[Brian B]

So, after holding off for a while to make sure bugs were ironed out I finally made the upgrade from 12.3 to 13.1. Before I did anything I backed up my userdata folder and exported both my music library and video/TV library to multiple files. The export did not ask for a location and just did its thing.

After about 3-4 hours of re-scanning the music it is in terrible shape. I went from about 6500 artists to 1200. Also, complete albums are missing from the album list.

I'm convinced the problem is the exported .nfo files and folder.jpgs. I don't have my folders organized exactly as the guide suggests: I have my folder structure as Music/genre/albums. I also have a _Singles and a _Compilations folder underneath the various genres. I believe that none of that is getting processed correctly. There are folder.jpg and .nfo files in the root of the genre folder as well as in the main Music folder that don't make much sense, i.e. have one artist listed or a picture for a single artist.

I could just delete all these, but I'm guessing that I'm still going to lose the 5000 artist pictures that I entered manually in Frodo over a month's time.

So, my question is: How do I fix it?

PS. When I go to import the music library it just asks for a file location, but the export never gave me an option to export the files to a location...

PSS. The TV and video library seems almost 100% as they are organized as suggested TV/Show/Season/Episode and Movies/Movie Title/Video_TS

HELP!

[negge]

Why do you export and import? Just stash your copy of .xbmc (or XBMC in AppData if you're on Windows) somewhere safe and run Gotham, it will upgrade your databases and you won't have to import/export anything.

[whitebelly]

PS. When I go to import the music library it just asks for a file location, but the export never gave me an option to export the files to a location...

The file location is only applicable if you chose the 'single file' option when exporting, which is probably what you should have done. I think if your folder structure is not Artist/Album/ then you'll have problems with the individual export. Its an issue I've brought up before, dependance on the Artist folder structure is not ideal.

Another Gotham upgrade issue many have experienced is with MBID tags. You may want to turn that option off and/or delete (or correct) any MBID tags in your music files if they exist.

If you saved your old userdata folder, you could copy that old music datbase to the new install, deleting the new db, and try it out. Or you could potentially re-install the older version, export to single file, then go back to a clean Gotham install and try again. Might want to open a couple nfos with a text editor and see if they are pointing to artist file locations that don't exist.

[peppe_sr]

Set in music settings for album album and artist to use local information instead of the one from web. see what happen.
Peppe

[Brian B]

Why do you export and import? Just stash your copy of .xbmc (or XBMC in AppData if you're on Windows) somewhere safe and run Gotham, it will upgrade your databases and you won't have to import/export anything.

Um...because that's what I thought I was supposed to do?? You try and read the backup instructions! Besides being sent from one page and then back around in a circle it isn't clear what to do and what not to do.

The other thing that isn't obvious is where the userdata folder is. Read the Windows location. %appdata%...something else. Windows couldn't find it with a search. Anyway, what are you suggesting I do at this point since I've already "upgraded"?

B.

---

Set in music settings for album album and artist to use local information instead of the one from web. see what happen.
Peppe

Already set this way by default--thanks but isn't the problem.

B.

---

PS. When I go to import the music library it just asks for a file location, but the export never gave me an option to export the files to a location...

The file location is only applicable if you chose the 'single file' option when exporting, which is probably what you should have done. I think if your folder structure is not Artist/Album/ then you'll have problems with the individual export. Its an issue I've brought up before, dependance on the Artist folder structure is not ideal.

Another Gotham upgrade issue many have experienced is with MBID tags. You may want to turn that option off and/or delete (or correct) any MBID tags in your music files if they exist.

If you saved your old userdata folder, you could copy that old music datbase to the new install, deleting the new db, and try it out. Or you could potentially re-install the older version, export to single file, then go back to a clean Gotham install and try again. Might want to open a couple nfos with a text editor and see if they are pointing to artist file locations that don't exist.

I'm aware of the Music Brainz stuff, but none of my music uses those tags (that I know of).

(1) So, I will try copying the old database over the new and see what happens.

(2) How do I re-install the old version? And, if I do you are thinking I will have all the artist info back? What do I do about all the .nfo and .jpg files XBMC has written all over my music folders?

(3) The info and .jpg files that are in parent folders make no sense--They reference single artists when the folder has hundreds in sub-folders. I might just try deleting these first and see what happens.

Appreciate any more detailed advice to get me back the way everything was.

Thanks
Brian

[scott967]

For the music library, there are two issues:

1. restoring your library database. That shouldn't be too hard if you backed up your db from Frodo. Better is if you backed up your database folder and thumbnail folder.

2. fixing your source folder/files. It sounds like you have a lot of local art files. Since you have what might be called a "non-standard" folder layout, it may well be all that local art is still there. I would probably go through your source folders using file creation date and delete to recycle bin anything from the multi-file export. (In the future, recommend only using the single file option.)

You might check out texturecache.py, a python script that can be used to fix your art cache. In the worst case (art files for some reason over-written) you can probably use the cached art to restore the local file.

As far as single file export/import for music, I find that works, except there is an element

Code:

<art></art>

for artist art that doesn't seem to be read back on import so I have to set the art manually.

scott s.
.

[Brian B]

For the music library, there are two issues:

1. restoring your library database. That shouldn't be too hard if you backed up your db from Frodo. Better is if you backed up your database folder and thumbnail folder.

2. fixing your source folder/files. It sounds like you have a lot of local art files. Since you have what might be called a "non-standard" folder layout, it may well be all that local art is still there. I would probably go through your source folders using file creation date and delete to recycle bin anything from the multi-file export. (In the future, recommend only using the single file option.)

You might check out texturecache.py, a python script that can be used to fix your art cache. In the worst case (art files for some reason over-written) you can probably use the cached art to restore the local file.

As far as single file export/import for music, I find that works, except there is an element

Code:

<art></art>

for artist art that doesn't seem to be read back on import so I have to set the art manually.

scott s.
.

Since I have the userdata folder it looks like I have both the database and thumbnail folder.

You're saying it is not possible to just copy over the database file (mymusic32) to Gotham and do the same with the thumbnails somehow?

I need to reinstall Frodo?

I did go through and delete artist.nfo, fanart.jpg and folder.jpg files from the parent folders for all the genres, but it has not had any effect. Do I need to do a re-scan rather than library update? (I realize this takes a long time, so no point doing it unless the artist pics are restored properly.)

I guess I was hoping someone might have specific instructions I could follow to get Gotham to work like Frodo.

B.

[peppe_sr]

try to do this:
install again a frodo version of xbmc.
restore music and video library from settings.
now you should have your data in right place (initial state)
if it is so, copy/backup the whole user folder called XBMC
X:\Users\USER\AppData\Roaming\XBMC
install gotham and replace the new empty user folder with yours.
if you have the scraper set to .nfo everything should be fine.
Peppe

[whitebelly]

For the music library, there are two issues:

1. restoring your library database. That shouldn't be too hard if you backed up your db from Frodo. Better is if you backed up your database folder and thumbnail folder.

2. fixing your source folder/files. It sounds like you have a lot of local art files. Since you have what might be called a "non-standard" folder layout, it may well be all that local art is still there. I would probably go through your source folders using file creation date and delete to recycle bin anything from the multi-file export. (In the future, recommend only using the single file option.)

You might check out texturecache.py, a python script that can be used to fix your art cache. In the worst case (art files for some reason over-written) you can probably use the cached art to restore the local file.

As far as single file export/import for music, I find that works, except there is an element

Code:

<art></art>

for artist art that doesn't seem to be read back on import so I have to set the art manually.

scott s.
.

Since I have the userdata folder it looks like I have both the database and thumbnail folder.

You're saying it is not possible to just copy over the database file (mymusic32) to Gotham and do the same with the thumbnails somehow?

I need to reinstall Frodo?

I realize all these various "suggestions" are probably running you in circles. Its the nature of the beast sometimes. I think re-installing Frodo is a last resort. If you do indeed have a copy of your old musicdb, you may simply first try to delete any existing db in your present Gotham build, copy the old DB into the database directory, and see what happens.

Going back to Frodo might may or may not help you. If you can get a Frodo session running with everything like it was, then you could export a single file library. If you have your old userdata folder intact(or at least the database and thumbnail/artwork directories), you could possibly install frodo on a different computer, replace the userdata folder with your old one, then use that installation to export a library file. The reason for this approach is that going back and forth from Gotham to Frodo, replacing one with the other then back again, might simply bring in other issues.

If you don't have your old music db file untouched, going back to Frodo may not help you any.

[Brian B]

I realize all these various "suggestions" are probably running you in circles. Its the nature of the beast sometimes. I think re-installing Frodo is a last resort. If you do indeed have a copy of your old musicdb, you may simply first try to delete any existing db in your present Gotham build, copy the old DB into the database directory, and see what happens.

I can do this, but don't I need to copy over the thumbnail folder as well?

B.

[whitebelly]

I realize all these various "suggestions" are probably running you in circles. Its the nature of the beast sometimes. I think re-installing Frodo is a last resort. If you do indeed have a copy of your old musicdb, you may simply first try to delete any existing db in your present Gotham build, copy the old DB into the database directory, and see what happens.

I can do this, but don't I need to copy over the thumbnail folder as well?

B.

First....take my advice with the awareness that I have not gone through this particular problem, its just from my understanding of how this stuff works.....

I don't think you should need to copy the thumbnail folder if all the original artwork is still where it was among your music files. But, for stuff that was scraped, the art would need to be re-downloaded, and if that scraping source has changed or no longer exists, it would need to be re-scraped. So, if all your artwork is local, I wouldn't copy the thumbnail folder. If it was all scraped, copying the thumbnail folder might help.

With your database only, it should be able to find all the local artwork and create new thumbnails. Anyone with a different understanding, please feel free to correct me.

[Brian B]

The artist pictures are not local (due to my not having any directories named with artists). There appear to be two music database files: one with a 32 and one with a 64(?) after them. I assume I copy both over?

I'm at work, so when I get home I'll copy the database files and thumbnail folder over and then see what happens.

If it doesn't work, then back to Frodo?

B.

---

try to do this:
install again a frodo version of xbmc.
restore music and video library from settings.
now you should have your data in right place (initial state)
if it is so, copy/backup the whole user folder called XBMC
X:\Users\USER\AppData\Roaming\XBMC
install gotham and replace the new empty user folder with yours.
if you have the scraper set to .nfo everything should be fine.
Peppe

In case I go this route, what do you mean by "restore music and video library from settings?" Do you mean copy the old userdata folder back to the new install?

B.

[scott967]

MyMusic46 is Gotham and MyMusic32 is Frodo. Upgrading Frodo to Gotham should read (and not change) MyMusic32 and transfer all the data automatically to a fresh MyMusic46.

scott s.
.

[Brian B]

MyMusic46 is Gotham and MyMusic32 is Frodo. Upgrading Frodo to Gotham should read (and not change) MyMusic32 and transfer all the data automatically to a fresh MyMusic46.

scott s.
.

So I should delete both and copy the MyMusic32 over then, correct?

B.

[peppe_sr]

In case I go this route, what do you mean by "restore music and video library from settings?" Do you mean copy the old userdata folder back to the new install?

B.

in first post you said: exported both my music library and video/TV library to multiple files. so you can re import from settings-->library your video, music backup if needed. but if you have your entire original data folder use just that.
i had similar issues in coming from frodo to gotham
Peppe