View as Songs with Column Browser
One of the things that disappoints me about the Music app (and iTunes before) is that there is no way to set a default playlist View. Whenever a new playlist is created it will default to View as Playlist. I suppose this is fine and I don't dislike View as Playlist; it has its useful moments when a minimal look is desirable. But I prefer View as Songs because I do most of my tag editing and track sorting in that View under which much more information can be made visible.
* * *
For several years I've been pointing out the Keyboard Shortcut trick of assigning Shift-Command-S to View > as Songs and Shift-Command-P to View > as Playlist in order to quickly toggle the playlist View on the fly.
* * *
So I find myself typing Shift-Command-S followed by Command-B to turn on the Column Browser. A lot. Wonder if there's anything I can do about that...
* * *
I hate using GUI scripting but this Shift-Command-S/Command-B dance has gotta stop. What I need is a single keyboard shortcut that fires both of those shortcuts. I've written about System Event scripting to emulate keystrokes and key codes, so it's just a matter of writing a script that presses those shortcuts and then assigning that script a Keyboard Shortcut for the Music app. Here's the script, which I named "My Playlist View" and saved in Music's "Scripts" folder:
tell application "Music"
activate
try
tell application "System Events" to keystroke "s" using {command down, shift down}
end try
delay 0.2
try
tell application "System Events" to keystroke "b" using {command down}
end try
end tell
I used the Keyboard Shortcut trick to assign it Command-D. Now, when I come across a playlist that's in Playlist View, I can quickly toggle it to the way I prefer it.
* * *
Know what? Why should I have to wait to stumble onto a playlist I haven't yet set to my favorite View? CHANGE THEM ALL NOW!
I've added a repeat block that will reveal each user playlist. While each is thus selected, the View and Column Browser will be toggled. Just run this in Script Editor:
tell application "Music"
activate
repeat with i from 1 to (count of every user playlist)
delay 1
reveal user playlist i
try
tell application "System Events" to keystroke "s" using {command down, shift down}
end try
delay 0.2
try
tell application "System Events" to keystroke "b" using {command down}
end try
end repeat
end tell
...and run it once a week or thereabouts to keep all Playlists to View as Songs with the Column Browser.