Any way to exclude views from controlpoint?

[lo0p]

Hi,

is there any way to exclude views provided by minimserver in the controlpoint?

I am used to browse my files in folder view only as they are very well sorted. Browsing them by album, playlist, artist what so ever does not really make sense as there are way to much files stored on my NAS. This will only end in endless scrolling on my Android device while searching one specific artist or album.

Therefore I never used, and I don't think I will in the future, all other views provided by MinimServer.

For me, if excluding is not possible, it would be a nice help to have "folder view" as first in the list, not the last

Thanks in advance!

[winxi]

(20-12-2013 11:42)lo0p Wrote:  Hi,

is there any way to exclude views provided by minimserver in the controlpoint?

I am used to browse my files in folder view only as they are very well sorted. Browsing them by album, playlist, artist what so ever does not really make sense as there are way to much files stored on my NAS. This will only end in endless scrolling on my Android device while searching one specific artist or album.

Therefore I never used, and I don't think I will in the future, all other views provided by MinimServer.

For me, if excluding is not possible, it would be a nice help to have "folder view" as first in the list, not the last

Thanks in advance!

It's not possible to exclude, sort or rename certain 'special' views from the brwosing tree, like 'n items', 'n albums', or 'n playlists'. However, you can remove all other 'regular' index entries from the browsing tree by removing them from the indexTags property.

If you are facing problems with large lists, you might want to have a look at the alphaGroup property which provides a convenient way to alphabetically group large lists.

[lo0p]

Strange, after deleting the entries in indexTags in Minimwatch, then restarting Minimserver, they appear again in Minimwatch/-Server (and therefore BubbleUPnP) like nothing happens. Do I need to enter some kind of dummy entry?

Using the latest Update 12.

[winxi]

(20-12-2013 12:29)lo0p Wrote:  Strange, after deleting the entries in indexTags in Minimwatch, then restarting Minimserver, they appear again in Minimwatch/-Server (and therefore BubbleUPnP) like nothing happens. Do I need to enter some kind of dummy entry?

Using the latest Update 12.

I've never tried this myself, it may be that MinimServer doesn't allow the indexTags property to be empty. If this is the case, I think that a dummy entry may do the trick.
Please also reload the browsing tree in BubbleUPnP to make sure it doesn't use the cache from previous browsing.

[DavidHB]

If you really don't want the browse tree, this begs the question as to why you would wish to use MinimServer at all; any DNLA server with folder browsing (which most of them seem to have) would do. As Simon himself said in a recent post:

"[The] browse tree is (from my perspective) the main reason to use MinimServer."

Without knowing what your collection contains and how it is structured, and indeed which control point(s) you use, it is difficult to be specific. But with judicious use of MinimServer properties (well explained in the User Guide) you can, as winxi says, 'tune' your browse tree to almost anything you want, including, possibly, mimicking your folder structure.

Another approach is to use playlists. Using Playlist Creator, you can compile one or more playlists of regularly played tracks in a folder accessible to MinimServer. This can save both folder and browse tree navigation, and the playlist folder appears near the top of the opening page of the MinimServer browse tree.

When I started using MinimServer, I was very much of your mind, that the folder structure gave me everything I wanted. Now I hardly use it at all. I did need to put some effort into making sure that the metadata in my music files was (at least as far as the main fields are concerned) complete and consistent, but I think the effort was worthwhile. So, while I agree with winxi's advice, I also suggest that you may find it useful to consider further whether and how the browse tree could be of use to you.

David

[lo0p]

I've installed MinimServer on my Synology NAS after testing several DLNA-Servers. The original Synology ones somehow prevented the use of the standby funtionality (had a lot of discussions with Synology about this issue). Serviio works well but was way too slow while scanning. Used MiniDLNA a while but this server has, in my configuration, problems scanning my library.

As I need a server for music files only winxi pointed me to MinimServer. And.. I like it, small, flexible and fast (even it's written in java ^^). While reading the specs I also liked the flexibility in id-tags and talking about flexibility, I really would like to see to exclude features I do not need.

The facts... MinimServer reports, based on the id-tagging, to my controlpoints:

- 6046 albums (not true, a lot of my single files are counted as a album even if they belong together and are in the same directory)
- 60528 items
- 554 playlists

Please try to find a specific track or album based on these informations, nearly impossible or a _lot_ of scrolling on my android device. The views artist, date, genre, etc. will not help either.

I always tried to have accurate informations/tags on my files but after merging my musiccollection with the one of my girlfriend the situation is now out of control The only escape is folderview as, for over 10 years now, I sort my files in way like "genre > artist > "year - albumname"" on my discs.

[DavidHB]

(20-12-2013 15:46)lo0p Wrote:  Used MiniDLNA a while but this server has, in my configuration, problems scanning my library.

Pity, that. I use ReadyDNLA, which is simply MiniDNLA branded by Netgear (and with proper DNLA membership, which MiniDNLA, now renamed, does not have); it has always worked well for me, within the usual DNLA limitations.

Quote:As I need a server for music files only winxi pointed me to MinimServer. And.. I like it, small, flexible and fast (even it's written in java ^^). While reading the specs I also liked the flexibility in id-tags and talking about flexibility, I really would like to see to exclude features I do not need.

I'd agree with all of that.

Quote:The facts... MinimServer reports, based on the id-tagging, to my controlpoints:

- 6046 albums (not true, a lot of my single files are counted as a album even if they belong together and are in the same directory)
- 60528 items
- 554 playlists

Please try to find a specific track or album based on these informations, nearly impossible ... The only escape is folderview as, for over 10 years now, I sort my files in way like "genre > artist > "year - albumname"" on my discs.

Well, you do make your point . I wonder how many collections there are with this kind of metadata tangle - rather a lot, I'd guess.

I think that, in your position, I'd at least try to fix the album and artist listing issues, not least because that would make winxi's suggested use of alphaGroup rather attractive in your case. For that, if you use Windows, MP3Tag is the obvious tool. It can handle files in sub-folders of the target folder, so you could work simultaneously with all the albums of a particular artist for example.

To have tracks indexed as a single album, the Album name and AlbumArtist tags must be the same on all tracks. In the MP3Tag grid you can select all the tracks which must have the same data, and either enter that data in the relevant field(s) or simply select from the drop down(s) provided by MP3Tag one of the variants already entered for particular tracks. MP3Tag also provides usable and powerful filtering and search and replace functions. With facilities of this kind, large numbers of tracks can be corrected simultaneously, and the process of untangling the metadata starts to become feasible.

MP3Tag can also be used to blank out metadata. Empty fields will not be indexed, so it is often better to have no entry than wrong or inconsistent data.

I hope these thoughts help.

David

[simoncn]

(20-12-2013 11:42)lo0p Wrote:  Hi,

is there any way to exclude views provided by minimserver in the controlpoint?

I am used to browse my files in folder view only as they are very well sorted. Browsing them by album, playlist, artist what so ever does not really make sense as there are way to much files stored on my NAS. This will only end in endless scrolling on my Android device while searching one specific artist or album.

Therefore I never used, and I don't think I will in the future, all other views provided by MinimServer.

For me, if excluding is not possible, it would be a nice help to have "folder view" as first in the list, not the last

Thanks in advance!

I'm planning to add more flexibility for this in a future release.