Clever ways to make folders for iTunes playlists, or otherwise organize/divide them?

I’m just curious, but why do you have a playlist for an album? Can’t you just search the album? I’m pretty sure they’re already separated like that.

Download the new iTunes v.8.0-there are updates to sorting (grid view for example) to resemble a more natural way to sort through music that builds on the coverflow concept.

Also, there is a new feature-genius playlist-that enables the software to compile playlists for you based on related genres/artists etc.

Lastly, look up the Smart Playlist feature in the iTunes help section-might be what you’re looking for-organizes playlists via common criteria other than the typical sorting methods…good luck.

I think the last suggestioin sndfreQ made may be the ticket.

“I want to put related playlists in a macro-folder, grouping by genre (or my own stuff, or mixes for/from others, etc)” this part would be what a smart play list could do for you.

If you have trouble, PM me or who ever your comfortable with

Thanks for the ideas so far. The Smart Playlist thing was a good idea, but I really need to be able to organize manually. For instance, I collect folk songs and therefor have literally thousands of source recordings – my own and from burned archival CDs, which iTunes has no information for – mixed in with commercial CDs which label themselves as Folk, World, Unclassifiable, etc… Not only would it be tedious to enter genres, I want to preserve the original information on these songs. Likewise, “Folk” would include a variety of genres I really want to separate into these greater folders.

I’ll check into these updates, but you can imagine how my work doesn’t lend itself to software auto-sorting, or viewing by cover art! But the genius playlist sounds neat – I wonder if they’re working with pandora….

wow! there’s folders now!!! problem solved!!! yeaaaaaaa!

Folders have actually been around a while in iTunes.

I had no idea. thanks zina and aidje. i always assumed they would be available down at the bottom as part of the plus sign if they were.

you know the old saying “assume makes an ass out of u and Bri_L”

yeah, they’re a bit hidden.

Hey guys I just tuned into this but; it seems as though you are saying there is a way to make my own folders in Itunes. It seems that this option is also “hidden”; not obvious.

On that I concur, because I Still can’t find it! Just for the record though, when if ever I do find this hidden option, will it enable me to say; put all my favorite rap singles into a big folder called “Favorite Rap Singles”, and all my favorite metal singles into a folder called “Favorite Metal Singles”, and call them up on my Iphone 3G (software version 3.0) that way?

Because see what happens right now is that if I put twenty songs from twenty different albums into a folder on my phone, Itunes separates the songs into separate album folders (twenty of them)!

@amaze122 It sounds like what you want is just normal playlists. Just create a playlist with the plus sign at the bottom left corner of iTunes. If you want to make a folder, just go to File -> New Playlist Folder.

You have to understand the real goal of iTunes, which is to sell music, and make sure the recording business as well as the RIAA makes money as well as Apple. To do that they basically take over your music and videos, and even encourage you to allow outside access so they can see what you are doing. At one time, they even controlled how many copies of a CD you could burn. But you can actually make one level of folders with iTunes, though if you have a lot of music, you might want a folder for CDs with various artists, then one with artists say starting with the letter A, etc. Then in the A folder you would want a folder for each of the artists in alphabetical order, and in each of the artist folders you would want each CD in order by year, and in each CD folder you would want a folder for any graphic art, or text articles, as well as each song on that album in the same order as on the CD. Also you might want your own names instead of using the tags. You can’t do that stuff, though many apps such as Audion etc., had that capability many years ago, but iTunes destroyed the company. As I said that goal of Apple is not to make your life better, or the creative artist’s life better, but to control your life, so everyone can get your money. Unfortunately, things like this along with the media control is the life we have now. The control of your life life even makes the life of the honest person difficult. But if you want more control, look around for one of the older apps. The only features you will loose is some music control capability such as controlling your music via wifi, etc