Apple fails to fix TV with 3.0.2

Question

I realise that for many users, it is the video capabilities of the TV that are important. But although these are useful, for me and many others it is the TV's musical abilities which are of paramount importance and these took a backward step with v3 that has STILL not been resolved.
A bit of background.
Over time, iTunes has introduced many invaluable features such as the 'Sort' field/tags and the Compilation flag. Any track with the latter set can be grouped under a single "Compilations" heading in the Artists list so these artists do not clutter up the main Artist list. This is invariably crucial as there can be very many of these and they're not really relevant when viewing the list of Artists. But the Apple developers thought this through and the user can set this flag at their own choice, so the user has complete control over how to use this setting - brilliant. Just toggle that checkbox on and off will absolutely determine whether that track is so grouped or not. As I said, brilliant.
Sadly, Apple didn't immediately extend this genius to their other products, but over time this facility has made it to iPods etc. and I'm pretty sure it worked the same way in v2.4 of the TV. Then came v3 and guess what, they broke it.
I've been waiting for them to fix this (and much feedback has been sent to ensure they are aware of their errors), but this latest 3.0.2 has changed NOTHING. The main Artist list still shows some 'Compilation Artists' After some messing about I have found that not only does the Compilation flag have to be set, but you MUST have something in the 'Album Artist' field for it to be excluded from the main Artist list, although setting that flag is sufficient for it to list under the Compilations heading. So 2 different criteria are being applied to the Compilations and Artists lists. Sorry, but this is simply crappy programming. If I have a single track by an artist, which I want kept out of the main Artists list, I now have to add some dummy text into the 'Album Artist' field that really ought to be empty (since there is NO Album). It shouldn't be necessary to have to fudge it like this.
And then there's the disastrous sorting they use.
Again, we can refer back to iTunes. Some time back we got the additional 'Sort' fields/tags. This finally allowed us to sort everything EXACTLY how we wanted and iTunes is now VERY good in this regard, but once again, they haven't followed it through onto the other products. Or more precisely, just as with Compilations, I'm sure they did fix this in TV v2.4, but broke it again in v3 and 3.0.2 still does NOT fix it.
The problem is that the TV ignores the sort fields, so the Artist list sorts e.g. "Bob Dylan" under 'B'. This is unbelievably moronic when they themselves introduced a special Sort version of that field/tag in which the user can put what they like and in this case I use "Dylan, Bob" which means in iTunes it sorts under 'D' although it is always displayed correctly as "Bob Dylan". But on the TV the sort is obviously only done on the actual Artist field/tag. The same problem is exhibited with sorting the Albums for the selected Artist - they use the Album field/tag when they should be using the Sort Album field/tag.
Yet another glaring example of their failure to correctly work with the data is when listing All Songs for an Artist. Who could possibly want an alphabetically sorted list of tracks. Shuffled, maybe, although not for me, but there already is an option to choose that if desired. But alphabetical? Default sort should be by Sort Album, then Track Number. If they think alphabetical sorting is so important, offer it as an alternate option, but I can't see anyone picking it out of choice.
These are really very basic database concepts. The actual programming required to fix these problems would be trivial, it is simply not rocket science and don't be mistaken in thinking I only want things my way. My whole point here is that these special 'Compilation' and 'Sort' field/Tags are available to every user so EVERYONE could have it how they want it and indeed already do in iTunes. But currently the TV shortchanges its owners by not providing the same functionality. This really is a chronic state of affairs.
What is so exasperating about these problems (both Compilations and Sorting) is that iTunes started it all and does it correctly, but other Apple products haphazardly ignore it all and make a complete hash of it. I just don't know what more I can do about this apart from send more feedback. At the moment I have 5 TVs that are no more than glorified AirPort Expresses to use with AirTunes since accessing the music directly from within the TV interface is hopeless.
I know I am not alone in my frustration about these problems, so can I IMPLORE everyone who feels the same to keep hitting Apple with feedback about this sorry state of affairs and hopefully they will eventually see sense.

Answer 1

While on the subject of consistency (or NOT, as the case may be), there's a couple of other things that have always bugged me on most of the 'iTunes Connected Products (iTCPs) that again, iTunes gets right.
First of all, I am picky about how my music collection is organised and have spent a LOT of time getting it so that iTunes does it exactly how I want, which in itself is a testament to how good iTunes is that it can handle my exacting requirements. When browsing my Library, I always have the Artist and Album browser showing so I can select an artist and then see a list of their albums, with of course all the tracks in the other part of the window. If I select an artist with only a single album, it all works in exactly the same way, with just that single album in the Album list and its tracks displayed below (or beside depending on your preference). This makes sense to me. The operation and display is consistent, independent of how many albums that artist may have (in your Library that is).
But, on most of the other iTCPs, if you 'drill down' using the main Artist list, selecting that artist with only a single album, you go directly to the list of tracks, whereas if there are several albums, you of course get the Album list first.
This I find immensely irritating.
Primarily because it breaks all the consistency guidelines, not only those that Apple stipulated all those years ago, but also those set by iTunes. I can see why they did it, thinking that it saves the intermediate step of having to select that one single album to get its list of tracks. There's no alternative album to select so why make the user click twice. But this is faulty logic. If the entire OSX interface was based on shortcuts like this, it would be a disaster and no-one would know where the **** they were (Ha, a bit like Windows). So why distort the interface in this way for the iTCP interfaces.
But there's another real reason why this is a bad idea. You cannot find the name of an artist's album if you only have one in your Library. As soon as you select the artist, you get a list of tracks. Er, what's the name of the album? Can't tell. You have to actually play a track to find out. How crappy is that.
Since I suspect that for many users this is not a bother to them (just as well they don't design software then) I have requested this as an option that can be chosen by the user. So everyone can have it working just how they like.
While I'm on the subject of my personal preferences, it also drives my nuts that when you do get a list of tracks, the top line, IOW the DEFAULT choice is 'Shuffle'. Again, I realise this is a personal preference, but I HATE this as I NEVER shuffle and consider the whole concept quite abhorrent. OK, so that's just me, but it irks that EVERYONE is forced to have this as their default choice, so pick an Artist, pick an Album hit play and you get it shuffled. Aarrrghhhh!
IMO there ought to be a separate shuffle toggle, sited elsewhere in the interface and take it OUT of the track list. It really doesn't belong there. It should NOT be the default choice when you get to the track list. Once again, this is not the way it works in iTunes where there is no 'Shuffle' option in your face for every track list.
Maybe the simplest is to include an option in Settings that allows the user to set Shuffle to NOT display. So those who want it there can have it and those who would NEVER use it, (like me and I suspect many others) would not have to see it and navigate around it at the top of every track list. Hmm, yes, that's the best solution, I like that.
I can feel more feedback coming on:-)