Channels & viewing

[renojim]

You'll need to create or find a script to do it or I did find "Bulk Rename Utility" (for Windows), but I haven't tried it - https://www.bulkrenameutility.co.uk/

I should add that all we're really trying to do is create file names that can be sorted alphabetically ("0001 - zyx" is alphabetically before "0002 - abc"), so any naming scheme that puts them alphabetically in the order you'd like them displayed will work.

[MrXxx]

Unfortunately Roku Media Player pays no attention at all to ID3 tags (tags within your files that give media players the information necessary to sort files in the expected order), which means the only other thing it can go by is the file names.

A couple of extremely useful programs with intuitive interfaces to help with this issue are Mp3tag and Rename-it.

Mp3tag does what you'd expect. It displays ID3 tags in files (IF they exist, which in many cases they do not, such as with vinyl conversions or torrent collections). This can be useful for either inserting your own tags or simply sorting by existing tags. It will also display the file names, which you can edit manually in the program. But the latter is cumbersome which is where Rename-it comes in handy.

Rename-it will bulk rename files based on rules you set. For example (pertinent to this discussion), you can set it to add sequences to the beginning of file names based on how you've sorted them in the programs screen.

It's work that nobody wants to do but once it's done properly the resulting catalogues are pretty impressive.

BTW, Mp3tag also allows for putting in your own album art, lyrics and all sorts of neat stuff if you happen to be a fanatic.

EDIT:

If you're looking for decent server software to use with this I highly recommend Serviio for your video files (I personally rely on folder structure only for ease of sorting since the tagging features simply do NOT work well at all). And SubSonic for audio. SubSonic works extremely well with ID3 tags. When I first set up SubSonic it didn't sort well, however I found that overnight it apparently had scanned all files and updated itself according to tags really well both on it's own web interface AND on Roku Media Player. I have not yet tested SS on videos yet but I'm betting it works just as well with them. Once I find out I'll be back here to post my findings.