Organizing Music Folder

I'm hoping that somebody can help me with this. I've noticed that I have several folders for one artist off of one album (for example: Alejandro Sanz's folder then there is an Alejandro Sanz_The Corrs folder). Is there any way to combine the two folders into one? This is a situation that I find myself running into often when I import music. I'd appreciate any help...

Thanks a bunch Doc. I tried the first method that you suggested and noticed that the Artist portion contains the name of the artist, /, then the featured artist. When I deleted the featured artist my problem was fixed!
I guess as a follow-up question is there any way to keep the multiple folders from being created or do I have to go through my music and manually make the changes each time it happens?

Similar Messages

ITunes stopped organizing music folder

I have iTunes set to organize music. All of a sudden, when I put a tune into the music folder and click it, it appears in iTunes and plays, but a new folder is not created and it stays in the main folder. In the Preferences screen, Advanced, General tab, the box next to Keep iTunes folder organized is checked.
How can I get it to resume organizing?
Jan
AMD Windows 2000

Hello DenDen281. Welcome to the Apple Discussions!
This discussion area is for AirPort networking related items. You may have more luck getting a reply to your questions if you post in the iTunes area.

Organizing Music Folder is adding multiple track numbers

When "Keep Music Folder Organized" is checked in Preferences, file names are prefixed with track number. I think there used to be a way to prevent that but I can't find it in the current version (8.2). I could live with the track number prefix, but I now have several cases of the track number being repeated. Here's an example: "1-02 1-02 1-02 Where Did Our Love G". Note that the song name was truncated when the prefixes were added. It hasn't happen to all my tracks, but seems to have happened mostly to those that were imported from .WAV files that I copied from vinyl. Is there a way to prevent this? Is it an iTunes bug? Is there an easy way to remove the prefixes in bulk?

Success! From this thread...
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=9267705&tstart=0
see turingtest2's note.
The part missing that I know works on Macs and may work on Windows, is AFTER you perform that hack, open preferences click on the Advanced tab and then UN-check "Keep iTunes Music Folder Organized", then click OK which dumps you out of preferences. Now open preferences again, and reselect (check) the box for "Keep iTunes Music Folder Organized" and click OK to get out of preferences. On a Mac, at this point iTunes will go through your whole library and fix all the file names to remove the track numbers in front of the song titles in the media files themselves.
Patrick

Sharing one organized music folder with different computers

I have one mp3 folder which is organized by itunes running on, lets say, computer 1. the mp3 folder is on the computer 1.
now there is a second computer, computer 2, running itunes and is connected via ethernet.
how can i use itunes on both computers now?
I want to import music on computer 2 and then see the imported files on computer 1 and vice versa.
I see all the files on computer 2, but silly me.. i said computer 2 to also organize the same folder, now computer 1 doesn't find any files any more. how can i fix this elegantly? all the files are still in the very same place, but itunes on computer 1 doesn't find them.
thanks for some help!

please let me know if this is an impossible thing for itunes or not.
if it is not then i don't know the key word or the name of the function.

Copying iTunes music folder but keepin' MY music organized MY way!!

The questions been asked a hundred times: how do I move my iTunes library to an external hard drive?
Yeah, I have the same question, but with a few differences. Basically, I keep my music folder organized as I like it. Consolidating the Library screws it all up. If "James Brown" is on the soundtrack to "Rocky IV," I want to have a "Rocky IV" folder with James Brown in there-- not a "James Brown" folder with another folder called "Rocky IV!" Why should I have to search the entire hard drive for all the separate tracks that make up "Rocky IV?!"
All I'd like to be able to do is copy my current music folder (and its hierarchy) to my new drive and link the library to it without screwing up playlists, etc.. Again, the key for me is keeping my music folder organized the way I've organized it.
C'mon, there's gotta be a simple way to do this!

I think you can do it this way: drag and drop the "iTunes" folder (under the 'Macintosh HD'/'Users'/-username-/'Music' folder) onto the external harddrive.
That works if the music is in the iTunes folder.
If it's not, it will still work but all the music will still be in the original location.
Are you saying that holding down the Option/Alt key will then automatically ask for the location of the new music folder?
No, it won't. It will ask you Create a new library or Choose existing library. it is asking for a iTunes library file, not a music folder.
If an artist appears on a soundtrack, I want to keep that file in the soundtrack's folder, not the artists' folder.
Set the album as a compilation. It will be stored in iTunes music folder -> Compilations -> {Album name}.
All I'd like to be able to do is copy my current music folder (and its hierarchy) to my new drive and link the library to it without screwing up playlists, etc..
Since you are managing the music yourself, not any easy way to do it.
You could export your playlists, delete the music from iTunes, move the music folder, re-add the music and import the playlists.
Just curious. Why do you care what folders iTunes uses? Just use iTunes to do everything instead of going into the Finder.

What happens after unchecking 'Keep iTunes Music folder organized'?

After unchecking the 'Keep iTunes Music folder organized' option, am I right in thinking that future additions to the library are simply linked from their default location? If so, what happens when ripping CDs, and how is it possible to rename or move files/folders without iTunes failing to find them and having to add them again?

It's more what doesn't happen rather than what does. If you like to organise your own folders in your Music folder you must leave it unchecked, as checking it gives iTunes the authority to rename and move tracks at will.
If you rip a CD with iTunes and the iTunes Music folder according the tabs recovered from Grace note. The hierarchy is Artist\album.
This is not affected by Keep iTunes Music folder organised.
If you add tracks already on your PC, depending on the setting of "Copy to iTunes Music folder when adding to library, iTunes will either store a link to the track in its current location or copy it into the iTunes Music folder according to the tags.
It is not possible to move or rename any track in your library or iTunes will lose it. There is no folder watch feature.
So you need to place and name a file BEFORE adding it to the library if you want to manage your own folders. Once added you can't change it without having to either add it again or find it manually in iTunes.
The only thing you can do is to use iTunes to move the whole iTunes Music folder to a new location.
Message was edited by: polydorus

Keeping itunes music folder organized

I have the box checked for "keep itunes music folder organized" but noticed that the folders on my computer are not consistent with how certain albums are organized in itunes.
For example, I have a series of albums, all with the same name, Vol. 1-6. On itunes, they are all properly separated by Vol number and disc number, but in the folder on my computer, they are all lumped in together in the same folder.
Anyone know how I can fix this because I really want to keep my itunes music folder consistent with how the music is layed out in itunes.
Thanks much.

I just ripped a 4-disc set that had really bad Gracenote tags.
I had to fiddle around with things so itunes could organize them properly. If you want more details, post back.
I really don't think this is an itunes bug. I think it's an issue with a bad Gracenote entry.

ITunes Music Folder organization

Hey. I have all my albums stored in a My Music folder, some are labelled fully (Artist - Album) as the folder name, while others are simply the artist, the album or what have you. As I load new albums onto my computer, I just do a manual "add folder to iTunes" each time. I checked both Keep ITunes Music Folder Organized and Copy Files to iTunes Music Folder when Adding, and it prompts me to copy all the files over. I've tried this a few times, using My Music as the folder, and other locations, but it only ever copies like, ten of my three-hundred odd albums.. I want it to copy ALL my music and organize it accordingly, but it won't.. What gives?

Hi Jen, welcome to discussions
iTunes always manages the music folder in that way (\[artistname]\[albumname]\[title]).
To keep it from splitting up your albums with several different artist, check "part of a compilation" in the info tab (right-click->get info). Now those albums will appear in one folder (\compilations\[albumname]\[title])

ITunes Music Folder Organization Inproperly

After I imported music of the album "Wings Of Song", by James Galway, from my removable hard disk to "iTunes Music Folder" and had iTunes organized it, I discovered something that's a little bit wierd. All the music I just imported is put under the folder Compilation\Wings of Song. This means that when iTunes organizing the music folder, it unexpectedly "thought" all these music are by the artist Compilation. What is the reason? Could anyone tell me why? Thank you!

The Compilation directory is how iTunes organizes albums that Gracenote (CDDB) considers works of various artists or collections of songs from the same artist, but differing albums (like "Best Of's" or "Greatest Hits").
The CDDB is not always consistent, as some Greatest Hits are marked as compilations and others are not. This really irked me in the beginning as I was wondering why some of my albums went missing. At first I tried to manually reorganize and move the files, but it was cumbersome. I stumbled on the "Compilations" function and it made things much easier.
For instance, if you have a Greatest Hits album of U2 sitting in the Compilations directory and would rather have it under the U2 directory (where I feel it better belongs), you would perform the process outlined below and the album and songs would move to its "improved" location.
That's why you have folders in your Compilations directory. Some you may wish to keep there, some you may want to move to a more appropriate place. This is how. Try moving some of them to their Artist's folder (if you have any that would qualify).
First check your Preferences:
-- Advanced/General: Keep iTunes Music folder organized (on)
-- Advanced/General: Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library (off) - change it back to 'on' after the song switch, if you want
To move an Album from the Compilations folder after it was imported from a CD (or otherwheres):
-- Highlight the collection of songs on that CD within the main Library
-- Right-click, 'Get Info'
-- Remove the 'Part of Compilation' check-mark - turn it to 'no'
-- Click 'OK'
iTunes will reorganize your PC folder structure, moving the songs from the Compilation folder to their Artist folder.
To defeat a Compilation designation prior to ripping the tracks from a CD, go to 'Get Info' on the CD and make sure that the 'Part of Compilation' box is not checked. This will keep the album under its designated Artist folder.
This is how I keep my music organized. I only want 'true' compilations under the Compilations folder, not some of the Artist's 'Greatest Hits'. You may have other desires.

Importing only songs to music folder, NOT videos?

OK, so here's my problem... I have probably 25+ gig's of Movies, and only have about 15 GB's of space left on my laptop. (I have a LOT of music, TV shows, etc...)
I would like to know if there is a way to get iTunes to import music ONLY into the iTunes music folder, and leave videos and such at their source (a 500GB external drive).
I obviously could copy the music manually, but that means it is no longer organized in the iTunes folder.

Note - You don't need to copy them to the HD first,
as btabz suggested.
There are different ways to import music. You can copy them (the music files) onto the HD wherever you want and then import into iTunes, or have iTunes import directly off the DVD and put the files in the iTunes Music Folder. Both ways get the music into iTunes and stored on your HD. It depends if you want the music in the iTunes Music folder or not. With the way I suggested, the music is placed where you want, instead of having iTunes put it where it wants.
Both ways will work fine though.
Message was edited by: btabz

After a crash, lots of audiobooks have somehow moved to Music folder, and links are broken - how can I fix this?

Wow, I'm surprised the forums accepted that long a title.
Anyway, the computer crashed. I started again, and when opening iTunes after the crash ... something happened. There was a prompt that I idiotically didn't write down (Moving Library? Updating Library?), that kept going for hours, and eventually I just gave up and shut it down. That was probably stupid. Also evidence of significant things happening: the next Time Machine backup was 60GB+, so something big had changed.
As best I can tell, lots of my Audiobooks (and I've got MANY) now have broken links - when I look in the "iTunes Media" folder, many of the files that were once in the "Audiobooks" folder are now in the "Music" folder instead. All are still in the same subfolder as before: so audiobook files that were in "Audiobooks / BBC Melvyn Bragg" are now in "Music / BBC Melvyn Bragg", for example. So far I've only found Audiobooks that have been messed up in this way. Music and iTunes U and Podcasts seem to be unchanged, but maybe I just haven't noticed those problems yet.
And obviously I want to fix this.
Note that my iTunes library is set to "Keep iTunes Music Folder organized". All of the organization is what iTunes has done.
Option 1: can I just restore from a Time Machine backup? If so, what should I restore? There have been a few changes in the metadata in the 3-4 days since the crash, but I'm not overly concerned with that.
Option 2: can I just use Finder and move the files back? This would seem the "easiest" option to me. Although lots (hundreds? thousands?) of audiobook files have been moved, they're within only a couple of dozen different folders. Dragging them back into the correct folder would be easy - but what kind of havoc would that wreak on the database system?
Option 3: go through each track and find the file. I can do this. It'll take hours and hours and hours. I don't want to do this.
Slightly different question: how can I make a smart playlist of all the files with broken links? (I'm still trying to get a handle on just how big this problem is.) I've found suggestions about (1) making a smart playlist of everything, (2) dragging all of those into a normal playlist, and (3) making a new smart playlist of whatever's in #1 but not in #2, but that doesn't seem to be working for this situation. Is that advice now outdated, or is there something unique to my situation?
Thanks in advance!

Following up: I went with Option 2 above, and it seems to have worked quite well. I didn't even need to quit iTunes. After the files were moved, the exclamation marks remained at first, until I played the file, or restarted iTunes - now all seems well, until the next crash anyway.

Moving an iTunes Music folder that's outside of iTunes (Library) folder

My music is stored on my external hard-drive, but the iTunes folder (with the library and .xml file) is in my user "Music" folder on the main HD. I want to store more things on the external to make room on my HD, but I want to make some folders to keep the music separate first. But doing so will change the pathway. Is there a way of doing this change without losing all the track information (especially album art...that took me a LONG time to finish, I have a lot of music) ?
I guess an alternative question is...will putting other files in the same path as my music directory on my external affect iTunes in any way? Do I need to make more folders to separate the iTunes music from the non-iTunes music? Or can I lump them together as long as iTunes knows where that folder is? If this is the case, I would still like to know if the former is possible. I want it to be nice, neat, and organized : ).

Not sure if this helps your issue, but what I would do is close iTunes, then copy the entire iTunes folder to the external hard drive. Then you can use these instructions to open the library at its new location...
How to open an alternate iTunes Library file or create a new one
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=304447
Now everything is on the external. Assuming you were successful in opening it at the external location, you can now delete or reduce in size the version on your internal drive. iTunes should still be able to access the stuff that was originally in the iTunes folder as well as the stuff in other folders outside the iTunes folder on your external drive.
Since everything is now on the same drive, you could use the consolidate command to move everything together into the iTunes folder. However this will move them and sort them the way iTunes wants to organize things, so if you have a different method of organization, this will mess it up.
Patrick

How do i get the mp3 information in my music folder to match the changes i make in itunes?

So basically, I am very OCD about the organization of my Itunes music collection. Every time I add a song I edit the info so that the artist, track name, album art, etc. are correct and follow the format I use. My Itunes music folder, however, is a complete disaster. Songs that I've imported from CDs are impossible to find because the proper artist and track names that I fix in itunes are not altered on the actual mp3 file. Even songs that I've purchased online frustrate me because I have a preferred method of organizing collaborative works that's different from the way the songs are initially labeled. Ultimately, I have a ton of music that would be a nightmare to sort through if I did so outside of Itunes.
I've looked this up quite a few times and honestly haven't been able to find any advice that can solve this problem. Perhaps I haven't been looking up the right question, but I hope what I'm trying to get across now makes sense. I believe what I need is for the id3 tags to be permanently changed when I alter information in Itunes.
I'm running OS X Lion 10.7.5 on a MacBook Pro.
I would be extremely grateful if anyone knows a way I can solve this problem, even if the only data I'm able to alter is the artist and track name, that would still be a significant help.
Thanks in advance !

Unfortunately, that's the only method Keep Media Organized uses. It's not as simple as renaming the file: iTunes may be unable to locate the file if the Filename changes, and you locating each file manually for iTunes is probably not an option.
However, now you have most of your library organized by iTunes, if you could stay on top of manual organization, you can uncheck this option and google one of Doug's scripts (perhaps "Doug's iTunes Script Append Artist to Filename"—you'll want to check version compatibility and whatnot with such scripts, as many of them are rather old). Your new additions to your library will not be organized automatically, though. I personally prefer iTunes organizing my files, as I am liable to procrastinate to an unholy degree when faced with organizational tasks!

Why has itunes moved my music files out of the Music folder?

To my horror I just found out that itunes has moved folders (albums) out of the Music folder, Ive always found those folders very well organized (music, movies, podcasts, etc) now Im seeing some albums mixed with those folders (out of the music folder) and some albums IN the music folder as well, even worse I have the same folder inside Music and out!! with a few tracks on each, but in iTunes everything looks normal and it plays the album as usual, Im losing my mind over this I cant find a way to fix it, I even started moving them manually but there are too many, and for the duplicate folders I have to move the tracks that were moved. Any idea on why did this happen? I dont want to move the folders and lose hours only to find out that itunes did it again!! I thank you very very ver much in advance.

iTunes on a Mac may be more forgiving if you move things around manually, but it isn't really recommended.
Here are typical layouts for the iTunes folders:
If you have upgraded from version 8 (or earlier) to iTunes 9 (or later) at some point, then your media folder (everything inside the red outline) may still be called iTunes Music instead of iTunes Media. The extra Music folder inside the media folder is used if you had an older library and have allowed iTunes to Upgrade to iTunes Media Organization (iTunes 9) or used File > Library > Organize Library > Reorganize files in the folder "<Media Folder>" (iTunes 10/11). Depending on your choices for Keep iTunes Media folder organized and Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library plus a little bug in which one build changed the name of the file storing the choice of layout it is quite easy for some of your files to be organized according to one layout and some the other. (Recent installs of iTunes on a Mac now give the library file the .itl extension)
Assuming you're happy letting iTunes organize your files the following steps should tidy things up (should it be necessary):
1. Select File > Library > Organize Library... > Tick Reorganize files in the folder "<Media Folder>" and click OK. Skip if this option is grayed out (already upgraded) or you prefer the older layout.
2. Select File > Library > Organize Library... > Tick Consolidate files and click OK. This will bring any files currently organized outside the designated media folder into it. N.B. This will create duplicate copies of any file that needs to be consolidated, and you will need to manually clean up afterwards.
3. Select iTunes > Preferences > Advanced tab, uncheck Keep iTunes Media folder organized and click OK.
4. Select iTunes > Preferences > Advanced tab, check Keep iTunes Media folder organized and click OK. This triggers iTunes into reorganizing everything according to your preferences.
5. (Optional, if applicable) Close iTunes, rename the media folder iTunes Music as iTunes Media then restart iTunes. Check under iTunes > Preferences > Advanced tab that the location has automatically updated. If you can't access the media for any reason just undo the folder rename.
PS If you really prefer the older layout, but it is already in the new one then, edit the hidden file .iTunes Preferences.plist in your media folder and change the integer from 1 to 0 before doing step 3.
You should backup your library before attempting any major reorganization.
If iTunes is still creating files or folders in the wrong locations there is a possibility of permissions problems. Offhand I'm not sure of the correct OS X terms but on Windows both the system and user accounts should have full access permissions to all files & folders within the iTunes folder in order for it to work properly.
tt2

A LOT of iTunes broken links/tracks after Music folder move...

So yeah, I'm getting a TON of broken links / dead track links in iTunes after having to do two things to my iTunes install recently and I'm at wits end trying to fix it.
I keep my iTunes Music Folder on an external and share the iTunes library between my work Macbook Pro and my home Macbook. Every Friday I drag my iTunes folder and all contents from my MBP onto an external and replace the iTunes folder on the 'weekend' MB, then do the same back on Monday. I keep my iTunes music 'View' as 'Date Added' so that I can always be listening to whatever is newest. It's how I roll.
Well, this week I had some data problems during the transfer and had to use a previous week's iTunes Music Folder, which was fine as I hadn't added much this week.
I also got a new external because the old one was getting a little shady, so after doing the iTunes Music Folder replacement I moved my music all over to a new external drive, told iTunes where it all was at. iTunes did it's thing, 'organized' my stuff and all seemed good - until I got back deeper into the catalogue of music and started getting a LOT of broken tracks. The songs are still there, in the correct folders and all, but for some reason iTunes isn't finding them.
When I say a LOT, I mean so far it's hundreds of my 13,000 songs.
Now I COULD use the 'Super Remove Dead Tracks' script from Doug's to find all the broken files then re-add the whole library, but it will add all the old songs out of order because they will get a new 'Added' date.
I could also manually move thru my whole library holding down the arrow key for 'Next' to find all the broken links then go thru, select them, and use the 'iTunes Track CPR' script from Doug's to re-add them to the library with ratings intact, but still they will be out of order time-wise.
I cannot find a script that will parse my library, find broken links, and re-associate them with their tracks, nor can I figure out why this happened and any other way to fix it. Repairing permissions hasn't helped. Any other ideas?

Just to follow up with a more comprehensive example of looping through a Library to detect & repair "missing" file-tracks:
<pre>
property kErrAENoSuchObject:(-1728)
on run
tell (application "iTunes")
set theLibraryPlaylist to (first library playlist)
tell theLibraryPlaylist
set theNumCandidateFileTracks to (count (every file track))
repeat with i from 1 to theNumCandidateFileTracks by 1
-- Get a reference to this file-track
set thisFileTrackRef to (file track i)
-- Get this file-track's info (useful for debugging, etc.)
set thisArtist to (artist of thisFileTrackRef)
set thisAlbum to (album of thisFileTrackRef)
set thisName to (name of thisFileTrackRef)
set thisFileTrackInfo to (thisArtist & " > " & thisAlbum & " > " & thisName)
-- Display a diagnostic message every 500th file-track
if ((i mod 500) = 0) then
tell me
display dialog ("Checking file-track #" & i & ": " & ¬
return & return & thisFileTrackInfo) ¬
buttons {"Cancel", "•"} giving up after 2.5
end tell -- me
end if
-- Retrieve this file-track's target file (an AS 'alias' object), if any
-- {!!! NOTE: Due to a bug in iTunes 7.x+ (esp. when downloading), AS might
-- be unable to access the 'location' field of some file-tracks !!!}
try
set thisFileTrackTargetFile to (location of thisFileTrackRef)
on error errMsg2 number errNum2
-- Check whether it's that bizarre error: (-1728) "Can't get location of …"
if (errNum2 = (kErrAENoSuchObject of me)) then
-- Set up to just skip this track (assume it's being downloaded)
set thisFileTrackTargetFile to (anything) -- (Other than 'missing value')
else (* Re-signal all other errors *)
error errMsg2 number errNum2
end if
end try
-- Check whether this file-track is "missing" its target file
if (thisFileTrackTargetFile = (missing value))
-- Inform the user
tell me
display dialog ("Repairing this missing file-track: " & ¬
return & return & thisFileTrackInfo) ¬
buttons {"Cancel", "•"} giving up after 2.5
end tell -- me
-- Set up this target file's new pathname (e.g., via explicit user input, or
-- better yet automatically reconstructed from this file-track's tags such
-- as Artist, Album, Name, Kind, etc.)
-- ... Translate this file-track's kind into a filename-extension
set thisKind to (kind of thisFileTrackRef)
set thisNameExt to "m4a" -- ... Default
if ({thisKind} is in {("Protected AAC audio file")}) then -- Older DRM'd file
set thisNameExt to "m4p"
else if ({thisKind} is in {("MPEG audio file")}) then -- MP3
set thisNameExt to "mp3"
else if (thisKind contains "movie file") then -- E.g., interactive booklet
set thisNameExt to "mov"
end -- (thisKind = "MPEG audio file") ... else if ... else ...
-- ... Auto-build this target file's new pathname
set thisTargetFileNewPathname to ("New Disk:New Path:" & ¬
thisArtist & ":" & thisAlbum & ":" & thisName & "." & thisNameExt)
-- Assign this new target file (as an AS 'alias' object) to this file-track
-- (This is the crucial step that was impossible in older versions of iTunes!)
set (location of thisFileTrackRef) to (alias thisTargetFileNewPathname)
end if -- (thisFileTrackTargetFile = (missing value))
end repeat -- with i from 1 to theNumCandidateFileTracks by 1
end tell -- theLibraryPlaylist
end tell -- (application "iTunes")
end run
</pre>
Regards,
--P

Organizing Music Folder

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