Think I need a script

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Hi there,

I am a newbie to my new Macbook. I have tried using the Spaces application. I am running 10.5.2 OSX. What I want to do is on Startup, have iTunes start up and have it open my iTunes library on an external drive. Does anyone know how I can do this?

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...C
 
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Hi there,

I am a newbie to my new Macbook. I have tried using the Spaces application. I am running 10.5.2 OSX. What I want to do is on Startup, have iTunes start up and have it open my iTunes library on an external drive. Does anyone know how I can do this?

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...C

Welcome to the forum :)

To have app (like iTunes) run at startup(from the Apple Site):
1. Log in as the user who wishes to have a login item or as an admin user.
2. Choose System Preferences from the Apple menu.
3. Choose Accounts from the View menu.
4. Click the name of the user.
5. Click the Startup Items button
6. Click the "Add {+}" button.

As far using an external library . . do you have an existing library already? Where is it at the moment?
 
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My external library is already created(built it from my Windows PC) and it resides on an external hard drive.

I have been told that in order to open it up on startup in iTunes I would need to mount the external hard drive and then get iTunes to open the library.

Essentially what I am trying to achieve here is to load up SPACES(Leopard)

I am very new to this, so if you could give me as much help as possible (how do you mount an external hard drive, etc) it would be great.

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...CP
 
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My external library is already created(built it from my Windows PC) and it resides on an external hard drive.

I have been told that in order to open it up on startup in iTunes I would need to mount the external hard drive and then get iTunes to open the library.

Essentially what I am trying to achieve here is to load up SPACES(Leopard)

I am very new to this, so if you could give me as much help as possible (how do you mount an external hard drive, etc) it would be great.

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...CP

As a one time thing you'll need to plug in your external drive (it'll automatically mount and appear as a drive in finder and on the desktop)run itunes, go into Preferences -> Advanced and change the iTunes Music folder location to point to the folder with all your music in on your external disk.

Once that's done you'll need to go to File->Add to library and point at the same folder you set in preferences.
iTunes will now build your library which will take a little time depending how much music you've got.

That's the end of the one time setup.

Everyday use:
Make sure external drive is connected before you start your mac you should be fine. Hopefully the drive will mount itself before iTunes loads.

-------
What are you trying to do with spaces? Spaces is a virtual desktop. That's got nothing to do with external drives or itunes.

Is it that you want to open iTunes in a particular 'space'?
 
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Yes the goal is to open up the itunes in SPACES and have it open my library on my external hard drive.
 
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You can assign applications to a particular space in the Spaces System preference window.

The other behaviour iTunes should do out of the box:
Just make sure it's configured to use your library on the external drive (iTunes >Preferences> Advanced> Library location) and set iTunes to start at login and you're good to go.
 
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This is exactly what I have done. The issue is that when iTunes opens in Spaces it has not opened my library. You mean I do not have to do anything else to get it to work. I am guessing that when it boots up the external drive is not accessible. Maybe that is my problem. How do i tell OSX to open the external hard drive on boot up?
 
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This is exactly what I have done. The issue is that when iTunes opens in Spaces it has not opened my library. You mean I do not have to do anything else to get it to work. I am guessing that when it boots up the external drive is not accessible. Maybe that is my problem. How do i tell OSX to open the external hard drive on boot up?

OS X will mount the external drive on startup, but it might mount it after it's loaded itunes.

If you close itunes then restart it does it find the library? If it does the library setup is ok.

What you need to do is delay the start of itunes for a little while to be sure the external has mounted.

Use Automator:
Custom workflow
Add a Pause - say 60 seconds - a bit of trial and error needed here
Add a Launch - for itunes

Save the workflow somewhere

Go to Sys Preferences - Accounts - login items.
Remove itunes from this list and add your new workflow as a start up item.

Try that.

You'll need to play around with the delay so that it's enough to allow the external to mount before itunes is launched
 
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You could also use Applescript to open iTunes, in lieu of Automator.
Code:
delay 30
tell application "iTunes" to activate
Save it as a script somewhere (home directory, documents, whereever) and add it to your login items as outlined above.

30 seconds should be enough time after login for the external drive to appear and itunes to start up without issue.
 
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This is great!! I will try it when I get home and update the thread with my results. Keep you posted.

Thanks for your help.
 
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Ok I have run into a problem trying to open my itunes library. Here is the scenario. Running iTunes I start while holding on the ALT key so I can choose the library. As I have mentioned in my earlier posts my itunes library(.itl file) is located on my windows pc. My actual music files reside on my external hard drive. I have shared the external hard drive and also the folder on my windows machine that holds the .itl file. So after opening iTunes using the ALT key I am then able to go to the folder where the .itl file resides. the problem is the file is greyed out so I cannot choose it for my library file. Why is it greyed out. Why will it not let me choose it? Once I have this figured out then how do I get OSX to open this library file automatically on startup?

Thanks and I look forward to your replies.

...CP
 
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Ok I have run into a problem trying to open my itunes library. Here is the scenario. Running iTunes I start while holding on the ALT key so I can choose the library. As I have mentioned in my earlier posts my itunes library(.itl file) is located on my windows pc. My actual music files reside on my external hard drive. I have shared the external hard drive and also the folder on my windows machine that holds the .itl file. So after opening iTunes using the ALT key I am then able to go to the folder where the .itl file resides. the problem is the file is greyed out so I cannot choose it for my library file. Why is it greyed out. Why will it not let me choose it? Once I have this figured out then how do I get OSX to open this library file automatically on startup?

Thanks and I look forward to your replies.

...CP

Before we go any further can you answer a couple of questions for me please ( so I can get everything clear in my addled mind!)....
1. is the external drive attached directly to your mac or your pc?
2. are you planning on using the library on your mac to sync an ipod etc or do you just want to listen to the music on you mac?
 
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Before we go any further can you answer a couple of questions for me please ( so I can get everything clear in my addled mind!)....
1. is the external drive attached directly to your mac or your pc?
2. are you planning on using the library on your mac to sync an ipod etc or do you just want to listen to the music on you mac?

Answers to your questions.

1. It is attached to my pc.

2. I would like to use the library on my Mac to sync my iTouch. So the end result is I would like to use the same library on both machines(Mac and PC). But have it stored on an external hard drive. Is this possible? How do I keep the library in sync on both machines. Once this is done I then want to be able to open the library on startup on Mac and have it loaded into one of the SPACES squares.

Can you help?

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...Bruce
 
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Since the drive is attached to your PC, you will need to use automater / applescript to mount it at login after all. I thought you meant a regular external drive attached to your Mac.
 
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Thanks for the reply. Automator it is. I will have to read up on it and see how I should set it up. But before I continue, I should say that the Mac iTunes does not seem to be working when I try to connect to my library on my PC. When I open itunes I press Alt key so it will prompt me for the library folder. I point it to the folder on my PC and it still does not seem to load the library of music which is on my external drive. that is how it should be set up right. The index files are on my PC drive and the actual music iles are located on my external drive right?

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

...CP
 
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Hmm, on the mac the iTunes library files normally looks something like this:
"iTunes Music Library.xml" that's the xml backup of the library and there should also be another (binary) file that's just called "iTunes Library"

Is your iTunes version on the PC up to date? Do you see an xml files anywhere?
 
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Below is a script that will attach you to a shared folder (i.e. the folder where your music is)

This script will mount a shared folder on your network. Please let me know if you need more detail and I can email you the workflow file I've created to test this.
e.g. "smb://<your-login>:<your-password>@<PC_name_or_IP>/<sharedfoldername>" becomes something like:
"smb://fred:[email protected]/sharedituneslib"

---------------------------
tell application "Finder"
try
mount volume "<your-login>:<your-password>@<PC_name_or_IP>/<sharedfoldername>"
end try
end tell
---------------------------

Others may be able to assist but personally I'd give up on the idea of using the library index files created by your Windows version of iTunes and create you own library files on your macs iTunes. It's only the music that needs sharing I don't think you need to access the windows library index files.

One other thing to note is that syncing you iPod with music from a network share will be painfully slow unless you're connected by cable or 802.11n wi-fi.
 
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Thanks for the replies. How can I build the index files on mac to point and use the music files on my external hard drive. This maybe the best way to do this.

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.
 
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Thanks for the replies. How can I build the index files on mac to point and use the music files on my external hard drive. This maybe the best way to do this.

Thanks and I look forward to your reply.

In Finder make sure you have access to the shared folder where your music is.

run itunes, go into Preferences -> Advanced and change the iTunes Music folder location to point to the folder with all your music is on your external disk.

Once that's done you'll need to go to File->Add to library and point at the same folder you set in preferences.
iTunes will now build your library index etc which will take a little time depending how much music you've got.

From now on iTunes will expect the music to be availble on that network location.
 

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