Song Database Questions - Importing

[Wrahn]

I’m in the process of importing tracks onto my USB external hard drive using Hoster 4.32 and it’s a slow process. I’m also learning something new every day thanks in large part to the postings on the Hoster Help forum and the by doing the imports. However, I have some questions that I hope the experts can answer:

1) How can I add tracks to the database without doing a rebuild every time I add them? It’s beginning to take a long time to rebuild.

2) What is the second number indicated during the rebuild process that indicates, “Currently processing Song DB track xxxx of xxxxx”? In my case the final number of tracks processed is 2,461 of 4,934. I don’t know where the 4,934 comes from.


3) How can I change the DiscID of a CD ID I entered in error? Reading through the posts it seems it can’t be edited.


4) How can I keep the duplicate tracks that have a different brand, without having them appear in my songbook? I don’t want to delete these songs that took so long to import.


5) How can I indicate the key change for a track in the song database and of course in the song book? I use my Hoster for my own use, so I need a way to know what key I’m using. At this time I enter a few spaces it after the song title, and then I type in the key change.


I have found that many CDs are in the on-line (in the sky) database, and that sure makes importing much easier and quicker. All told I “guesstimate” that about 4/5s of the CDs I have are in the databases. While the auto add title and artist makes the other 1/5 easier to import, it still is quite time consuming.


Thanks for any help you can provide,

Wes

[ddouglass]

Originally Posted by Wrahn

I’m in the process of importing tracks onto my USB external hard drive using Hoster 4.32 and it’s a slow process. I’m also learning something new every day thanks in large part to the postings on the Hoster Help forum and the by doing the imports. However, I have some questions that I hope the experts can answer:

Originally Posted by Wrahn

1) How can I add tracks to the database without doing a rebuild every time I add them? It’s beginning to take a long time to rebuild.

When you import tracks they are automatically added to the database and you do not have to rebuild for those.

Originally Posted by Wrahn

2) What is the second number indicated during the rebuild process that indicates, “Currently processing Song DB track xxxx of xxxxx”? In my case the final number of tracks processed is 2,461 of 4,934. I don’t know where the 4,934 comes from.

The second number should be the total number of songs files in the hard drive folders you have under rebuild. If it is not completing to that total number then you may have duplicates in one of the folders. Check in C:\MTU\Hoster for a Duplicate songs text file.

Originally Posted by Wrahn

3) How can I change the DiscID of a CD ID I entered in error? Reading through the posts it seems it can’t be edited.

That is correct. The only way to change it would be to use the Edit tool and delete those files. Then re-import them with the correct DiskID.

Originally Posted by Wrahn

4) How can I keep the duplicate tracks that have a different brand, without having them appear in my songbook? I don’t want to delete these songs that took so long to import.

You can use the Edit utility to "Hide in Songbook" those that you do not want listed.

Originally Posted by Wrahn

5) How can I indicate the key change for a track in the song database and of course in the song book? I use my Hoster for my own use, so I need a way to know what key I’m using. At this time I enter a few spaces it after the song title, and then I type in the key change.

There is no way to do this in either the database or the songbook. However you can list your most sung songs under your name in the Singers database. When you add a song from there the set Keychange is done automatically.

Originally Posted by Wrahn

I have found that many CDs are in the on-line (in the sky) database, and that sure makes importing much easier and quicker. All told I “guesstimate” that about 4/5s of the CDs I have are in the databases. While the auto add title and artist makes the other 1/5 easier to import, it still is quite time consuming.


Thanks for any help you can provide,

Wes

Wes, are you doing the monthly updates to get the maximum songs from the builtin database? Also note that the on-line database has the artists names in Firstname Lastname order instead of the standard Lastname, Firstname.

[Wrahn]

Dale,

Thanks for the quick input. When I get my mind around getting the rest of the CDs imported, I'll then erase the tracks with the wrong DiscID and re-install. I'll also start to evaluate which duplicates I want in the song book and either erase or hide them.

Yes, I'm doing the updates for the database.

Another situation just came up when I switched the external hard drive from my laptop to my netbook, the drive letter is different. I know I can go in and change the drive letter based on posts I have read, but is there another way I can switch back and forth? Do I have to create a Song DB for each computer? Would it be easier to have two external hard drives?

The reason I ask these questions is I'm taking a cruise with some sea days and I plan on taking my netbook (lighter and smaller) and complete the importing of those discs I'll have to import manually.

Thanks again for your input,
Wes

[ddouglass]

If it was me I would go ahead and do a rebuild of the songs database on the netbook, setting it up for the drive letter that was assigned. That shouldn't change for each time you plug it in the netbook. Anytime you add more songs to that drive through the laptop you will need to rebuild the database on the netbook for it to list those.

[Wrahn]

Dale,

Thanks, I did as you instructed using the drive letter provided and I rebuilt the song database and then the song book and everything worked out.

Thanks,
Wes

[admin]

Wes, I don't want in any way to sound "condescending" or insulting in any way, but you would learn a lot if you read the Hoster manual.