[robrocke]

I have been trying to create a Kodi Smart Playlist based on a folder location on my NAS.

I have my entire NAS music library (“My Music”) imported into Kodi’s Library.

My NAS folder structure is to have top-level, general-category folders such as “Rock,” "Jazz,” and “Classical” within which are then Artist sub-folders that are then further organized by Album.

I have been trying to create Smart Playlists based on my top-level, general-category folders, such as the “Rock” folder as seen here:


However when I try to play this Playlist, it plays music from my entire “My Music” collection, which is the same set of music as my entire Kodi Library.

I’m not sure if the Smart Playlist is incorrectly misinterpreting the “Path - Is” argument, or if it’s actually ignoring that Smart Playlist criterion entirely and for some reason just plays from my entire Kodi Music Library.

I have tried both the “Path – is” and “Virtual Folder – is” options:


Also, do I choose “Songs,” “Artists,” “Albums,” or “Mixed” as the Type? I’ve tried them all with the same result: instead of just playing music from the desired “Rock” (sub)folder, the entire contents of my Kodi Library are played.

HELP!?

Thanks in advance for any advice/guidance anyone has.

[DaveBlake]

In Kodi 16 the "path" rule only works for "songs" type smart playlists (something that will work for artists and albums in 17).

The rule needs to be "startswith" rather than "is"

[robrocke]

Thanks! Will try this this weekend.

[scott967]

In Kodi 16 the "path" rule only works for "songs" type smart playlists (something that will work for artists and albums in 17).

The rule needs to be "startswith" rather than "is"

I did happen to test an album smart playlist with rule 'path contains "Various Artists"' in 17 0523 and it did work as expected.

scott s.
.

[robrocke]

Thanks @DaveBlake and @scott967. Yes using "songs" and "startswith" did wind up working as expected! Now I'm faced with another issue: when I use the Kodi playlist playback interface to play my new, working Smart Playlist in "Party" mode (thinking that would give me a unique random playback order every time) the playback order is always the same. This seems just like the issue I had with "shuffle" playback also always giving me the same playback order. Is there no way to generate a new random playback order every time? Thank you!

[meowmoo]

There is a sort value at the bottom of the playlist settings, set it to random and it should do what you want

[scott967]

Thanks @DaveBlake and @scott967. Yes using "songs" and "startswith" did wind up working as expected! Now I'm faced with another issue: when I use the Kodi playlist playback interface to play my new, working Smart Playlist in "Party" mode (thinking that would give me a unique random playback order every time) the playback order is always the same. This seems just like the issue I had with "shuffle" playback also always giving me the same playback order. Is there no way to generate a new random playback order every time? Thank you!

Party mode works for me as a random ordering. You need at least 10 items in a smart playlist for party mode.

scott s.
.

[robrocke]

Hi Scott et al

Just re-visiting this. My newly created Smart Playlists (Jazz, Rock, etc.) continue to now access the desired music sub-collections, but I'm still having the problem of Party mode playback always playing back the same faux-random order. It doesn't seem to matter whether or not I have the "Order by" sent to "Random" or not. I've also tried non-Party playback with the "Shuffle" play toggle enabled in the playback GUI, but that too always then plays back the same (faux)random order.

Frustrating that it's not easier to get a truly "different every time" playback scheme working.

Any other thoughts/ideas?

Thanks,
RR