Purgatory and Deserving of Life

I recently made the transition to a new computer. My reasons for this were varied, but can mainly be traced back to my decreased need for mobile computing and increased desire for a system that can handle video editing and gaming in my limited free time. In the course of this transition, I reached the conclusion that my iTunes library is simply too big. As of this writing, I have 3,860 items in my music library. And that number does not include movies, TV shows, audiobooks, or a full compliment of podcasts. Taking a peek at my hard drive, I see that the total size of this library is 218 gigabytes. The Library XML files alone weigh in at a hefty 21 megabytes. Thats a lot for nothing but plaintext database content.

So. In yet another attempt at cleaning out my system, I have created two new playlists: Purgatory and Deserving of Life.

Deserving of Life is a repository for albums (and the rare single track, which I eventually plan to consolidate into mix albums for simplicity’s sake) that I know I want to keep. Except for a few absolute favorites, the only way that an album may find its way onto this playlist is when I listen to it in its entirety and determine it worthy of saving.

Purgatory is simply every album that has not yet found its way onto Deserving of Life (managed as a smart playlist).

I’ll do this for a few months and then, some time over the summer probably, take a serious look at any music remaining in purgatory… some of which will certainly find its way into the great dustbin of history.

Movies, TV shows, and Podcasts are another assortment of canned worms.

-otto

Playlist: “Please Play Me”

In the far back corners of many an iTunes library lurk songs to which no man has listened for months. Timid creatures, many of these tracks live in mortal fear of library purges, hard drive failures, and ravenous dust bunnies. But there is hope for these wretched solos! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the “Please Play Me” smart playlist.

Consider:

1. Match ALL of the following conditions

2. Playcount is less than (number)
I set this to 5. You should pick some number well under the playcount of anything in your top 25, but above 3 or 4.

3. Date added is not in the last 6 months.

4. (Exclude anything you don’t like in your smart playlists. I use several fields to block podcasts and videos)

Those who would attempt this should be warned that not all long-forgotten tracks are entirely subdued. Long isolation in the far reaches of an XML database has been known to drive some tracks to unplumbed depths of madness. To avoid the abject horror, and very real danger, of having teaming masses of forgotten, starving, potentially even zombified songs throwing themselves into your playlist, you may want to limit the list as follows:

5. Live Updating!

6. Limit to 25 items selected by least recently added.

Using this formula, many a brave iTunes adventurer has rediscovered old favorites. Sure, a few have been lost, dragged kicking and screaming into the darkness by vengeful Jefferson Airplanes, to be devoured around A Perfect Circle by ravenous Living Sacrifices. But that, I am told, is the exceptioAUGHHHHHHHHH!