On Sep 6, 2009, at 3:10 AM, Mac User #330250 wrote:
> > Naming files in a specific order using the filenames is a simple but > working > solution. Yep. And I might as well just manually build the playlists from my CD or record player to my cassette recorder. There's many REASONS I'm using a computer; one is to make the COMPUTER do the dull, boring tasks of ensuring that files are properly named and organized how I want. Different strokes, i guess. > If you use the files on a mobile device where they are not meant to > be transferred yet to another storage or shared with friends -- > that's a KISS > solution, I'd say... The problem here is that your solution is ignoring the BUILT-IN solution to all this, which is that the .mp3 format specification INCLUDES all this information, as part of the file metadata, *built into the file*. Far too many people got used to manually managing files because early implementations of MP3 players did not deal with the mp3 metadata, and WAAAAY to many people got used to stripping MP3's down to meta-data-less 64k encoded files so they would be small in the early Wild West days of Napster and Limewire where the object was to collect as many songs as possible; actually LISTENING to the music was secondary or tertiary. I mean, bang paths were KISS, too, but you don't see those in use any more, do you? POKE and PEEK were simple, and you could make an Apple II do some amazing things with 'em, but we've sort of moved on. Telling someone asking a simple question about iTunes that's fixable via a menu selection* to switch to a different program and manually maintain playlists by manually managing filenames is not simple. *KISS in action: that menu option NEVER shows any ambiguity; there's only ever one option. It turns shuffle off if it's on, or on if it's off, there's not even the check mark we've come to expect for menu toggles...which is decidedly un-KISS-like. The proper behavior would be to change the menu item dynamically like iTunes does. We only recognize that check mark kludge because we've been trained to. Think about it. The system is maintaining metadata about the state of that menu item...it has to, to display the checkbox. It's not harder to change the wording of the menu item to reflect its current state than it does to display a checkbox. So why do we use checkboxes? Because in the says of 9" and 12" screens we needed to minimize all control elements as much as possible to preserve as much screen space as possible for the actual working area. It was a kludge, the best compromise between complicated (we have to teach users what this checkbox means) and the simple (just have the menu item say what it does!), the problem is that the kludge lead to menus being largely static, which is how everyone learned to use computer onscreen menus. So when menus actually work like iTunes do, people lose track of what's where, because they've memorized the layout of menus, not understood what they do, so menu items that change freak people out. I see this all the time day to day supporting a college full of people. -- Bruce Johnson "Wherever you go, there you are" B. Banzai, PhD --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
