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Using Minimserver with iTunes
14-11-2019, 12:42
Post: #1
Using Minimserver with iTunes
Hi,

I have been an Apple iTunes user for sometime now and have built up a library of around 22k tracks. I have recently acquired some decent HiFi kit and the manufacturers (Arcam) suggested that to use their own App (Music Life) for streaming music to their kit, it would be better for me to install and use Minimserver as it works well with their setup.

Accordingly, I installed Minimserver on my Mac (iMac with Catalina) and sure enough, Music Life does indeed link up well with Minimserver. But........ I have two problems :-

1) Minimserver has thrown up error messages for around 3000 tracks - The log reports "Error: couldn't access file ......." Looking at the files, most are classical pieces but there are other ones there too so its not obvious to me what wrong here or what I need to fix

2) I'm not getting any artwork with any of my music. The directory on my machine that Minimserver points to is the iTunes one and underneath that I believe the music and artwork live in separate directories. I tried to put a png file in one of the directories where the music tracks live to see if that might help but it doesn't seem to have

I am hoping therefore that someone out there might have an idea as to what's going on and what I need to fix as I surely can't be the first or only person to have had a go at this ?

Thanks in advance :-)
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14-11-2019, 17:10
Post: #2
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
(14-11-2019 12:42)Barheys Wrote:  2) I'm not getting any artwork with any of my music. The directory on my machine that Minimserver points to is the iTunes one and underneath that I believe the music and artwork live in separate directories. I tried to put a png file in one of the directories where the music tracks live to see if that might help but it doesn't seem to have.

The name of the png file is important, I.e. folder.png or cover.png.

However, there are many other options that MinimServer tries in discovering album art. One of which you may prefer to the above two.

Check out the User guide Artwork section

With regards to the MinimServer errors, is that error message complete?
If not, perhaps providing a sample of the error messages would help us help you.
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15-11-2019, 10:09 (This post was last modified: 15-11-2019 10:10 by simoncn.)
Post: #3
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
The messages about "couldn't access" might be related to non-English characters in the file path or might be related to the location of these files on your file system. Please post the full exact text of a few of these messages.

There are tools that can export iTunes artwork into a form that MinimServer and other UPnP servers can access. For example, the "Save Album Art as folder.jpg" script from this page has solved this problem for other MinimServer users. The current versions of this script are v4.2 for Catalina and v3.10 for older versions.
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15-11-2019, 11:35
Post: #4
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
Thank you so much for responding to this - I really really appreciate it !

So I have a sense that you might be right in your guess about the error messages inasmuch as having reviewed the files that are throwing up error messages (see screen shot attached), it seems just about all of them have special characters in them (umlauts and accents) - so I am guessing this is what needs fixing. I will have a go and report back on where I get to.

I will try your album art suggestions and see what happens.

Thank you all so very very much :-) As you have probably gathered, I am bit of a novice in this so all help offered is very gratefully received.

Syd


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15-11-2019, 13:29
Post: #5
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
An update to my earlier reply - I have now gone through a lot of the error messages and getting rid of the Umlauts and Accents does indeed fix the error message - so thank you for that.
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15-11-2019, 13:48 (This post was last modified: 15-11-2019 13:57 by Barheys.)
Post: #6
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
Guys,

On the artwork question, Ive looked at both of your suggested reads and there is a lot more info there that I am easily able to make sense of, so may I please ask you to explain a little more if you can ?

1) Is it necessary for the artwork to reside in the same directory as the music - I get the impression that this might be so....

2) Presumably, if this is the case, I will need to create copies of all the artwork in the appropriate directories - is that correct ? (currently everything lives ins separate directories I believe although its not obvious how this works)

3) One of the utilities on the page suggested will help do this - is there anyone in particular that's worth looking at ?

4) Is there a particular format for either the image or file name that I should be aware of. It seems like that it needs to be the exact same (case match) as the directory name (the directory also being the album name) - is that right ?

Thanks in advance

Regards

Syd


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15-11-2019, 13:58
Post: #7
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
Screen shots of my Mac


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15-11-2019, 17:44 (This post was last modified: 15-11-2019 17:44 by simoncn.)
Post: #8
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
(15-11-2019 13:29)Barheys Wrote:  An update to my earlier reply - I have now gone through a lot of the error messages and getting rid of the Umlauts and Accents does indeed fix the error message - so thank you for that.

I wasn't intending that you should "fix" these files. MinimServer should be able to handle these characters and I would like to find out what is causing the problem and fix MinimServer so that it works with these filenames.

On my Mac, accented filenames are working. I have an idea about what might be different on your Mac. To confirm this, I would need to see a minimserver.log file containing some of these error messages. (A screenshot is not sufficient.) Do you still have any unfixed files left?
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15-11-2019, 17:47 (This post was last modified: 15-11-2019 17:50 by simoncn.)
Post: #9
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
Regarding the artwork issue, the script that I linked in this post should do everything that is needed (find the correct artwork and copy it to the correct location with the correct filename). The script that you need is named ""Save Album Art as folder.jpg" and there are two versions of this script, one for Catalina and one for previous versions of macOS.
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15-11-2019, 18:05
Post: #10
RE: Using Minimserver with iTunes
Please open Disk Utility (it is in the Utilities folder under Applications) and highlight Macintosh HD. What is shown for "Type:"?
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