How is sorting on albums composed of multiple discs supposed to work?

[sophom]

This is a question or an enhancement request.

When I pick an album that is composed of multiple disks right now, if I sort by track I get this sequences of tracks: Disc 1, Track 1 Disc 2, Track 1 Disc 1, Track 2 Disc 2, Track 2 etc...

If I sort by DIsc I get some seemingly random sequence within each disc; Disc 1, Track 11 Disc 1, Track 1 ... Disc 2, Track 1 Disc 2, Track 3 etc...

What I would like is to get a sequence of the tracks on each disc as well so: Disc 1, Track 1 Disc 1, Track 2 Disc 1, Track 3 ... Disc 2, Track 1 Disc 2, Track 2 Disc 2, Track 3

etc...

Is there a way to do this with the existing functionality? If not, can you consider this an enhancement request?
You can either do it automatically or do something fancy where when you sort you account for the existing sequence so if you first sort by tracks and then by discs the tracks would stay in the same relative order within each disc.

[gogglesguy]

There are a couple of columns that merely sort by its value and nothing else. I think Title, Track, Rating, Disc and Time are among those. Then are a few columns that automatically also sort on other columns as well:

Column	Sorts by
Default Order (Ctrl-N)	Album, Album Year, Album Artist, Disc and Track
Album	Album, Disc and Track
Album Artist	Album Artist, Album, Disc and Track
Artist	Artist, Album, Disc and Track
Composer	Composer, Album, Disc and Track
Conductor	Conductor, Album, Disc and Track

[sophom]

That works. Now that I know what default sort does, I'll use that all the time.

I can see how clicking on album or artist is useful when you select multiple albums or have a compilation disc... but... it's not very intuitive to click on when you only have one Album from one Artist that just happens to span multiple discs.

[gogglesguy]

I'm not sure i follow your last point, can you elaborate?

[sophom]

Sure. Now that I know to press control+N all the time it's a non issue

For a new user who doesn't know all the shortcuts yet, when they have an album from a single artist that spans multiple discs, they have no reason to sort by album or artist. I think that they'll naturally want to sort by disc and then by track and they can't do that.

ctrl+n does that. What I'm suggesting is, as an enhancement, maybe you can either: 1) make the ctrl+n sort happen by default when you select a single album (and avoid them having to sort) 2) make the Disc sort sort by disc then by track 3) make the Disc sort the same as pressing ctrl+n

Or something else more clever...

[gogglesguy]

Unless there is some bug, the ctrl-n is already the default so there's no need to actually press it unless you accidentally clicked on one of the headers to change the order.

[gogglesguy]

3) isn't a bad suggestion either. 2 would fail when you have more than one album listed.

[sophom]

Well...WRT the default sort, if I sort album A by title and then click on album B (plain left click, so not selecting multiple albums) album B gets sorted by title as well (not the default sort)

Implementing 3 would probably be enough but it might also be weird when selecting multiple albums. For example if you had 2 albums, album A with 2 discs and B with 3 discs then option 3 would yield 1A,2A,1B,2B,3B. The user probably would have expected 1A,1B, 2A, 2B, 3B. Having said that, 3 would probably be better than the existing disc sort.

I agree that 2 would look weird if more than one album was selected.

What about an option 4 where you sort by disc but keep the previous order as it was? A user could first sort by album then by disc? You would only bubble up an entry if its disc number was less than its previous entry... Just a thought...

[gogglesguy]

Well...WRT the default sort, if I sort album A by title and then click on album B (plain left click, so not selecting multiple albums) album B gets sorted by title as well (not the default sort)

Merely changing the tag / artist / album selection won't change the sorting method. The view settings, including columns shows, sorting method are stored per selected source (which can be the Music Library, Playlists, Filters). What I meant by default sort method was that if any of those sources are created that's the initial method that gets set.

Implementing 3 would probably be enough but it might also be weird when selecting multiple albums. For example if you had 2 albums, album A with 2 discs and B with 3 discs then option 3 would yield 1A,2A,1B,2B,3B. The user probably would have expected 1A,1B, 2A, 2B, 3B. Having said that, 3 would probably be better than the existing disc sort.

True, however I do feel 1A,2A,1B,2B,3B would be less confusing...

What about an option 4 where you sort by disc but keep the previous order as it was? A user could first sort by album then by disc? You would only bubble up an entry if its disc number was less than its previous entry... Just a thought...

That idea has been mentioned before. It would mean switching the sort algorithm, and may be initial be confusing to existing users (all 5 of them :P). I think it would definitely be worth experimenting with.