What I’m about to post overlaps with the long “Browse by Folder Structure” conversation, but I think it’s different enough to deserve its own conversation. Plus, I intend to color outside the lines a bit.
I started using Roon a pretty long time ago; just renewed for the second time, so that’s three years +. And still there are some things I’m unclear on–and I don’t think it’s totally my fault.
I’ve just had a look at the Knowledge Base entry on “Adding Your Music”, and–I’ll be honest–I find it not just incomplete but evasive. The Knowledge Base almost seems to assume that you’ll take advantage of iTunes to get your music onto your computer, which then makes Roon’s job way easier, apparently. Because otherwise that whole bit about how it gets into the form you want it in in those “Watched Folders” isn’t addressed, or not thoroughly.
OK, so I can add music to a watched folder. There are many ways that could be done. What’s the best way? What does Roon recommend?
I understand that Roon doesn’t care THAT much–and yet there are suggestions about precisely how files should be named and how directories should be organized, and sometimes that seems to matter in whether your albums get identified, or organized correctly. I know a guy–this is probably common–who just dumps every damn thing into his watched folders without worrying about it at all. Roon seems to work fine for him. But he’s creating a nightmare of organization. If he were to decide to move on beyond Roon–or simply to make sense of his music collection–he’s in deep shit. I’m not willing to abandon care to quite that extent, so I still have artist folders, and within those I file the artists’ albums. My collection is pretty modest in size–maybe a couple thousand albums. If it were ten times that large, maintaining it this way would be a serious pain in the butt. another order of magnitude and it becomes unworkable.
Does Roon make recommendations about this? What’s Roon’s official position on how we ought to be organizing our libraries inside those watched folders? Is it written down? I don’t care about accessing music via folders. I do care about keeping my folders in decent shape. Is it Roon’s position that that ain’t your problem?
Then there’s the issue of metadata. Spend some time on the forums and you learn that if you want to have a reasonable chance of a well-ordered Roon library, you’d best get comfortable using a metadata editor; otherwise, those boxed sets will go astray. Managing metadata doesn’t require a PhD in CS, but it’s a nontrivial IT task. Does the KB even mention external metadata editors? (Answer: Yes, once, in passing, before showing us how to remove a credit from INSIDE Roon. As far as I can tell, Roon’s metadata editor isn’t suitable for, e.g., trying repair boxed-set problems. Correct me if I’m wrong.)
My point(s): Much of what’s necessary to have a successful Roon experience exists only outside of Roon: File management (unless you’re willing to totally give up on orderly folders) and metadata management.
You will note that I said toward the beginning that I had just re-upped for the second time. So, consider this tough love–though not especially tough.
Jim