Excel: Comparing old and new library?

Roon Software Discussion
1

Hi!

Would anyone know how to compare two exported Excel files from two complete libraries?

Problem is my Drobo totally crashed with all my music taken into its sad death.
Now I have a backup of the music plus library from February 2020, so a reaintall to a new Synology was possible.

But.

Library from 2021, before the crash, and the library from 2020 differ in a whole lot of albums.
Now I’d like to know which albums I’ve lost so I can get them back somehow.

So I have two Excel files. One från the old and one from the new library.
But how do I compare these since Roon seems to refuse to add the column for date added?

BR,
Thomas

2

One way to do this would be to sort by a meaningful column/columns (e.g. artist/album/track-name), export as text (*.txt or *.csv) and then compare the text files with any file comparing utility.

3

The database guy in me would dump them into sql and run queries. However, isn’t there a de-dup function in Excel.

Might this be what you need?

1 Like
4

Thanks!
But the lists would then have to be converted to lines in one cell only, right?

5

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/basic-tasks-in-spreadsheet-compare-f2b20af8-a6d3-4780-8011-f15b3229f5d8
Basic seems a bit judgemental . . .
This should give you some help I hope.

6

The right keyword is Pivot Table and it works without programming knowledge.

https://www.google.com/search?q=excel+pivot+table+create&oq=Excel+Pivo&aqs=chrome.3.0i433i512l2j69i57j0i512l7.7504j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

I used to do it professionally with Excel. Today I use privately only LibreOffice, there it also goes very well.

Copy the first table and the second table together. Make another column and enter there o or n, then it is clear which record is old and which is new.

Mark everything and build a pivot table as described in the internet. So flexible evaluations are well possible and it is immediately apparent where n is missing.

7

I’ve received tremendously valued help from Uwe Albrecht to create a usable file.
Many many thanks.

Now I will start to recollect all the missing albums again.

What a great community!

8

Yes is think we all need to maintain our fascination and community, even if there are always new moments of frustration. I also thank you for the support and music recommendations I have received.

The right motto is:

Support with your knowledge for the satisfaction of others in this community. Not everyone can know everything and solve every problem on their own. If the business management allows it, gladly a few more part-time supporters.

We would like to see so much more technology and program code, some of it is just emerging, others are not yet stable in every situation.

There are technologies like the automobile that have been rolling for many more decades, but when it doesn’t start, we are upset too.

But honestly, is there a better program? Why are we here now?

1 Like