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30 Most Recent RSS FeedNEW: Playlist XML Librarian
I don't know what I've been thinking over the years not using exported Playlist XMLs to offload and store superfluous playlists.
For a couple of years recently, I did a weekly two hour streaming radio show. I created a playlist of songs for a each show and kept the playlists in a "Shows Folder" in the Music app. All one hundred or so of them. I didn't want to delete them. But having them around, even inside a Playlist Folder, didn't make a lot of sense either. So it occurred to me to just export them as XML files and keep them Just In Case.
After exporting a few, as mentioned previously, I assigned a Command-E keyboard shortcut to Music app's File->Library->Export Playlist... command. That restored about six weeks to my life.
Once all the playlists were offloaded and deleted from Music, Man, oh Boy, did I feel great.
But then it occurred to me that if or when I ever wanted to reload a Playlist XML I wouldn't be able to know what tracks were in it. Unless I loaded it in Music first. That would be dumb. So I whipped up Playlist XML Viewer, which could load an exported Playlist XML so I could look at it in a table format. Boy, was I cruising on a wave of joy.
But then it occurred to me that...
Well. Perhaps you can imagine what I needed to do:
Playlist XML Librarian will list the exported Playlist XML files collected in a specified folder with options to view, search and send (import) them to the Music app. Makes it easy to maintain an organized stockpile of exported Playlist XMLs to reduce the number of onboard Music playlists.
More information for Playlist XML Librarian and download link is here.
Select None Lives
Did I say there was no "Select None" in Music app's Edit menu? Something had to be done.
tell application "Music"
tell (get view of front browser window)
try
reveal track 1 of it
reveal track 1 of it
end try
end tell
end tell
Run this when tracks are selected in a playlist and muscle memory has you going for Shift-Command-A. It first selects (reveal) the first track of the playlist, which clears any other selection. Then, (because of a bug?) the reveal command run a second time de-selects the first track, leaving no tracks selected.
Bug or Feature: No Shortcut to Delete a Playlist
Now one of the Things a Music app playlist doesn't do lately is obey a Delete keypress. Used to be a Delete or Command-Delete or something like that would delete the selected playlist. Magical. Nowadays, we have to right-click on it for the contextual menu and choose "Delete From Library"—which is wicked loaded title for a playlist contextual menu item lemma tell you just sayin'. So what a guy like me does is make a piddly little AppleScript:
tell application "Music"
tell (get view of front browser window)
if special kind of it is none then
try
delete it
end try
end if
end tell
end tell
Click the script icon above to open this script in your Script Editor, save it with the File Format of "Script" named "Delete Selected Playlist" in your ~/Library/Music/Scripts/ folder.
And then you just know I'm going to tell you to assign it a Shift-Command-D shortcut.
There's also no "Select None" in any Edit menus anywhere. But I digress.
NEW: Export Playlist as CSV v1.0
I like the look of QuickLook'd CSV files so much, I made a thing.
Export Playlist as CSV will export abridged info from each track in the selected playlist to a CSV (comma-separated values) formatted text file, which can be viewed in a spreadsheet app, like "Numbers". Or QuickLook 'em like yer Mama do.
Latest version:
- Initial release
More information for Export Playlist as CSV v1.0 and download link is here.
NEW: Playlist XML Viewer v1.0
I got those XMLs I was talking about offloaded. They're easy to reload back into Music and the Music app is less cluttered.
But its kinda hard to tell what's actually listed in an exported playlist XML file. Maybe you like scrolling through XML formatting like a caveman but not me.
Playlist XML Viewer v1.0 can open and view the contents of a playlist XML file exported from the Music app in a conventional table layout. Includes options to load the XML in the Music app, export a TXT, CSV or M3U version (highly recommend the CSV export), copy info to clipboard and reveal existing files in the Finder. (Not for use with exported Library XML files.)
Latest version:
- Initial release
More information for Playlist XML Viewer v1.0 and download link is here.
Playlist XML Onloader
There came a time at my house when I had to get rid of a bunch of playlists. Like about 100. That I was very attached to. So I didn't really want to trash them. Instead, I exported each one as an XML file.
But wait! After exporting just three of them (click "File", click "Library", click "Export Playlist...", click "Save"), the first thing I did was assign a Command-E keyboard shortcut to the "Export Playlist..." menu item. Are you kidding? Of course I did.
Then it occurred to me that if I could only export one playlist at a time, what are the chances that I can only import them one at a time. Unfortunately, the chances are excellent for that.
So I wrote a really simple script that can choose a batch of exported playlist XML files—providing they are all in the same folder, like ~/Music/Export Playlist XMLs/ or something—and load them into the Music app.
try
set thePaths to (choose file with prompt "Choose one or more Playlist XML files:" of type {"xml"} with multiple selections allowed)
on error
return
end try
repeat with f in thePaths
tell application "Music"
try
add POSIX path of (f as text)
on error m
display dialog m with title "Music sez:" with icon 2
end try
end tell
end repeat
Click on the little script icon there to open this in your Script Editor and then save it as a "Script Bundle" named whatever you like, perhaps "Playlist XML Onloader". Save it in ~/Library/Music/Scripts/ so that it will appear in the Music app's "Script" menu.
NEW: Show Me the Track Info v1.0
You ever need to look at a track's Info panel and go hip-hopping through the panels to see what you need to know? You ever have to do this for a lot of tracks?
Show Me the Track Info will display track info from the playing or selected track in a floating window that can be configured to show information in a user-configured order. Eight sections within the window can be drag-arranged by their hierarchical importance. The window can then re-sized to only display as much of the information as is necessary. Handy for quickly surveying tracks without having to click-click-click for the Music app's Info panel.
Latest version:
- Initial release
More information for Show Me the Track Info v1.0 and download link is here.
UPDATED: Playlist Manager v5.0
The Music app only allows one playlist to be selected at a time. This applet can perform common useful tasks on a multiple selection of playlists: playlist title renaming (add text, remove text, search and replace text, text transforms), change View, duplicate, delete, export, move to Playlist Folder, merge playlists and remove track copies.
This app is free to try full-featured in Demo Mode. While in Demo Mode, only up to 10 playlists can be manipulated per launch. If you like it you can purchase a code for $2.99 which will unlock the Demo Mode limitation. Launch the app and click "Register..." in its File menu to make an in-app purchase.
Latest version:
- Accommodations for macOS 26/Tahoe
- Adds Text Transformations
- Adds Set View options
- Adds Remove copies of tracks option
- Adds CSV as an export-as-file option
- Adds "Edit Info" panel to edit names and descriptions
- Preview field larger
- Fixes a number of regressions
More information for Playlist Manager v5.0 and download link is here.
UPDATED: Assimilate View Options v6.3
This script re-creates each selected playlist so its Songs View column settings (visible columns) are the same as the main "Songs" library.
Works with user-created regular playlists only. Please read the accompanying Read Me .rtfd doc.
Latest version:
- Accommodations for macOS 26/Tahoe
- Worksaround issue that prevented setting playlists to Songs view after processing
- Fixes "Filter..." sometimes not filtering
- Copies playlist description correctly
More information for Assimilate View Options v6.3 and download link is here.
UPDATED: De-Genre v6.0
This script re-assigns the tracks of selected Genres to another Genre, ostensibly so that the original--and consequently any un-assigned-Genres--disappear from the Music app's Genre pop-up list. Of course, it can also be used simply to batch-edit Genres without having to assemble the tracks first.
As you may know, you can make superfluous Custom Genres vanish from the Genre pop-up list simply by eliminating a reference to them in your tracks; when no tracks are assigned to a particular Genre, that Genre will be dropped. (Note however that Music's original Genre names cannot be removed this way; only those accumulated from other sources or created by you.)
Latest version:
- Accommodations for macOS 26/Tahoe
- Adds sorting options
- Fixes toggle-size issue
More information for De-Genre v6.0 and download link is here.
