Bugzilla – Bug 1947
New Various Artists feature is ignored after a rescan of the database
Last modified: 2008-09-15 14:36:01 UTC
After installing the August 7 nightly instead of 755 artists only 233 artists were shown in my library. All artists which exist only on various artists albums were no longer shown separately in browse artists as expected. But after the next rescan (with clearing the database) all 755 artists are back in browse artists. It doesn't matter whether I choose "Automatically identify "Various Artist" albums" in the server settings or not, I never get the behaviour I had after the first installation of the August 7 nightly. So it seems that the rescan does not correctly consider this option. I verified this behaviour by deleting the slimserver program directory and by copying back my previous (backuped) directory. Update: I just installed the August 8 nightly over the previous installation with 233 artists. With the new version there should be a "Diverse Interpreten" instead of "Various Artists" (I use the German language). After the installation it seems that there was no automatic rescan. The number of artists was correct 233 but there was still a "Various Artists" artist instead of a "Diverse Interpreten". So I made a complete rescan with wiping the database (this was now the first rescan after installation) and the 233 artists were maintained and instead of "Various Artists" there was now a "Diverse Interpreten" artist section. For the sake of completeness I made another complete rescan (with wiping the database) without changing anything and after this (second) rescan all 755 artists were back and neither "Diverse Interpreten" nor "Various Artists" are shown. So it seems that after the very first (automatic or manual) rescan after installation everything is fine but after further rescans the Various Artists feature is ingored.
The 'Automatically identify "Various Artist" albums' setting is a red herring, as it doesn't control this behavior. It could probably use a better discription in the web UI. The pref that controls the browsing behavior is the Server Settings > Behavior > Composer, Band and Orchestra in Artists setting. When set to "Don't include..." all Various Artists will be grouped together, when set to "Include ..." then the individual artists will appear in the browse artists list. This pref also could use a better explanation, including mentioning its affect with regard to Various Artists albums.
I realized already that the "Composer, Band and Orchestra in Artists setting" controls whether all various artists are grouped together so I have set it to "Don't include...". But even then the various artist feature works only after the very first rescan after a new installation. After a further rescan it does no longer for (at least for me). As described I did not change any setting before making the second rescan and suddenly all 755 were shown again when browsing and the "Various Artists" or "Diverse Interpreten" section was no longer shown. In the forum Dan has written: "If you have the 'Automatically Identify Various Artist Albums' turned on (which is the default), a post-processing step is done after a scan." Dan, could it be that this post-processing step is not done in some circumstances (e.g. after a second scan)?
It seems that this problem only exists when wiping the database during the rescan.
Fixed in subversion change 3944. This will be in the 2005-08-12 6.2 nightly.