[SOLVED] Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
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[SOLVED] Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
Hi folks. I'm having a bit of a trivial but irritating issue with my car's onboard USB music player. This is a 2011 Honda CR-V. Inside the glove compartment there is a USB input socket, where you can just plug in a memory stick and it'll play music.
I copied over about 8GB of music (1100 tracks) and immediately noticed that the car was playing tracks within folders in a seemingly random order. My first thought was obviously I've got it set to random play, duh... but I hadn't. Everything is named and tagged correctly.
I had a look at the owner's manual (see attached page; the section highlighted in red) and was amazed to discover that "files are played in the order stored in USB flash memory device". So this means that when I drag and drop a folder full of tracks in one go, it plays those tracks in the order that the files finished copying to the device. Which is insane.
I can get round this by laboriously copying each track one at a time, in order. I've tested it and they play in order perfectly. But that is as tedious and time-consuming as you would expect. So now for the question!
Is there any way to copy tracks en masse to the device, so that they will be copied in order, e.g. so that track #2 doesn't even start copying before track #1 has completed?
Cheers!
I copied over about 8GB of music (1100 tracks) and immediately noticed that the car was playing tracks within folders in a seemingly random order. My first thought was obviously I've got it set to random play, duh... but I hadn't. Everything is named and tagged correctly.
I had a look at the owner's manual (see attached page; the section highlighted in red) and was amazed to discover that "files are played in the order stored in USB flash memory device". So this means that when I drag and drop a folder full of tracks in one go, it plays those tracks in the order that the files finished copying to the device. Which is insane.
I can get round this by laboriously copying each track one at a time, in order. I've tested it and they play in order perfectly. But that is as tedious and time-consuming as you would expect. So now for the question!
Is there any way to copy tracks en masse to the device, so that they will be copied in order, e.g. so that track #2 doesn't even start copying before track #1 has completed?
Cheers!
Last edited by LockBot on Sat Jul 29, 2023 10:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
This really has nothing to do with LM. Check with your vehicle manufacturer.
If you want to play music from the first track to the last then don't put them in folders. Vehicle play songs best MP3 format, I have a 32gb full of MP3 songs, and when I copied them to the usb I had them as as Ascending order. Mine are song/artist and you can do that in any file manager.
If you want to play music from the first track to the last then don't put them in folders. Vehicle play songs best MP3 format, I have a 32gb full of MP3 songs, and when I copied them to the usb I had them as as Ascending order. Mine are song/artist and you can do that in any file manager.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
I think you're misunderstanding the question. No offence. I've posted what the user manual says, and it explains the behaviour. Assuming I can't get Honda UK to somehow change the software for me, this is a computer issue, not a car issue.kato181 wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 7:55 am This really has nothing to do with LM. Check with your vehicle manufacturer.
If you want to play music from the first track to the last then don't put them in folders. Vehicle play songs best MP3 format, I have a 32gb full of MP3 songs, and when I copied them to the usb I had them as as Ascending order. Mine are song/artist and you can do that in any file manager.
I want to have the music stored in folders so I can easily navigate between them. If you don't know the answer, that's fine. Perhaps others do.
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Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
It would be interesting how the music player gets the information in which order the files were copied. My guess would be, it uses the file creation timestamp. If that is the case it would be possible to write a script that modifies the timestamps in a way that they are sorted how you would like it.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
We can actually take the car completely out of the question here. It's not massively relevant, it's just mentioned as a bit of background.
To simplify things, the question just needs to be:
Is there a way to drag and drop multiple files, so that they will copy one after the other in alphabetical order?
I am not much good in the terminal btw. And I have no idea how to write scripts...
Edited to add:
To simplify things, the question just needs to be:
Is there a way to drag and drop multiple files, so that they will copy one after the other in alphabetical order?
I am not much good in the terminal btw. And I have no idea how to write scripts...
Edited to add:
I did have a look at that by showing the "date created" column in Nemo, but it's blank for all the files I've copied...ringshellfish wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 8:08 am It would be interesting how the music player gets the information in which order the files were copied. My guess would be, it uses the file creation timestamp. If that is the case it would be possible to write a script that modifies the timestamps in a way that they are sorted how you would like it.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
I already told you the answer, usb players on motor vehicles don't like folders. They will not play a song in the order you want. The easiest way to do that is what I suggested. I have done music for people for years to play on their vehicle. It's up to you to take on board what I said, or just plod along and not achieving what you want.alan2001 wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 8:01 amI think you're misunderstanding the question. No offence. I've posted what the user manual says, and it explains the behaviour. Assuming I can't get Honda UK to somehow change the software for me, this is a computer issue, not a car issue.kato181 wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 7:55 am This really has nothing to do with LM. Check with your vehicle manufacturer.
If you want to play music from the first track to the last then don't put them in folders. Vehicle play songs best MP3 format, I have a 32gb full of MP3 songs, and when I copied them to the usb I had them as as Ascending order. Mine are song/artist and you can do that in any file manager.
I want to have the music stored in folders so I can easily navigate between them. If you don't know the answer, that's fine. Perhaps others do.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
My car handles folders just fine. It can navigate between them without any issues. It seems like you're suggesting I just dump the whole 1100 tracks over to the root of the USB and just put up with it. That is not happening lol.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
I had them as Ascending order
Have you tried that?It seems like you're suggesting I just dump the whole 1100 tracks over to the root of the USB
Never said that either.I'm done..Good luck.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
Thanks anyway kato181.
I'm gonna try and narrow this down even further: in addition to this not being a car issue at heart, it's not even about USB or MP3s either. It's simply a question about file operations.
I thought describing the reason for this question would help, perhaps not haha.
I'm gonna try and narrow this down even further: in addition to this not being a car issue at heart, it's not even about USB or MP3s either. It's simply a question about file operations.
I thought describing the reason for this question would help, perhaps not haha.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
Column “Date Created” is unknown to exFAT file system, look at ”Date Modified”, I’d guess is it the same as in the source but doesn’t matter to the player.
It will depend on the location in the file system.
However, I (n00b) don’t know how to write a (very slow) 1:1 transfer/copy script, sorry.
There is a forum section for scripts: viewforum.php?f=213
It will depend on the location in the file system.
However, I (n00b) don’t know how to write a (very slow) 1:1 transfer/copy script, sorry.
There is a forum section for scripts: viewforum.php?f=213
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
So I've just done some testing. I dragged and dropped a folder with 14 tracks, all in one go.sanmig wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 8:48 am Column “Date Created” is unknown to exFAT file system, look at ”Date Modified”, I’d guess is it the same as in the source but doesn’t matter to the player.
It will depend on the location in the file system.
However, I (n00b) don’t know how to write a (very slow) 1:1 transfer/copy script, sorry.
There is a forum section for scripts: viewforum.php?f=213
This is what it looks like on the PC, sorted by name (which matches the order shown when sorting by "Date Accessed":
This is what it looks like when sorted by "Date Modified":
... and here is the order they actually play in:
So they are playing in an order that I can't actually see anywhere. Which puts me back to square one and it seems Honda have described the behaviour correctly; they are playing in the order they were copied to the USB.03 ERNIE
13 You Said
06 On the Beat Pete
11 Overdone
04 Close Escape
07 Solid Gone
05 Not Home Today
14 The Return of the Los Palmas 7
08 Take it or Leave It
02 Embarrassment
10 Disappear
01 Baggy Trousers
12 In the Rain
09 Shadow of Fear
Dunno if any of that helps.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
Um, in part, because as you assumed, you need a script that reads directories and files sorted by “Name” and writes one after the other to the drive, without invoking any cache, be it in the OS or the drive, probably taking 1+ sec for each file, depending on the stick. I do’t know if there is a command to “write now”, flash sticks tend to wait because they’d prefer to write in bulk. The target partition should be (manually) formatted first to start from scratch.
I guess you “only” need that script now …
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
^ That sounds great, please come round to my house and get it started lol.sanmig wrote: ⤴Sun Jan 29, 2023 10:33 amUm, in part, because as you assumed, you need a script that reads directories and files sorted by “Name” and writes one after the other to the drive, without invoking any cache, be it in the OS or the drive, probably taking 1+ sec for each file, depending on the stick. I do’t know if there is a command to “write now”, flash sticks tend to wait because they’d prefer to write in bulk. The target partition should be (manually) formatted first to start from scratch.
I guess you “only” need that script now …
I've looked into it a bit deeper. As I suspected, I am not the first person to have this issue!
There is a utility in the Software Manager called "FATSORT" that addresses this behaviour:
https://fatsort.sourceforge.io/fatsort.1.html
All done in the terminal so no doubt I would find it extremely fiddly and frustrating. There also seems to be a GUI version of that, which I am now going to investigate:
https://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index. ... 72062.html
I honestly thought this would be a simple thing to figure out! Ah well. Thanks folks.
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
FWIW -- you have found the right answer. Your player plays in physical order of the directory entries;
According to http://unixetc.co.uk/2011/09/24/sorting ... le-system/ usage of
ls -U
while in a directory on the stick would supposedly show the same order as what the player picks.According to http://unixetc.co.uk/2011/09/24/sorting ... le-system/ usage of
fatsort
is going to be easy. If you don't know what to specify in place of /dev/sdb1
: with the stick inserted/mounted identify its device from the output of mount
, say /dev/sdb1
, then (close any GUI windows keeping it busy and) umount /dev/sdb1
, then sudo fatsort -c /dev/sdb1
.Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
^^ That's a really great link, thanks very much!
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Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
alan2001,
You can't fight city hall. Any computer,USB stick, etc play by the same rules. Folders don't and never will work.
If you want a strict order, you will need to number each file and even better, observe which file system to use; best is exFat. I have bin doing this for my car and giving music to friends for years.
You can't fight city hall. Any computer,USB stick, etc play by the same rules. Folders don't and never will work.
If you want a strict order, you will need to number each file and even better, observe which file system to use; best is exFat. I have bin doing this for my car and giving music to friends for years.
Cinnamon 21.3 Thinkcentre M920Q + 2 Thinkpad T440p (modded) + Lenovo Y50-70 (all have VBs) + 2 PC NAS drives w XFCE21.2 + Q4OS-32bit on ASUS Atom (2011) + Asus UX305F-64bit
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
I suggest using fatsort as that cured my issue with my cheap/generic MP3 player (one of those cheap China made ones that are more old school, like 2000's MP3 players, but support much higher capacity MicroSD cards and runs on a single AAA battery of which I use NiMh rechargeable) not listing files in proper order from the MicroSD card etc.
then...
once I do that things are listed in proper order then. like how you would expect them to be. that "-n" is 'Natural order sorting'.
p.s. they must have used a slightly newer version of fatsort in Mint 21.x vs Mint 20.x because when I would run that same command on Mint 20.x it would basically have to rescan the all of the MP3 files where as on Mint 21.x when doing the same thing, it seems to be able to detect only the changed files which makes the entire process much quicker.
Code: Select all
umount /dev/sdx
Code: Select all
sudo fatsort -n /dev/sdx
p.s. they must have used a slightly newer version of fatsort in Mint 21.x vs Mint 20.x because when I would run that same command on Mint 20.x it would basically have to rescan the all of the MP3 files where as on Mint 21.x when doing the same thing, it seems to be able to detect only the changed files which makes the entire process much quicker.
MainPC: i5-3550 (undervolted by -0.120v (CPU runs 12c cooler) /w stock i3-2120 hs/fan) | 1050 Ti 4GB | 16GB (2x 8GB) DDR3 1600Mhz RAM | Backups: AMD E-300 CPU (8GB RAM) / Athlon X2 3600+ CPU (@2.3GHz@1.35v) (4GB RAM) | All /w Mint 21.x-Xfce
Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
^^ Cheers!
A quick update: I got this to work with fatsort without any issues. Folders work perfectly, despite what a couple of people have said.
I've been using:
... which did what I wanted it to do. For any people finding this who are worse in Terminal than myself, find out the device/partition name of your USB drive first (use the "Disks" app for that) then type that in the code above. For example, my USB drive is called "/dev/sde1", so I had to type:
This is making me wonder what on earth Windows users would do to resolve the issue...?
Anyway, thanks for all the help. I am very happy with the outcome. p.s. hello to any Linux-using Honda CRV owners from the future lol.
A quick update: I got this to work with fatsort without any issues. Folders work perfectly, despite what a couple of people have said.
I've been using:
Code: Select all
sudo fatsort -c /dev/sdx
Code: Select all
sudo fatsort -c /dev/sde1
Anyway, thanks for all the help. I am very happy with the outcome. p.s. hello to any Linux-using Honda CRV owners from the future lol.
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Re: Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
Wow, what a great find! This issue has been bugging me for months now with my cheap-o-china car stereo.alan2001 wrote: ...
I've looked into it a bit deeper. As I suspected, I am not the first person to have this issue!
There is a utility in the Software Manager called "FATSORT" that addresses this behaviour:
https://fatsort.sourceforge.io/fatsort.1.html
...
I tried to tackle the problem by finding out how I could write the files to my SDcard one at a time by could not find a solution by searching the web. Maybe my search terms were off...
And today I stumble across this marvel of a post!
Many thanks!
Re: [SOLVED] Help with car's USB Music Player - copying MP3 files in order
fatsort looks good. I didn't know that existed before now.
If it's of any interest, I wrote something similar a while ago for my mp3 player - same problem. Mine works with any filesystem, must be mounted. It works by moving all the files to a temporary directory and then moving them back in the desired order. It's missing some of the options that fatsort has though. I was careful that it sorts files with numbers numbers into 1,2,3 not 1,10,11...2,21,22.
I'll try to attach it here in case it's of interest to anyone. Nope. Can't attach it. I'll just post the content (I called the file dir-reorder and put it in ~/bin):---------------------------------------------------------------------
If it's of any interest, I wrote something similar a while ago for my mp3 player - same problem. Mine works with any filesystem, must be mounted. It works by moving all the files to a temporary directory and then moving them back in the desired order. It's missing some of the options that fatsort has though. I was careful that it sorts files with numbers numbers into 1,2,3 not 1,10,11...2,21,22.
I'll try to attach it here in case it's of interest to anyone. Nope. Can't attach it. I'll just post the content (I called the file dir-reorder and put it in ~/bin):
Code: Select all
#!/usr/bin/env python3
# This little ditty re-orders the files in a directory by moving them to a temporary directory
# and then moving them back in the preferred order. This means my music player should then list
# (and play) the files in my preferred order (it seems to do them in the order they are
# written into the directory with no attempt at sorting them).
import os, sys
def vsort(strings, ignore_case):
kvpairs = []
for val in strings:
v2 = s.upper() if ignore_case else val
chunks = re.findall(r'\d+|\D+', v2)
key = [int(chunk) if chunk.isdigit() else chunk for chunk in chunks]
kvpairs.append([key, val])
return [kv[1] for kv in sorted(kvpairs)]
def sortDir(d, ignoreCase, recursive):
# Sort the ordering in a directory
files = os.listdir(d)
sfiles = vsort(files, ignoreCase)
# Don't bother if they're already in the right order
if files != sfiles:
# Make a temporary directory
tmpdir = os.path.join(d, "_-sort-_.tmp")
os.mkdir(tmpdir)
# Move all the files to the temp directory
moved = []
subdirs = []
for f in sfiles:
original = os.path.join(d, f)
stashed = os.path.join(tmpdir, f)
os.rename(original, stashed)
moved.append((original, stashed))
# Replace all the files
for original, stashed in moved:
os.rename(stashed, original)
# Remove the temporary directory again
os.rmdir(tmpdir)
# If recursive, reorder the content directories
if recursive:
for f in sfiles:
subdir = os.path.join(d, f)
if os.path.isdir(subdir):
sortDir(subdir, ignoreCase, recursive)
def printhelp():
print("Re-order directory contents.")
print("usage: %s [-i] [-r] directory" % sys.argv[0])
print(" -i : case insensitive ordering")
print(" -r : recursively reorder subdirectories")
sys.exit(0)
if __name__ == "__main__":
if len(sys.argv) < 2:
printhelp()
ignoreCase = False
recursive = False
for arg in sys.argv[1:]:
if arg == "-i":
ignoreCase = True
continue
if arg == "-r":
recursive = True
continue
if arg == "-h":
printhelp()
if os.path.isdir(arg):
sortDir(arg, ignoreCase, recursive)
else:
print(arg, "is not a directory.")
#-