Tutorial: Using Playlists

[Paul]

Mezzmo includes 4 different types of playlists to help you easily organize the collection of files in your Mezzmo library.

• Playlists
• Smart Playlists
• Active Playlists
• Linked Playlists

[Paul]

This is the simplest type of playlist and is just a list of files that you have manually added into the playlist.

To create a playlist, click Create Playlist -> Playlist.



Typically you would use a playlist to collect a bunch of files that you may like - for example, to create a music mixtape.

Give your playlist a meaningful name and description. Optionally, select some artwork for it - or leave it blank and Mezzmo will automatically assign artwork to it based on the files contained in the playlist.

Once you have created your playlist, then you can drag and drop files from your Mezzmo library into it.

Right-click on the playlist and click Properties to edit it at any time.

Tip: Set the Sort by setting to match they way you want your files listed. Select Random Shuffle to have them randomly ordered each time you access the playlist.

[Paul]

Smart playlists let you drill into the metadata of your collection of files and create a list of files with certain attributes.

They are fully dynamic so the list of files in the smart playlist will change as your Mezzmo library changes.

To create a smart playlist, click Create Playlist -> Smart Playlist.



You can use smart playlists for many purposes. For example:

• A list of unwatched movies
• A list of music from the band Coldplay
• A list of photos from your vacation in Spain
• A list of highest rated Electronic music
• A list of TV shows from the 1980s
• A list of most played music
• A list of Action movies starring Robert De Niro
• A list of classical music from composer Beethoven
• A list of videos rated G from the folder \\NAS-001\Videos

Give your smart playlist a meaningful name and description. Optionally, select some artwork for it - or leave it blank and Mezzmo will automatically assign artwork to it based on the files contained in the playlist.

Add the rules that you want to use to drill into your collection of files in your Mezzmo library. The above example uses [Play Count] [is] [0] to find all files that have not yet been played (streamed) and [Category] [contains] [Movie] to find all the files that are movies. There are many metadata attributes that you can use to match on.

Choose the types of files that you want to find - all types of files, just video files, just music files or just photos.

Set the Sort by setting to match they way you want your files listed. Select Random Shuffle to have them randomly ordered each time you access the playlist.

If there are many files that match your rules, then you may want to limit the list of files using the Limit playlist setting. For example, you may only want to list the top 50 rated movies.

Right-click on the playlist and click Properties to edit it at any time.

[Paul]

Active playlists create a hierarchy of playlists based on the keywords that you choose. Files that match the keywords are listed under each sub-playlist.

They are fully dynamic so the list of sub-playlists and files in the active playlist will change as your Mezzmo library changes.

To create an active playlist, click Create Playlist -> Active Playlist.



You can use active playlists to quickly get your files nicely organized. For example:

• A list of your movies organized by year
• A list of your TV shows organized by TV show name, season and episode
• A list of photos organized by year and month
• A list of music organized by artist and album
• A list of music organized by composer
• A list of movies organized by content rating

Give your active playlist a meaningful name and description. Optionally, select some artwork for it - or leave it blank and Mezzmo will automatically assign artwork to it based on the files contained in the playlist.

Select the keywords that you wish to use for organizing your files. The above example uses "Album / Series" and "Disc / Season" so that video files will be organized where the top level playlists will be the TV series and the sub-playlists will be the seasons and the corresponding files will be listed under each sub-playlist. For example:

[+]SpongeBob SquarePants

[-]Season 1

Help Wanted
Reef Blower
Tea at the Treedome
Bubblestand

[+]Season 2
[+]Season 3

[+]Dora The Explorer

[+]Season 1
[+]Season 2

[+]The Wiggles

[+]Season 1
[+]Season 2
[+]Season 3
[+]Season 4

To filter your active playlist so that it only includes certain types of files, then click the Smart Filter button and add the rules that you want to use to drill into your collection of files in your Mezzmo library. The above example uses [Category] [is] [TV show] to find all the files that are TV shows and [File path] [starts with] [\\NAS-001\Kids Videos] to find only those files in that folder on disk.

Choose the types of files that you want to find - all types of files, just video files, just music files or just photos.

Set the Sort by setting to match they way you want your files listed. Select Random Shuffle to have them randomly ordered each time you access the playlist.

Right-click on the playlist and click Properties to edit it at any time.

Note: When you add files, delete files, change the attributes of a file or maintain your Mezzmo library, Mezzmo will display a Processing active playlists task in the Status pane. This tells you that Mezzmo is working through all your active playlists to make sure they are in-sync with your collection of files. Whilst this task is processing, you can browse and stream your files on your devices. You do not need to wait until it has completed.

Tip: If you think your active playlist is out-of-sync with your collection of files, then you can instruct Mezzmo to update it. Right-click on the active playlist and click Properties. On the Active Playlist Properties dialog, click OK to close the dialog. Mezzmo will silently update the active playlist in the background. It may take several minutes depending on number of files in your Mezzmo library.

[Paul]

Linked playlists let you reference external playlist files on disk that you have created with other media player tools such as Windows Media Player, WinAmp, etc.

They are fully dynamic so the list of files in the linked playlist will change as your external playlist file changes.

All popular playlist files are supported - .M3U, .PLS, .WPL, .ZPL.

To create a linked playlist, click Create Playlist -> Linked Playlist.



Typically you would use a linked playlist when you have a collection of playlists that you use with your favorite media player. This lets you automatically keep in-sync your media player playlists and Mezzmo playlists.

Give your playlist a meaningful name and description. Optionally, select some artwork for it - or leave it blank and Mezzmo will automatically assign artwork to it based on the files contained in the playlist.

Right-click on the playlist and click Properties to edit it at any time.

Tip: Set the Sort by setting to match they way you want your files listed. Select No sorting to have the files listed as they are listed in the external playlist file.