[meta] music search locations
@mschraal
Submitted by Marinus Schraal Link to original bug (#766676)
Description
There are a lot of questions about the default search location for music files in gnome-music.
It used to be ~/Downloads and ~/Music in older releases (<3.18 iirc), it is currently just ~/Music. This proves cumbersome in some setups.
Users want to be able to:
- configure other local search locations
- use external devices or locations (possibly temporarily)
- sync music (with devices or services)
- import music from non-default search locations
We need one consistent story for questions around this issue, what we'd like to achieve at some point in the future.
This discussion should be seen in the larger picture of gnome core apps and their required functionality.
#51 (closed) consolidated here (21 October 2018)
Additional thoughts fromThere have been a few requests to allow browsing and playing music that is on removable media (like USB hard drives) or remote locations (like home NAS boxes). I'd suggest that this should work in the same way as a lot of cloud-based mobile apps (and indeed, it would be great if the following logic could also be used for cloud-based music).
The user would be able to select where their music library is stored: locally, in an online account, on a NAS, or on a removable device. When any of the options other than local are selected:
- Music assumes that the library will only be transiently available, and shouldn't complain when it isn't connected.
- It should be possible to tag music to be kept locally. When music is tagged in this way, it is copied over to ~/Music.
- Music that exists locally and in the library should only be displayed once.
- When not connected to the music library, only local music should be displayed.
- If new music is added locally, it should be automatically copied over to the library when possible.