Size of Windows File Folder Name Causing Strange Behavior

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Joseph Ficarrotta

Size of Windows File Folder Name Causing Strange Behavior

Post by Joseph Ficarrotta »

I was lucky that my tinkering uncovered a workaround for this weird problem. Would be nice if you could fix it, or if not, explain why it happens.

I've organized my music collection in a Windows file folder structure, independent of MM's library. For my opera, the Windows file folder name is often pretty long, because it will include the list of featured singers, the opera chorus and orchestra, the conductor, and the record label. There will also be a lot of files IN the folder, all the recitatives, arias, choruses and interludes that are in the opera, in some cases, as many as 70 files. MediaMonkey does not behave well under those conditions. When I open them up as a group, they all appear in now playing, and will play, but some random few of them do not display the tag info, either in the Now Playing section or in the side bar---only the file name displays. Also (which I tried to attempt a fix), when trying to rescan the files to the library, some random number of files failed to reload, "Files didn't match your parameters" or something like that. At first I thought the files were corrupted, until I realized how widespread the issue was. To my surprise, when I shortened the WINDOWS file folder name, the problems disappeared, no adjustment to the files themselves or to MediaMonkey required. How is this a thing?? Why does MM care about the length of the name of the Windows folder? Additionally, I can have a really long file folder name, but if there are only a few files in the folder, say fewer than around 10, like for a symphony or a concerto, there is no problem---MM properly reads and displays all the tags. It's as if the combination of the file folder name length and the number of files in the folder, if "too much," creates some kind of overflow.

Thanks for your attention. At the very least, you should point out this issue in your documentation, to prevent some other poor user from spending so much time and frustration trying to fix this problem.

Best

Joseph Ficarrotta
Lowlander
Posts: 56465
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2003 5:53 pm
Location: MediaMonkey 5

Re: Size of Windows File Folder Name Causing Strange Behavior

Post by Lowlander »

Which version of Windows and MediaMonkey are you using? Paths longer than 248 characters can cause issues.
Joseph Ficarrotta

Re: Size of Windows File Folder Name Causing Strange Behavior

Post by Joseph Ficarrotta »

Windows 10. MediaMonkey 4.1.31.1919

Yeah, I checked the link you provided, and I'm betting the path length is the issue, since I'm using a MM4 version. Time to upgrade to 5 (actually thought I had at some point, guess not), and try again.

Thanks for the suggestion.
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