based on that (which seems to be the way it is currently done). All this would mean (in terms of the user interface at least] would be a some new filename elements [Album Artist] and [Track Artist] and an Album field on the main window... or something like that...

Cheers

[dbample]

Thanks - as I understand it then. If I have a CD with multiple artists, at the moment I have to go in and manual reconfigure the file naming convention?

Then set it back for single artist CDs?

Yes it would be great to automate this somehow as is done in other converters.

For example how about allowing for an "Album Artist" and creating a folder based on that as well as allowing "Track Artist" and creating folders based on that (which seems to be the way it is currently done). All this would mean (in terms of the user interface at least] would be a some new filename elements [Album Artist] and [Track Artist] and an Album field on the main window... or something like that...

Cheers

You have so much flexibility the way things are right now. Did you follow Christina's advice to go to dMC Audio CD Input --> Options --> File Creation --> Set?

Look at the resulting little window. You have "Filename Elements" you can insert to make up your own pattern for organizing how dMC saves your ripped files. Below that you also have pre-defined combinations (presets). All you have to do manually, until Spoon automates it even more, is to double-click "[artist] - [track] ([album])" preset and make sure the ripped-to directory is what you want, and you would not get the files flying to different folders.

Then after you finish with Various artist albums, double-click on one of the "[artist]\[album]\..." presets to get back to the default behaviour.

Or if you do not want to change default setting as described above, then rip the songs from the Various Artists albums and let them get scattered in different Artists directories. Then to automatically fix this (as well as all previously ripped Various Artists albums that may lay scattered around), do the following:

1. Open MMC (Music Collection).

2. Create a new collection that has only your files that are scattered - i.e. from the Various artists albums

3. Goto Collection --> Music collection --> Arrange files

4. Set your "Root folder", to "Various Artists" or wherever you want all these files to go under.

5. For "Arrangement", type "[album]\[aritst]-[track]" or whichever way you want these scattered files rearranged. Or press "Set" which brings up the same window as described above; then use the presets.

6. After that, press "Begin", and your scattered files will magically move into neat little album folders within the directory "Various Artists", in exactly the way you want them.

7. Just make sure you do not have other songs within the same MMC collection displayed, or they would also move.

I enjoy this flexibility of choice and control that I have as a user. Yes it occassionally requires you to press a few more keystrokes or two more mouse-clicks, but it is refreshing to have so much user control on all this functionality.

[Carlton Bale]

I'm having the same problem as the original poster and the easy fixes listed here seem to be pretty complicated. I'd really not change settings for each CD I rip.

I understand some type of auto-switch improvements are coming in version 12. But wouldn't it be easier to just add "Album Artist" as an option for folder creation? This would solve all of my problems and should be a simple improvement compared to the alternatives.

[Spoon]

As said for R12 it has already been written (check the cd ripper beta in the next 2 weeks).