Cover Flow sorting is wacky (not a compilations issue).

I just purchased a 120GB Classic with the hope that I'd be able to browse my collection of music by album artist. After all but giving up hope, it looks like Cover Flow is almost doing it (on purpose or not, I don't know).
Here's the issue: I tag my .mp3s so that on tracks with multiple artists, they're separated by a "/" -- so, for example, on my Aesop Rock album, "None Shall Pass", track 6 has an artist field of, "Aesop Rock/Breeze Brewin/Cage". I always include the artist in the artist field before I put any of the guest artists.
When I sync this to my iPod, the Cover Flow only shows this as one album (there are four tracks scattered throughout the album with different artists). If Cover Flow was sorting purely by artist, it would have multiple covers. So I'm thinking that I figured out a way to get what I want.
Except the iPod seems to randomly decide which albums it wants to treat this way -- some, such as the Kid Rock album "Cocky" (the one with "Picture" with Sheryl Crow"), are shown as two separate albums in Cover Flow. This doesn't make any sense to me.
All the "sort" fields are blank for all the files, so that can't be what's doing it. If I go under the Artist menu, it shows all the artists just as they're written in the tags.
So what's the deal here? How does Cover Flow really work?
[EDIT] Nevermind, I figured it out. Apparently when you sort by artist, it will give me all the songs with just the artist, and then give me the songs with that artist and any other artist (the slash comes after all the letters alphabetically). So if the artist has more than one album, it doesn't group them together by album.
I guess the "sort field" is the only way to fix it for now.
Message was edited by: Psyact

Using the sort field to try to force things together doesn't quite work, and certainly not when the album artist has more than one album with guests. I think you'll also find there are some enumeration issues in the album menu which may cause the wrong cover to be displayed as you progress through the library. See my recent post on Grouping Tracks Into Albums for a somewhat long, but hopefully comprehensive, exposition of the issues.
tt2

Similar Messages

Cover Flow Sort Problem To Do With Compilations?

Hi,
I just had a thought. Do you think the problem we're having with Cover Flow on the iPod Nano is to do with "Part of a compilation" not being ticked in iTunes?
If you bought one movie soundtrack Album that has a different Artist for each track, should "Part of a compilation" be ticked in iTunes, even if you've set the Album Artist to "Various Artists"?

No. does not help. The Compilations-Checkmark brings the files in a folder and not one level up. So the iTunes folder is a little cleaned up.
mk

Send your feedback to Apple if you want Cover Flow sorted by Album

I know this is a hot topic, but I really would prefer to have Cover Flow sorted per Album rather than per Artist. I don't buy the same album for each artist so I think Cover Flow should be per Album, it just makes sense.
As there's no real way around it and if you agree send your feedback to Apple so at least they know it's something people want and maybe they'll work on a way to fix it for us.
http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipod.html

I would support an option to sort by album or artist but if it were only 1 way, i'd like it to be by artist. Assuming the fix the compilation problem, I want the coverflow to work like going to a 'record' store so that i can easily go artist by artist and each artists albums are sorted together. compilations would either be grouped together at the end or under various artists ( but each album would appear once). I know my collection way better by artist than i do by album name.

Cover flow - Sort by Album/Year?

I love the cover flow feature on my iPhone but I am disappointed that it sorts based on Artist name. Is there a setting to make Cover flow - Sort by Album/Year?

Sorry, no such setting.

Cover Flow Sorting Issue - Workaround

Here is a temporary solution to the Cover Flow view & the Album Art Grouping view.
As many of you know the sorting by 'Album' or 'Album by Artist' or 'Album by Year' in the above mentioned views is not correctly prioritized.
The issue stems from the fact that the sort algorithm prioritized 'Artist' over the expected logic implied by grouping by the sort field name. So if a single album contains tracks all by different artists, you will get a Album Cover for each artist NOT each album.
To get around this (until Apple fixes it) use the 'Album Artist' field (which is usually, but not always, empty) and set this field to a common value for an entire album — such as 'Various Artists.' When doing so, the logic will still sort on the Artist Name first, but will group the entire album together.
If Sorting by "Album by Year" then the only hitch to this method is if you have two or more albums with the same & progressive title (see example below.) Then the album will sort in order of the Artist name of the 1st track of the album. — This probably will affect nearly zero of the the iTunes population though.
e.g. The album sort order will be:
Album: "Music 02" 1st track Artist: "Astro"
Album: "Music 03" 1st track Artist: "Terra"
Album: "Music 01" 1st track Artist: "Viggio"
Once again just set each album with a common "Album Artist" descriptor. I use "Various Artists"
-Alan
Note: Also there is a new field in the info tags for each song called 'Album Artist.'
AlBook, TiBook, iMac, iBook Mac OS X (10.4.5) Corporate / mixed environment / multiple networks.

Hi,
just change the switch Compilation to true for all songs in the album and it works too.

Ipod nano - cover flow sort order nano 5th gen

hi community,
i'm using different ipods (3rd gen, 4th gen, 5th gen, nano) and i love tagging my mp3s (artist, album, _but not_ album artist)
the sorting in cover flow for my ipod (3rd, 4th gen, touch, _but not 5th gen_) is fine for me: first regular albums then compilations.
with the nano 5th generation sorting is as follows: regular album + compilations mixed - base is artist name ( not fine for me ).
what i want is: first regular albums, than compilations (analogue ipod nano 4th). workaround for this should be: setting of album artist.
my question: do i have to setup my album artist for the desired sort order in nano 5th, and how will be the sort order in cover flow for the future? (e.g. nano 6th gen., + followers (because i don't want to reset my tags weeks later once again ....)
thanks for your reply.
best regards
itunes_gef

Hi Damon et al:
I agree with you that you shouldn't have to screw around with the file names. The iPod should allow you to sort in a variety of ways (e.g. any of the fields in the MP3 metadata, and in forward or reverse order). I'm going to keep checking back on this thread to see if more information comes out of it, but it looks to me like a flaw in the iPod OS, not a user-education issue.
Cheers,
bkengland
P.S. One would hope that the Apple program managers look at these threads for RFE ideas!
iPod Nano Other OS

Is there a way of making my iPod's "cover flow" sort in the same way the software can . Artist -- Album by Year . It only seems to do Artist -- by Alphabetical Album . I want it look like it does on the PC .

Is there a way to make the "cover flow" on the iPod match the sort style that I use on the software . I go with Artist -- Album by Release Year . But the ipod seems to only do Artist -- Alphabetical by Album , and then there are a handful of albums oddly out of place . Can it be done ?

Ottonomy, here's what to do.
Connect your iPhone to your computer and open the iPhone's playlist in an iTunes window. Copy/Paste the entire playlist into a new(!) playlist in iTunes, not on your iPhone. Then resort the playlist. After you sort it, Copy/Paste it to a new(!) playlist on your iPhone. Now delete the old playlist on your iPhone and rename the new playlist the name you want it to be (probably the same name as the old playlist).
The downside to this method is that you have to do it every time you add a song to the playlist. Unfortunately, I don't think there's another way.

Need help please: cover flow sort order logic

hi community,
is there a official document / specification from apple where the sort order and the settings of the corresponding tags (album, album artist, compilation on/off) of the cover flow is described?
AA)
i use diffent ipods. earlier versions diplayed in coverflow:
1) sorted by artist for compilation = off, following
2) sorted by album for compilation = on
this was fine for me.
BB)
now on my nano 5g order is as following:
- only 1 list: sorted by artist with all compilations listed in
does anybody know how i can set up the nano to display the cover flow like AA)?
best regards
gef_audio

s there a official document / specification from apple
If there is, it would be in Apple's Knowledge Base or iPod nano (5th generation) - User Guide.

Cover Flow sorting options

Currently it appears that Cover Flow is sorting by Album Artist, this is a problem because I have lots of compilations. I want it to sort by Album, does anyone know how to change this?

windows itunes:
- select all songs from compilation
- right click, then select 'get info'
- click 'sorting' tab
- select 'Sort Artist' and put e.g. 'Various', or whatever you want

Cover Flow on Windows XP not working, any suggestions?

I recently had a problem with my HP computer (certainly not the first) and had to recover it using recovery disks. Of course I lost everything and when I reinstalled iTunes, the cover flow option wasn't available. I have tried looking everywhere and performing the nesscessary steps to get it to work. It did work before my computer had to be restored. I went to the Microsoft site and downloaded the latest updates. I checked the bit-rate, I guess you could call it and is at 32-bit. I turned up the hardware acceleration to full (it was already up there) and I downloaded a version of DirectX and it still does not work. If someone could help me out it would be much appreciated. I am technology-challenged.
Thanks!
Kate
Message was edited by: kkshfun

Try checking your ipod settings, i had an itunes one change on its own once. Go to settings, then general, then rotate. If it says "off", then just hit the center button. If it says "cover flow", then see if it's the orientation sensor by going to the "maze" game if you have it to test it. The circle thing on the menu will probably glitch up/not move if it's the orientation sensor. If it responds normally (rolls/slides in the direction you tip the ipod), then i'm not sure. Try calling their customer service line at 1-800-APL-CARE (1-800-275-2273) if that happens. Also, if you are walking w/ it with the hold switch off, then it may me that your walking is shaking it enough to shuffle it. That's my theory, anyway.
BTW, are you're sure the ipod's not too flat for the sensor to register the rotation? I've done that before. It'll register at about a 45 degree angle.

Art shows in itunes cover flow & album view but not on ipod

I spent several hours downloading cover art to itunes for albums where the art couldn't be automatically retrieved by itunes. I'd browse through album view, and for every album that had no art, I'd (a) select the album by clicking on the default music-note image and thus activate the drag-and-drop target in the lower left, and (b) drag some art from a website. When I was done with this, all the albums for which I downloaded art would properly show art in the itunes cover flow and in album view mode.
For the iPod (a 160GB Classic), I deselected "display album art on your ipod", hit "apply" to have it delete the art, then reselected and applied again, and itunes went through the process of formating and downloading the art to the ipod.
Now, however, the iPod still only shows the artwork that had been automatically retrieved; all the art I had added manually won't show. Back in itunes, I notice that it looks like my process for downloading the art only resulted in the art being applied to one song per album, as far as I can tell randomly selected. If, in album view, I select each song individually, the art will show in the lower left corner (and in "get info") only for one of the songs; on one album it might be track 1 while on another it might be track 7. However this is enough for itunes to show the art for the whole album, and also to show the art in cover flow.
Is there any automatic way to synchronize the art over a whole album, or at least to get it to download to the ipod so that it shows in cover flow and album view on the device as well as on the computer? I had to download art for about 190 albums; it would be a real drag to have to do that again.

Ok, here is the method I used. Another member gave this to me. It has worked for my iTunes library, and hopefully my ipod on the next sync.
I opened iTunes and Safari, with Safari on Amazon.com (to get the art). I would play any song from an album and command-click the each song in the album. Once each song is highlighted, I hit command-I to change info. I then dragged the art from Safari to the small box on the right of the smaller info change screen. This resulted in every song highlighted displaying the same artwork.
I hope this helps.

Cover Flow: is it possible not to display albums without artwork?

Hi all,
I was wondering if there is a way in cover flow view not to display albums (album names) that do not have art work.
Thanks,
D.

Not as far as I know.
But I expect you know you can get artwork from other sources if the iTunes store doesn't have it. I tend to copy and paste from Amazon.

Cover flow on ipod nano not working

My cover flow on my ipod stopped working when i plugged in ipod. Have the covers on itunes just not ipod. Also songs skip to next song sometimes also. Could be any song I never know. Seems since i upgraded to new itunes version stuff has been going wrong.

Try checking your ipod settings, i had an itunes one change on its own once. Go to settings, then general, then rotate. If it says "off", then just hit the center button. If it says "cover flow", then see if it's the orientation sensor by going to the "maze" game if you have it to test it. The circle thing on the menu will probably glitch up/not move if it's the orientation sensor. If it responds normally (rolls/slides in the direction you tip the ipod), then i'm not sure. Try calling their customer service line at 1-800-APL-CARE (1-800-275-2273) if that happens. Also, if you are walking w/ it with the hold switch off, then it may me that your walking is shaking it enough to shuffle it. That's my theory, anyway.
BTW, are you're sure the ipod's not too flat for the sensor to register the rotation? I've done that before. It'll register at about a 45 degree angle.

Cover Flow sorting question

I have several seasons of different shows in my iTunes TV library. Even though each season has it's own artwork (Season 1, Season 2, etc.) the entire show's episodes show up in Cover Flow as 1 image - usually from the last season I imported.
Example: I have seasons 1 through 3 of West Wing in my library. But in cover flow view, when sorted by show, all three seasons show up as 1 image and it's the Season 3 cover art.
How do I get each season to show up as separate images with their own respective artwork in Cover Flow? I've filled in all the correct metadata and each episode and season are labeled correctly.

I would also like to know about this. I have an entire series of one show and I would like them sorted together as one whole show, rather than separated by each season.

Cover Flow Sorting

Is there any way to change the cover flow from sorting by artist to sorting by album? Sorting by artist, in my opinion, is pointless in cover flow.

Frisbey wrote:
Is there any way to change the cover flow from sorting by artist to sorting by album? Sorting by artist, in my opinion, is pointless in cover flow.
Really? That's how my CDs & vinyl are ordered. The iPod Cover Flow order is Album by Artist - there are no options to change this. If you want a pure alphabetical album order just use the album menu.
tt2

Cover Flow sorting is wacky (not a compilations issue).

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