One iTunes Library, Multiple Users

Is it possible to have one iTunes library (say the Administer's iTunes library) and share it with multiple users on the same computer?
Thanks.
Mick

See if this helps: iTunes: How to share music between different accounts on a single computer

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One iTunes Library, multiple user accounts?

Hi,
I recently purchased a new iMac 21.5" for my Family and want to share my iTunes library with my wife's OS X user account so we can both access the same music/media on both accounts. Is there an easy way to do this? Maybe place the files in a "shared" folder?
Also, What's the best way to move my iTunes media to my new Mac from my old PC?
Thanks,
C

The Apple store will move everything from the pc to the mac or you can call Apple Support and they will help you do it.
If you type "share itunes library" into the search bar at the top of this page next to "Support" and find articles to show you how to do this.

One iTune Library - Multiple Computers - Playlists?

I am running a couple of Windows PC from the same iTune library stored on a network drive.
There's no need to use "sharing" in this situation since all computers access the same library.
So far so good.
My problem is that I cannot see the Playlists from one computer to the other, is there a way to achieve that?
I did try sharing previously (share everything) and it did not make any difference.
Any ideas out there?

I am running a couple of Windows PC from the same iTune library stored on a network drive.
There's no need to use "sharing" in this situation since all computers access the same library.
So far so good.
My problem is that I cannot see the Playlists from one computer to the other, is there a way to achieve that?
I did try sharing previously (share everything) and it did not make any difference.
Any ideas out there?

One iTunes library, two users?

My brother and I share a computer, and we both have the same taste in music. Is there any way that we can both have access to the same iTunes library without having to duplicate it? How about iPhoto?

iTunes: How to share music between different accounts on a single computer tells you 2 methods of sharing.
You would be interested in the second method which describes setting up a library at a shared location.
I don't know about iPhoto either. Check the iPhoto forum or post a question there.
Hope this helps.
M
17' iMac fp 800 MHz 768 MB RAM Mac OS X (10.4.6) Several ext. HD (backup and data)

ITunes library on one computer with multiple users

Mom, Dad, and kids each have their own log-in to this computer. Mom is the main administrator and when we downloaded all the CDs to iTunes, it went to Mom's iTunes Library. Dad has logged in under his name and purchased items from iTunes store which are now in his library. We now have 2 separate iTunes Libraries. How can we make the iTunes library the same for both Mom and Dad?
Dad just got iPhone and wants to be able to sync his apps to his computer login as well as having access to Mom's iTunes library - it would seem to me that the easiest way to do this is to copy the library from Mom to Dad or somehow be able to have Dad share the itunes library. Can't figure out how to do this. Any help would be appreciated.

To share an iTunes library among multiple users, put the iTunes library in /Users/Shared/Music/iTunes, and for each user, make an alias from ~/Music/iTunes to /Users/Shared/Music/iTunes. Set permissions on /Users/Shared/Music/iTunes (and everything inside it) to give each user read and write permissions, and you're all set. My wife have been sharing our iTunes library this way since 2005, without a hitch.
Also, you'll have to import the contents of one library into the other, to make one big library, which is an extra step, but there's no way to avoid this now that you have two libraries.
Here are step by step instructions:
1. Figure out which library is larger, and start with that one. I'm going to guess it's Mom's. Log in as Mom.
2. In the Finder, make a folder called /Users/Shared/Music.
3. Move the folder ~/Music/iTunes (that's your iTunes library) to /Users/Shared/Music/iTunes.
4. Select the folder /Users/Shared/Music/iTunes, and make an alias of that folder. (In the Finder, click on File->Make Alias.) The alias will be called "/Users/Shared/Music/iTunes alias".
5. Move "/Users/Shared/Music/iTunes alias" to "~/Music/iTunes alias". Rename the alias to ~/Music/iTunes.
6. At this point, check your work: start iTunes while still logged in as Mom. Mom should see her iTunes library, just as before, as if it had never been moved.
7. While still logged in as Mom, go to /Users/Shared, select the Music folder, and give Mom and Dad read and write permissions on that folder and all its contents.
8. Log out as Mom, and log in as Dad. In the Finder, move Dad's iTunes library from ~/Music/iTunes to the Desktop.
9. As Dad, repeat steps 4 and 5.
10. Now Dad should check his work, by starting iTunes. Dad should now see Mom's library instead of his own.
Congratulations! You now have a shared library. You not only share content, but all playlists, artwork, etc. As Dad, create a playlist, fill it with romantic music, and call the playlist "To My Beautiful Wife". Log out as Dad, and log in as Mom, and Mom will see the same playlist. Crack open a bottle of champagne.
But Dad's content is still in ~/Desktop/iTunes. You'll have to add it to your shared libary:
11. Log in as Dad, and in iTunes, turn on the preference iTunes->Preferences->Advanced->Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.
12. Still in iTunes, choose File->Add to Library and start adding all the files in ~/Desktop/iTunes. They'll be copied from Dad's desktop into the shared library. Try importing a couple of tracks, and log in as Mom and confirm that both Mom and Dad see the imported content. (I myself have never done this, so I can't give you much guidance about importing, since I started our iTunes library as a single shared library from the very beginning. For all you know, you can just select every folder in ~/Desktop/iTunes and import everything at once. I would imagine you might have to futz around re-organizing everything nicely once you've imported all Dad's stuff, but once that's done, it's done.) Once everything is imported you can trash ~/Desktop/iTunes.
That's it. Any content you add will be instantly available to both users without having to sync or copy anything ever, because both users are always looking at the same library. (If one user deletes something it's gone for both users too, so be careful!) The only trouble you could possibly have are permissions issues, depending on how your system and users are set up. On my computer, after setting it up once, we never had to think about it again. However, we set up a separate account to be the administrator, and neither my wife or I have admin privileges. Since Mom is an administrator and Dad is not, you might find that OS X treats you differently when you create new files in your library. You'll have to try it and see. Good luck!
Message was edited by: dgauthier

Multiple users on one mac sharing one itunes library

Hi, I read through this thread https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3753008 and was able to have two users share one itunes library on one computer (yay). However, for the new user, she can't add any music files to her itunes even though I already made sure that she had read/write permissions for the shared folder. Can anyone help? Thanks! (I recently upgraded to mountain lion on a 2009 macbook, if that matters at all. Thanks.)

During the last months... did you get the answer yet, i also would like to know if this is possible

Managing apps for multiple users in one iTunes library

Hi - my wife and I both have iPhones and separate iTunes ID's. We both share music in one iTunes library and sync to the same library. We also backup our phones to that same computer. We have some apps on both phones (for example, Pandora) and when we backup/restore our phones, iTunes apparently will put "my" version of apps on her phone and "her" version of apps on my phone. Afterwards, when I update apps, my phone will ask for BOTH my iTunes ID AND her iTunes ID. Similarly, her phone asks for both her ID and my ID. Presumably, this also uses two of my FIVE authorized devices, which is also a problem.
My question is how can we manage our apps separately on iTunes so that we can get rid of this annoying behavior? It is very common for families to share one common iTunes library, so I don't see why this would be unsupported.
Thanks for any assistance!

Bump

Windows 7, one computer, one library, multiple users

I installed iTunes 10.0.1 (64 bit) on a new computer running Windows 7.
1. I copied my old iTunes library from an old computer.
2. In iTunes, I changed my iTunes media folder location to C:\users\public\music\itunes\itunes media
3. I selected th copied files, then dragged and dropped them into the itunes window.
All good so far. Now I can see and play my old tunes on my new computer. But... this is a home computer with multiple users. When I change users, I can start itunes, but when I change the iTunes media folder location to the same location as the install user's location, I get nothing. It's like iTunes can't see the data at that location.
Can anyone help with this? Is there a different way to do this? My goal is to have all users on this computer share one iTunes library (we all use the same store account). What am I missing?
Thanks in advance,
Dave

+... but when I change the iTunes media folder location to the same location as the install user's location, I get nothing. It's like iTunes can't see the data at that location.+
When you change user B's itunes preference to use C:\users\public\music\itunes\itunes media as their itunes media folder, that part worked, right?
You need to add the "C:\users\public\music\itunes\itunes media" folder to their itunes database file (itunes Library.itl). Each windows user has their own database file.
The itunes library content is not the same as the itunes library database.
Make sure everyone's preferences for "Copy files to itunes folder" is NOT checked, or you'll end up with duplicate files.
Message was edited by: Katrina S.

How to share one iTunes library with multiple computers AND Apple TV? Help?

It seems like my dilemma may not be easily solved. Hopefully it isn't as complicated as I think it will be. Here's the situation:
My wife hates that, in order to see or do anything with the images she takes, I need to have iPhoto open on my computer (Mac Pro), and she then has to connect to it over sharing.
By the same token, I don't like that she buys iTunes content on her MacBook, which is sometimes a duplicate of content I already have. Now that the App Store is out, that is going to start getting really expensive.
So instead, I want us to be able to:
1) Have ONE iTunes library on the network, and ONE iPhoto library. Both of these would be accessible to any computer on the network. When you launch iTunes, you would get all the media that is in that library.
2) Both be able to access iTunes at the same time to listen to / watch content.
3) Both be able to purchase iTunes content, and when it it purchased, it updates that single library. If I buy a song, the next time my wife fires up iTunes, that song is there for her to listen to.
4) Have our two Apple TV units be able to play content from this library.
So, I know that we need something on the network. I have a Drobo with DroboShare, so that is one option. I also have a spare Mac Pro laying around, along with a copy of OS X Leopard Server.
I just don't know what route we should take with this. All I want is for us to share a library, to be able to both use that library, for us to be able to sync content from that library to our portable devices, and for our Apple TVs to also see that library.
Possible?!

I'm sort of in the same boat. We've got an iMac with separate User Accounts set up and are currently sharing the same iTunes and iPhoto libraries along with streaming them to our Apple TV.
Right now I'm the only one with an iPod, however she'll be getting one in a couple of weeks.
We also just picked up a MacBook yesterday and I'd like to be able to sync certain libraries like iTunes and iPhoto so that no content gets duplicated on either the iMac or MacBook and so that we both have access to the current libraries for each program on our iPods and AppleTV.
I have an external hard drive that I back up the iMac on and I assume I could manually keep things current with that but there's got to be an easier way...that's why these are Macs right?
Bill

Can I share one iTunes Library with multiple computers on a network?

Can I share one iTunes Library with multiple computers on a network?
note: one library universally shared, not Home Sharing (one library each, shared to each.)
I want to share one library stores on my server and access it through various local computers. When I buy a song from a computer (non-server), I want it to be added to the library (stored on server). I want it to auto copy to my server, for organization. I want to be able to sync my phone from any computer.
Most of this I can do, if i figure out how to use one universal library for all my computers.
Any ideas how I can do this?

eyeinit,
You can authorize your iTunes account on up to 5 computers at a time.
However, purchased music is downloaded to the first machine to download it, but these articles have more information on moving your music between authorized computers:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93063
This one is for moving all your music using an iPod as a storage drive
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300173
Hope this helps,
Nathan C.

One iTunes library for multiple accounts, iPhones, laptops and PCs.

First off, I'll apologize up front for asking a question that has probably been asked a million times. I've searched the intarwebs and these forums but I've seen so many different answers and read so many different threads pertaining to my question that I think I've over-informed myself to the point of confusion.
OK, for the longest time I've had one iTunes library running on one Windows PC in my house. I used that for updating all our iPods. That was fine for the last however-many-years we've had iPods.
We just picked-up a couple iPhones last night.
All I want to do is move the iTunes library to our NAS so that we can both access the library from any laptop or PC in order to update the music on our iPhones using our different accounts.
Is there a definitive way to do this, or do I have to follow one of these sideways, shady and round-about ways to get this done.
Having to run upstairs to the PC seems to be completely needless with all this technology we have!
Any help would be appreciated.

After reading this and several other related threads, I am becoming thoroughly confused about all of this. I have a situation similar to the one that pokerpal described in the post dated January 7 at 8:06 pm, except that the music files on my system are located on an external hard drive. Everything else is pretty much the same though - I am the admin user (and the main iTunes user and maintainer) and my girlfriend is a standard user who has no music in her own iTunes library. She can see and listen to and make playlists from and sync her iPod with the music in this library from her account, and I can do the same thing, independent of her, from my account. And if I make a change to information within a song, she doesn't see it, and vice versa, and I understand that. What I don't understand is why when I add a song or an album to the music files by importing a CD or downloading something from the iTunes Music Store, she has no way of knowing that unless I tell her, and then she can add it to her library by using the "Add to Library" function. Is there no way of automatically updating her library files to add the new song(s)? We have almost 15,000 songs and videos in that library, and I don't even want to think about what might have to happen if the answer to my question is "no." Interestingly enough, if I put an update to a Word document in the same exact location (on the hard drive), we can update that and pass it back and forth all day - why is that such a difficult task for iTunes to accomplish?
Sorry I went on so long, but this has been building up for some time, and none of the solutions I've read about here have really been of any help, so I'm a bit frustrated and, as I said at the beginning, confused.
iMac G5, MacBook Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Can i install itunes multiple times on one computer for multiple users?

Can i install itunes multiple times on one computer for multiple users?

Like most applications you only need to install it once for it to be available to all users. (That said it is possible to install an application and only make it available to the current user, but that's rarely needed.)
tt2

Can users have one iTunes library deriving from two drives?

Hi everyone,
I keep my 4 & 5 star songs on my C drive and the rest (all stars, 1,2 3, etc.) on my exhternal hard drive.
Whenever I want to listen to my music, all I can readily play are the tunes on my C drive.
I'm guessing the issues having one library for tunes stored on separate drives is insurmountable?
I say that because I'm guessing that my iPod (4th gen) is only capable of importing from one library?
I think the biggest issue is either I don't know how to (or maybe users can't) list a second drive so that iTunes can load all songs from both drives whenever I do have the second drive up and running.
Adding to the second drive library issue, I can't figure out how to permanently tag my external HD's (I've got 6) so that their drive letter is not automatically defaulting to their order of prescence.
I can deal with that issue by simply not opening iTunes while I the second drive has been assigned a drive letter other than what iTunes (hopefully) is set to (i.e.; hopefully C and F drives).
But can users have one iTunes library deriving from two drives?

Seems I've over come what is something I'd hoped/expected iTunes would be capable of (ie; reinitiating the pathway for external HD music files when their drive letter is the only thing that changed).
I tried the obvious by going to iTunes's Edit>Preferences>Advanced and clicking the change button for "iTunes Music folder location", then entered the current drive and pathway (as the drive is currently assigned, F as opposed to the original G) and of course iTunes still couldn;t find the missing tunes.
Giving up on the hope that iTunes was designed smarter than it is (ie; each and every single missing tune req's manual redirection of pathway, as opposed to a preferable tick box for something like 'use the last redirected pathway').
And I finally figured out how to properly changed drive letter assignments, but still uncertasin if that means permanently tags my EHD's with that drive letter.
For that to be permanent, maybe I need to name each drive regardless that Windows already has unique inforamtion on each HD. Suppose I'll soon find out if the drive at this point has fianlly stored its drive name and whether or not Windows will contiue to change the EHD drive letters simply by the order which I am introducing them to the os.
No real luck with rats nest USB hubs as they crash my os alot, so I'm left to trying to find an easy way of managing the EHD drive assignments. THe following is the closest I've yet to come to doing that:
Click Start>Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management, and then in the left pane, under Storage, click Disk Management.
Right-click the drive, partition, logical drive, or volume for which you want to assign a drive letter, and then click Change Drive Letter and Paths.
Click Change.
Click Assign the following drive letter (if it is not already selected), click the drive letter that you want to use, and then click OK.
Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the drive letter change.
Again, too bad iTunes doesn't afford a 'find' feature for 'missing' files such that one might be afforded a tick box for 'do not prompt again, instead use the last indicated location for "iTunes Music" folder as the base storage location'.
This drive renaming thing is a real hassle. Not like somebody couldn't have guessed it and Windows and/or iTunes can't afford some script, etc. to better manage 'tagging' EHD's and/or re-locating 'missing' tunes.
But then what would we have to complain about, not that they listen anyway.

Multiple iPhones and one iTunes Library

I have a question about multiple iPhones and one iTunes Library.
Currently I have 3 PC's, 2 iPods and 2 iPhones.
My PC had the iTunes library on it and everyone was just listening to mine via the iTunes sharing.
Well I bought a Buffalo LinkStation and told itunes to move my library to M:\My Music\..... and then did a Consolidate Library which in turn moved all the music from my C: drive to the M: drive.
My wife's computer has it's own Library with no music (only app store apps, and ringtones).
Now my question is what happens if I tell my wifes computer that M:\My Music\....... is her new location of the library and restart itunes. I am pretty sure this will work fine. But what happens if she syncs her iPhone now? Will all my apps now be on her phone and she will lose hers? She does have her own itunes store account with her own apps. Is there a way to have it so only her apps are on her phone and my apps are on my phone? Can she choose different playlists to be synced than what I have?
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Brad

Since the three of you are using separate iTunes accounts, then you each need to run your own itunes, which should be logged into the itunes store using each individual account. For that, on a laptop, you each need to have your own computer accounts.

Two user accounts, one iTunes library

Hello,
trying to solve problem with sharing one itunes library on macbook pro (mid 2009) between two users. I moved all itunes folders to shared folder, open itunes on new account with alt key, choose library and seems to be working. However it isnt...on my account I did the same, worked sometimes. After a qwhile I recognized that i cant use both accounts simultaneously. Once I log in to new account and open itunes and then I just switch users (not logging off) and try to open itunes, the first picture warning appears...I include also pictures with sharing preferences which should be OK.
Any ideas how to solve this?
Once I log off from account, it starts working with other one. But wioth simple switching users, it doesnt work (or rarely:-/)

judge2001 wrote:
Do I also have to create an user account on my Mac for her in order to have her own addressbook and calendar?
yes.
How will she access "my" iTunes library from her account?
click here for information.
you can authorize iTunes on her user account to play/use content purchased with your iTunes store account and vice versa.
JGG
edited by the Jolly Green Giant (where Green stands for environmentally friendly)

One iTunes Library, Multiple Users

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