Option to display albums in Database by year?

[KindOfBlues71]

I've read through all the posts I could find regarding sorting albums by year in the Database and the only answer given was "no".   This is a function I would really like to have and I was wondering why it's not possible to sort albums by year, only tracks.  I personally don't understand why someone would want to sort tracks by year, but I'm sure they have a good reason!  Any chance of this functionality being available?  If not, is this something that could be added via a patch?  Doubt that it matters but I'm using Rockbox on a 30GB 5g iPod Video.

I've only been using Rockbox for about two months now and I'm really happy with the functionality it provides.  I hope you'll all continue making it both stable and as customizable as possible, which is not an easy task!

-KindOfBlues71

[Llorean]

Add the year into the album name, for example "(1997) This Album" and then when you sort by album name, they'll be sorted by year.

Seriously, it sorts by metadata. The album itself doesn't have metadata, only songs do. You could find an 'Album Year' tag, if one exists, add support for it into the database, and then you could have a list of years, and when you select a year, have a list of albums. Assuming such a tag exists it'd be a workable solution.

[scharkalvin]

There IS a tag for copyright year that you could hijack for that purpose.

[Llorean]

If you're hijacking tags, you may as well just hijack one of the tags already supported in the Rockbox databsae. Just pick one you aren't using and use it.

[KindOfBlues71]

I understand that the file contains the metadata info, but if you can specify how to sort by artist name and album title, it doesn't make sense why albums cannot be sorted by year.  Especially since selecting a year gives me a list of artists with albums tagged with that year and then under an artist, a list of those albums.  So is that a limitation of the tagnavi syntax or am I way off here (the most likely reason)?  I know the File View settings affect the way files and the database lists things, so is that part of the reason I can't sort albums by year?

Regarding your suggestion to use the Album Year tag, what do you mean by "add support for it into the database"?  Do you mean write a patch or edit tagnavi_custom to look for that tag?  Assuming the database supported the Album Year tag, or I hijacked an already-supported tag, wouldn't that sort the exact same way Year is sorted now?  Your description of how it would sort sounds like it does.

Thanks very much in advance for any explanation, as I'm trying to wrap my head around this.  When it comes to something I'm interesting in learning about, like Rockbox, I like to know "why/why not".

-KindOfBlues71

[Llorean]

I don't understand what you're asking in the first paragraph at all. It sounds like you haven't quite read what I've said.

Albums cannot be sorted by year, because there is no data stored for albums. Data is stored for songs. So what you get is "All songs on this album." What you can do though is have another tag on the songs for "Album Year" or just use an existing tag as it. Then sort first by that tag, then by album name.

The database just stores information about songs. "Albums" don't really exist. All they are is a series of letters that several songs have in common, so you can't store specific information about an album such as its year. But you can, on every song, use a tag to store what year that song's album came out.

And yes, to add a new tag to the database you'd need to make a patch. To "steal" a tag the database already supports, on the other hand, you could just edit the tags in your files, and make a custom tagnavi.

[countach]

^^^

All this is true, but, for example, why not consider the date stored in the first song as the date of the album? Or even in all songs. That would be a method as valid as the one used to retrieve the album's name.

In fact, foobar2000 does it that way.

[Llorean]

There is no method to retrieve the album's name, because no information is stored about the album.

If you have six songs from one album, and in three the album name is misspelled, you will have 3 songs from one album, and 3 from another, and will see two different album names in the list because all it's doing is grouping them by the content of a list of letters, and doesn't know what that list *means* other than it's the list "called" a different list of letters.

You could group them by year, but of course then it would group every song from that year, independent of album. But if you do "Year" then "Album" then you'll see all albums from that year, assuming all your songs have the same year marked on any given album.

Then again, if all your songs had the same year marked, wouldn't that negate the need for this request which was for a separate tag for album date than then normal year tag?

Your statement basically seems to suggest exactly what he doesn't want to do...

[cc]

I understand that the file contains the metadata info, but if you can specify how to sort by artist name and album title, it doesn't make sense why albums cannot be sorted by year.  Especially since selecting a year gives me a list of artists with albums tagged with that year and then under an artist, a list of those albums.  So is that a limitation of the tagnavi syntax or am I way off here (the most likely reason)?  I know the File View settings affect the way files and the database lists things, so is that part of the reason I can't sort albums by year?

If all you want to do is see a list of albums after you select "Year" (instead of a list of artists first), then you could just change this line in .rockbox/tagnavi.config :

 "Year"     -> year ? year > "0" -> artist -> album -> title = "fmt_title"

to this:

 "Year"     -> year ? year > "0" -> album -> title = "fmt_title"

You will have to do the mod each time you update rockbox though...

And it isn't really sorting by album year, if there are songs from different years on an album you will only see the songs from the year you selected when you get to the album.

Is that what you meant?

[yapper]

Wouldn't following this advice avoid the overwriting issue?

# Tag Browser configuration file, do not edit as changes will be lost!
# Instead, you can modify "/.rockbox/tagnavi_custom.config" which will never
# get overwritten automatically.

[cc]

AFAIK (which is not all that far   ) tagnavi_custom.config only allows you to add new custom menus, not change the default menu.

But, yes, adding a custom menu might also do what he wants.

[roolku]

AFAIK (which is not all that far   ) tagnavi_custom.config only allows you to add new custom menus, not change the default menu.

Not quite true.

You can set the default menu using the keyword %root_menu. I.e the line

%root_menu "custom"

at the end of your your tagnavi_custom.config will set the root_menu to "custom" (which needs to be defined)

[cc]

So it does! Cool. I assumed because the custom file was read before all the other stuff (including rootmenu) was defined that the defaults would overwrite any changes you tried to make.

[KindOfBlues71]

I don't understand what you're asking in the first paragraph at all. It sounds like you haven't quite read what I've said.

I've read and understood all your posts.  I asked if the options in the File View settings had an affect on the Database's inability to display albums by year.  I read the Wiki and ensured that Sort Directories and Sort Files was set to "Alphabetical" (which should be renamed to "Alpha-Numeric" since it sorts letters AND numbers in order, but that's off-topic), so I answered my own question and apologize for confusing you.

Albums cannot be sorted by year, because there is no data stored for albums. Data is stored for songs. So what you get is "All songs on this album." What you can do though is have another tag on the songs for "Album Year" or just use an existing tag as it. Then sort first by that tag, then by album name.

The database just stores information about songs. "Albums" don't really exist. All they are is a series of letters that several songs have in common, so you can't store specific information about an album such as its year. But you can, on every song, use a tag to store what year that song's album came out.

How is using the "Album Year" tag or hijacking another tag is any different than using the "Year" tag.  I understand the difference but aren't both tags, to quote you, "a series of numbers/letters that several songs have in common"?  It'd be a waste of time to creating a patch for an unsupported tag that essentially sorts the same as using the existing "Year" tag.  I'd still have to select a year first to see all albums tagged with that year.

Furthermore, since albums are just "a series of letters that several songs have in common," the same is true of artists.  And the same is true of the year as well, only it's a series of numbers that several songs have in common.  So why can we sort by Artist but restrict those to a certain genre, for example?  You can define a filter/condition/format to display certain Artists and/or Albums, right?  So why can't we use "Year" as a filter/condition/format when displaying albums?

All this is true, but, for example, why not consider the date stored in the first song as the date of the album? Or even in all songs. That would be a method as valid as the one used to retrieve the album's name.

In fact, foobar2000 does it that way.

Exactly!

There is no method to retrieve the album's name, because no information is stored about the album.

If you have six songs from one album, and in three the album name is misspelled, you will have 3 songs from one album, and 3 from another, and will see two different album names in the list because all it's doing is grouping them by the content of a list of letters, and doesn't know what that list *means* other than it's the list "called" a different list of letters.

You could group them by year, but of course then it would group every song from that year, independent of album. But if you do "Year" then "Album" then you'll see all albums from that year, assuming all your songs have the same year marked on any given album.

Then again, if all your songs had the same year marked, wouldn't that negate the need for this request which was for a separate tag for album date than then normal year tag?

Your statement basically seems to suggest exactly what he doesn't want to do...

Actually, countach stated exactly what want to do.  I never requested a separate tag for album date, I only want use the supported Year tag to sort albums chronologically when I select an artist.  You've stated multiple times that it can't be done, but you haven't explained WHY it can't be done.  The Database Wiki shows that the Year tag can be used in Filter, Condition and Formatting.  So it would make sense based on the Wiki that albums should be able to be displayed chronologically by year when you select an artist first, rather than selecting the year first.

Erroneous entries will always mess up the way information is listed, regardless of whether we can sort albums by year or not.  If someone has 300 audio files all tagged with the same year, they're probably not the type of person who cares about listing an artist's albums chronologically by year.  Regardless of how detailed someone is with their tags, we should be able to use the supported tags to "control the structure and layout" of the database (to quote the Database Wiki).  So why can't we?

-KindOfBlues71

[KindOfBlues71]

If all you want to do is see a list of albums after you select "Year" (instead of a list of artists first), then you could just change this line in .rockbox/tagnavi.config :

 "Year"     -> year ? year > "0" -> artist -> album -> title = "fmt_title"

to this:

 "Year"     -> year ? year > "0" -> album -> title = "fmt_title"

You will have to do the mod each time you update rockbox though...

And it isn't really sorting by album year, if there are songs from different years on an album you will only see the songs from the year you selected when you get to the album.

Is that what you meant?

No, what I'd like is to select an artist and see the albums listed chronologically by year.  For example, selecting The Beatles from my list of Artists lists their albums sorted by year:

The Beatles

• Please Please Me
• With The Beatles
• Meet The Beatles!
• A Hard Day's Night
• Beatles For Sale
• Help!
• Rubber Soul
• Revolver
• Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
• The Beatles [White Album]
• Abbey Road
• Let It Be

-KindOfBlues71