Forum Discussion

ag87's avatar
ag87
Reel Rookie
2 years ago

Media player sort by filename

Hi,

The Media Player sorting of mp3 files is for sorting purposes apparently scanning internal names rather than standard filenames for some strange reason.  Is this a bug or an intentional design?  If the former, maybe the sorting code is referencing the wrong field and so a bug that needs to be fixed.  If the later, please add "by filename" as a new sort option (additional to and in combination with A-Z and such existing sorting options).

I have all of my CD to mp3 conversions carefully sorted by filename order via prefix such as "01-First Song", "02-Second Song", etc. because every other player I own uses filename order.

Using the internal name puts the tracks in a weird order no matter the sorting option used.

I'm not particularly thrilled at the prospect of going through every one of my mp3 files to modify the internal name so a way to sort by filename would really help.

It probably doesn't matter to the question, but the files are on a USB drive.

Thank you

 

 

 

4 Replies

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  • atc98092's avatar
    atc98092
    Community Streaming Expert
    2 years ago

    Roku Media Player is filled with bugs, and hasn't had any updates for several years. We have no idea if Roku is abandoning this app, or what is going on. 

    MP3 files have the ability to have internal metadata tags, and that is likely what RMP is reading. Yes, it was important to know you were using a USB drive for the files.

    There is a workaround for you, and that would be to use a DLNA server on your home network and stream your music from there. The server will control the presentation of the files, so you should get them in the order desired. I use Serviio, and it also works well with playlist files, which allows you to place your media tracks in whatever order you desire. RMP displays the playlist tracks exactly as listed, so whatever list order you have is retained. This is handy for my movies, when I want them in a specific sequence that the file name or year released doesn't match my desired list. One example: I have all the Star Wars movies in chronological order, which isn't supported by the file name or release date. 

    Another advantage of using a DLNA server is that your media is now available on any supported device on your network. That means any Roku device, Smart TV, and most DVD/Blu Ray players, as well as other streaming devices. You don't need to move the USB drive to different devices for playback.

  • Strega2's avatar
    Strega2
    Roku Guru
    2 years ago

    This takes me back to when I first copied my computer collection of MP3s to my phone and found out that my directories and filenames became meaningless and the phone only cared about mp3 tags.  Since many of my files had none, I had a huge collection of unknown title by unknown artist.  Swell.

    So, I downloaded the free program mp3tag and started defining actions like setting the mp3 title tag from the filename etc.  Once you define an action like that, you can apply it to the entire directory structure all at once.  So, once you get over a brief learning curve, it’s not bad at all to get it done.

    • ag87's avatar
      ag87
      Reel Rookie
      2 years ago

      Hi,

      Thank you for your replies, I really appreciate it.

      Your reply regarding the cell phone reminded me how when I had run into the same thing on a cell phone I had found another app that does go in filename order (a 3rd party file manager). Remembering this lead me realize that I had just assumed the Media Player was the only choice for an mp3 player on the Roku, but it turns out that was an incorrect assumption; there are actually other choices and at least one of them, the first one I tried, DOES go in order. That said, that player has some other weaknesses (mainly, handles directory navigation in a very non-standard and cumbersome manner) so it would definitely still be very nice if they ever did decide to do more work on the Media Player to still fix the issue (make it go in filename order or add a new sort option to do so).

      As for the tool to deal with the tags, thank you, that's a great idea. I did some research and it turns out that my CD to mp3 conversion program defaulted to adding an ID3 tag (although turns out could have been manually configured to not do so). Based on some research, apparently such tags are entirely optional and not even part of the original mp3 format's design, so I think a very poor choice as a default because it just increases the file size and even eventually lead to this problem with the Media Player. I wish I had known about it adding those sooner or I would have turned it off in the first place before I did any conversions. Thankfully my vinyl conversions don't have the same problem (no tags in those) because I used an entirely different process for them. But now all my CD to mp3 conversion result files are burdened with those tags so regardless of finding that player that goes in order I still would like to fix them (probably just use the tool to remove them entirely).

      Thank you for your suggestion regarding using a DLNA server. I did actually look into that a few years ago (for purposes of the other advantages you mentioned) but unfortunately found no DLNA server would run on my machines at the time (minimum requirements issues). But I'll take another look. As an aside, back when I was trying to get that to work I also did some research on just going with the vastly more simple approach of a standard Windows share and found out that unfortunately the Media Player doesn't support this. That said, if they ever do more work on the Media Player, I really do think they should add that (support for accessing Windows shares). But as I said, that's a bit of an aside because I assume it would still go out of order unless they also fixed that separate issue.

      Thank you again

       

      • atc98092's avatar
        atc98092
        Community Streaming Expert
        2 years ago
        ag87 wrote:

         

        Thank you for your suggestion regarding using a DLNA server. I did actually look into that a few years ago (for purposes of the other advantages you mentioned) but unfortunately found no DLNA server would run on my machines at the time (minimum requirements issues). But I'll take another look.

        Serviio really doesn't need much in the way of power from the computer it is installed on, especially if your media does not require transcoding. I run it on several different computers at my home and some family members. I think the simplest one is an old dual core AMD processor and at best 8GB of ram (might only be four, I can't remember). And it can transcode for a single user without maxing out. Audio transcoding takes far less power than video transcoding. As far as the operating system, Serviio has Windows, Mac and Linux versions. As for Windows, I believe it will still run on Windows XP, but naturally Windows 7 or later would be preferable. All of my installs are on Windows 10. My main Serviio PC is the one I'm using right now, so it doesn't need to be dedicated to being a DLNA server. This one has an Intel i5 quad core CPU and 16GB of ram, and it never breaks a sweat, even though the hardware is 4-5 years old.