[black_eagle]

You can reproduce the OP problem, again can you see why it is a problem? I'm not getting it, something to do with the drive/folder browser not letting you browse read-only even though it isn't writing anything at that point?

See https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc/blob/master...p#L196L219.  There is a write test to the directory that you have selected so core is attempting to write to it at that point. Obviously it fails and throws up the error message.

[DaveBlake]

Thanks for that @black_eagle , so it is the common file browser (CGUIDialogFileBrowser) behaviour. I wonder why it was designed like that? Been like it for over 11 years so it is unlikely we will ever know for sure.

The AIF needn't be written to unless you export to it, and general Kodi use does not write to it although art addons might. But the browse to a folder/file dialog does do a write test all them same.

[Karellen]

I don't know if ArtworkBeef saves image files by default or optionally,

[black_eagle]

The AIF needn't be written to unless you export to it,

Whilst this is perfectly true, it's a bit pointless to actually have an AIF unless you can write to it, isn't it ?  Because if you can't, how else is the info going to end up in it ?  I doubt people will want to create the entire thing by hand from the beginning.

[DaveBlake]

But the situation of the OP is that only one instance of Kodi needs to be able to write to the AIF.  Info can end up in it without Kodi ever writing to it, mine does. I scrape with the fastest machine, export the lot (because there is no filter yet) to a folder, pick off the new stuff and manually edit (if necessary) and move it to my AIF. Kodi itself never writes to it.

Then surely I'm odd

[HomerJau]

Why not just allow writing to AIF in your storage permissions?

[Buzzsaw]

But the situation of the OP is that only one instance of Kodi needs to be able to write to the AIF.  Info can end up in it without Kodi ever writing to it, mine does. I scrape with the fastest machine, export the lot (because there is no filter yet) to a folder, pick off the new stuff and manually edit (if necessary) and move it to my AIF. Kodi itself never writes to it.

Then surely I'm odd

Exactly! I'm odd too! I use 1 instance of Kodi with AB to populate most AIF contents, but I do a considerable amount of hand editing to get my library images 'just right'. I don't want other users with write permission credentials just in case they change what I've worked so hard to maintain.

If I can maintain a read only access and 'fool' Kodi by manually editing an html settings file stating where my AIF is, please tell me which file and location pls.

[black_eagle]

If I can maintain a read only access and 'fool' Kodi by manually editing an html settings file stating where my AIF is, please tell me which file and location pls.

The file you want is guisettings.xml and is located in your userdata directory.  The setting within it is musiclibrary.artistsfolder.  You have to edit the file without Kodi running otherwise your changes will be overwritten when Kodi exits.

As an example, mine is set like this <setting id="musiclibrary.artistsfolder">nfs://192.168.1.125/mnt/windrive/Artist Information/</setting>  Kodi will then use that location to look up artist info but as long as you don't try and export to it, should never need to write to it.

[Buzzsaw]

Perfect! I'll give it a go! Thx!