Thanks for that. WIll play....

Also you can copy and paste tags between databases. It would be awfully tedious (copy tag, open new database, paste tag, back to old database) though. Unless you had two instances of Vegas opened, each with a different database open.

kairosmatt

Thanks for your suggestions, but unless I'm doing something wrong, it's not helping.

I did as you suggested, opened my "backup" database which has loads of entries under the tag "Electric Bass Guitar" (itself grouped under "Bass" and highlighted all 7000 odd names (in the middle section of MM) right clicked and selected Save Tags and Properties to file(s). Now this happened extremely quickly (a quick "saving" flashed up less than a second) which suggests to me that something might not be quite right here.

Then
Method 1
Opened my "current" database which has "Bass" but not "Electric Bass Guitar"
Dragged a folder containing some files tagged as "Electric Bass Guitar" into the current database.
It imported them but no imported "Electric Bass Guitar" tag. Presumably because the files have already been catalogued in the database.
(I tested this with another test database with only a few entries and confirmed that this is what happens)

Method 2
Yes, you can copy the tags, but it doesn't result in the files being tagged (ie it has the same effect as simply re-adding the tag)

I'm sure there must be some way of merging databases and I'm missing something

Tim,
When I select Save Tags and Properties to Files, it usually takes quite a while-and I only have about 1500 files-not 7000! But maybe its because I've tagged a bunch of HD-as opposed to audio files? I wouldn't think that would make any difference as you're just saving tag info, but...

I just tested it again, and when I import files, it brings in the tags with it.

I guess the problem is the media is already in the database. When you open the "Add files to Media Library", in the advanced box under "When adding files, update media library information for" try click on "all files". Then have it scan your folder where the "Electric Bass Guitar" files are. I'm not sure, but maybe this will force the library to update those files...good luck!

I really thought you'd hit the nail on the head with the "update all files" option and was severely chastising myself having got it to work exactly as you said.
Once.
On a sample of a dozen samples.
Then tried it with the whole lot. No go. Not even the tag duplicated.
Then again with another dozen.
Still no go.

Think I'm going to uninstall, delete all the media files and start from scratch. But I'm not sure I can bring myself to trust MM anymore. Which is a shame as I know how much some of you swear by it (whereas I seem to just swear AT it)

I spent hours (over a number of days) tagging all these samples only six months ago. Am rather upset.

Tim,
I'm sorry I can't come up with anything else. Its weird that idea worked once, but then never again.
There is a guy who does the VASST MM training video (I used it and liked) named John Rofrano, so I sent him in an email to see if he had any ideas.
Its too bad you (and others in this forum) are having such problems with MM, because when it works, its really cool.
kairosmatt

> There is a guy who does the VASST MM training video (I used it and liked) named John Rofrano, so I sent him in an email to see if he had any ideas.

Matt, Thanks for sending the email. I saw your answer to the original post and it was exactly what I would have said so I passed on the thread thinking things were well under control. ;-)

> Now this happened extremely quickly (a quick "saving" flashed up less than a second) which suggests to me that something might not be quite right here.

Tim, Matt is correct that this should take a while. What might be happening is that when you copy loops off of a read-only CD the read-only bit stays ON while on your hard drive. This would prevent the Media Manager from saving the tags with the media.

Here is something to try. Open a command prompt at the root of your ACID loop libraries on your hard drive. Then issue the following DOS command:

ATTRIB -R *.* /S

This will run the attribute program (ATTRIB.EXE) and remove the read-only bit (-R) from all files (*.*) in all subdirectories (/S). If this is the problem, this will clear it up.

> It imported them but no imported "Electric Bass Guitar" tag. Presumably because the files have already been catalogued in the database.

I think you're on to something there. My recommendation would be to start a 3rd database and merge the two into it. This way you can be sure that the media is only added and tagged once. So the steps would be:

1) Open the first database
2) Select all files and Save tags with media
3) Open the second database
4) Select all files and Save tags with media
5) Create a NEW database and import all of the media

This is the cleanest way. Now one problem might be that the database you have now has already tagged data incorrectly from the original one. For this reason, I would do one of two things: Either remove all of the data from the database that is tagged incorrectly before you save tags with the media, OR save the tags from the bad database first, then save the tags from the old (good) database that you like. This way the last tags saved are the "good" tags!

Good Luck,

~jr

Guys, I'm really appreciative of your help. Without it I'd have abandoned MM by now.
I've been experimenting for a couple of hours this evening and making some (albeit little) progress.
I did exactly as you suggested Johnny - I though the "read only" flag was a very good suggestion (and another classic oversight by me). Unfortunately none of the files I examined had that set but I ran the attrib command anyway.
Still no joy though. Funny thing is it works for some files, not for others.
So I took one specific media file and watched it through the system. Very carefully did everything. No go. Tried again to be sure. Nada.
Tried it on another file, one that had worked. Removed it, added it again, added to a new database. All worked fine every time.

The difference? When saving the tags and properties to the file, on the "good" one the %bar goes very quickly from 0 to 100 and the dialog closes. On the "bad" file, it goes quickly from 0% to, well, 0%

So, we can conclude for now that the problem is definitely with the saving of the tags. For the life of me I can't see anything different in the files. Will investigate further over the weekend with copies of files, different folders etc (I'm out tomorrow night - at my video club) and report back.

Thanks for encouraging me to keep on the case.

Tim,
I just noticed something: some of my files are DVCProHD. The ones that are converted to Raylight AVI can save the tags, the ones not converted (I use the Raylight plugin to edit natively) cannot save the tags.
Maybe there are certain file types that MM is just unable to save the tags too? Is there any difference between the files that do work, and the ones that don't? Or to put another way: are they the same type of wav (or other) file?
kairosmatt