[on4now4]

From what I can tell the music navigation goes something like this Music > Artist > Select Artist

Is there any way to make this more manageable with large collections of music?

something more like this Music > Artist > Select Letter A - Z > Select Artist

Is there any way to make this happen?

[DaveBlake]

How to make large music collections easy to navigate is a really good question, I hope others will share their approaches.

For starters the navigation offered by standard nodes is Music > Genres > Artists > Albums > Songs
Genres node lists genre values derrived from the genre tag in song files. When you click on one of the genre values you get a list of artists that have songs with that genre. Genre is the primary means to divide a large music collection into manageable chuncks, but it is not the only way. You can try that if you have tagged your music with genre.

There is also by default a years node that takes you to the albums, and then songs, from a given year.

Then there are smart playlists and custom nodes, which are slightly more advanced user tools but extremenly powerful way to create navigation in a way that suits you best.

I know that @zag has created a set of custom nodes that give an alphabetic selection for artists, along the lines of what you suggest. I hope he will come along shortly with a link or explanation for you.

[zag]

I did a node PR for this but it was sadly rejected because a programatic way would be better.

You can still see it here: https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/pull/7518

Basically all you need to do is copy these files to your userdata\library\music\artista-z\

Also you may want to check: http://kodi.wiki/view/Audio_nodes

[zag]

This is how it looks on my setup



It will probably look even better on the new Estuary skin as it can do a grid view.

[HomerJau]

I use the Kodi Music Remote app (on an iPad) which has a vertical A B C list in both its Artist and Album list (see right side of first image here?)

http://kodimusicremote.com/app-videos

This is iOS only though. Highly recommended if you have an iPad. I use it always for headless audio.

[on4now4]

I will give it a try. Looks like exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks for the replies!

[on4now4]

It's really sad that this is not just the standard method and that yours was rejected.

[zag]

It's really sad that this is not just the standard method and that yours was rejected.

Well I agree that this should be a feature of Kodi, but I also agree that doing it in a nice programmatic way is also best

The comments in the PR about showing symbols are also quite valid. This is not yet possible with smart playlists and nodes.

The solution above should be easily transferable once you have the node files, just copy to any of your kodi installations.

[melons2]

I can not seem to download your files for this great idea. Can you post a link to a zip file or explain what I am apparently missing?

[zag]

Heres the zipped folder for ease of install

https://www.mediafire.com/?gpedotjgxpnhu8e

Just copy to this folder: Userdata/library/music

In LibreELEC the location is: /storage/.kodi/userdata/library/music/

[deveng24]

It's really sad that this is not just the standard method and that yours was rejected.

agreed, people with large collections and the kodi UI is struggle for locating artists quickly.... especially if trying to use a tablet ( your finger is 4 x the size of the distance the scroll bar needs to travel) .

Zag should try pushing a solution again.... there seems to be many users on here with large collection who would benefit for this.

Troy

[on4now4]

It's really sad that this is not just the standard method and that yours was rejected.

Well I agree that this should be a feature of Kodi, but I also agree that doing it in a nice programmatic way is also best

The comments in the PR about showing symbols are also quite valid. This is not yet possible with smart playlists and nodes.

The solution above should be easily transferable once you have the node files, just copy to any of your kodi installations.

Well even if its not the best. For large music collections and in my case a car media center connected to a display without a touch screen. Its really the only way.

I was able to get everything installed and working last night. Thank you!

[zag]

No problems, i'd be interested in any screenshots of the result

[scott967]

Did a POC but would want something to auto-generate all the files needed.



scott s.
.

[on4now4]

I'm still working on getting it how I want it.

But here you go: