I debated whether to put this in the Collector or Connect section but decided the folks who still use Collector would be more interested:
Since Alwin has made it clear that the desktop software will eventually be abandoned in favor of Connect, I thought it might be helpful to start a list of features that are missing (or some of us just haven’t figured out yet) that could help provide Alwin a list to explore for future updates to ease the transition for some of us old die-hards. Please consider these proactive and positive suggestions for ways to improve an already great set of programs.
In Manage Pick Lists, ability to sort pick lists by count
In Manage Pick Lists, ability to batch delete unused items
1 or 2 Custom fields
Ability to relabel fields - with no custom fields, this would be helpful for those of us who, for instance, don’t use Packaging but would love to use this field for something else.
Ability to import album with full header and track details from xml or csv file (a substitute for adding from scanning a drive)
Consistency between Collector and CLZ: example adding musician default sort name is “last, first” in CLZ and “first last” in Collector. It would be great to have the option to choose the default.
Ability to choose whether to add instrument as default when adding new musician to album. If you create a new musician while adding to an album, the instrument becomes the default and you have to go back to Manage Pick Lists to change it.
@CLZ_Alwin I appreciate any corrections or guidance if something suggested is already available and I missed it.
In Manage Pick Lists, ability to sort pick lists by count
Noted, why exactly do you use that?
In Manage Pick Lists, ability to batch delete unused items
This should not be needed. Manage Pick List on Connect doesn’t have unused fields. Or am I missing something?
1 or 2 Custom fields
User Defined Fields will very likely make it to Connect.
Ability to relabel fields - with no custom fields, this would be helpful for those of us who, for instance, don’t use Packaging but would love to use this field for something else.
This will probably not happen. But it’s been asked before.
Ability to import album with full header and track details from xml or csv file (a substitute for adding from scanning a drive)
Would this work like importing per single, so, 1, album at a time?
Consistency between Collector and CLZ: example adding musician default sort name is “last, first” in CLZ and “first last” in Collector. It would be great to have the option to choose the default.
We’ve talked about this before in a different topic, where I experessed how I would like to have it built, but indeed, an option to tell the generating of the name can be chosen would be nice. But I think you want it “per name field” to be able to set it, and I’m not yet sure about that.
Ability to choose whether to add instrument as default when adding new musician to album. If you create a new musician while adding to an album, the instrument becomes the default and you have to go back to Manage Pick Lists to change it.
In Manage Pick List (the new version I’m testing currently), you can set a default instrument for a musician. As soon as you add this musician, the default instrument will be added to that album, and you can also quickly remove that instrument.
Or if a Musician does not have an instrument, no instrument will be added.
That is how it works in my new test version.
Also the new test version allows you to directly edit the manage pick list for any of those fields right from the Edit Album screen.
I use that in a couple of ways. One as a form of statistics, to see what’s populat or not. Secondly to search for inconsistencies and errors. Low number entries are often errors that creep in
We made this possible in the Windows version a LONG time ago (before we offered User Defined Fields and before we offered translations. So the renaming of fields was a good workaround for both problems (translating and custom fields).
But now we do offer translations and we do offer custom fields (in the Windows software) and we regretted the field renaming feature ever since. It is often used for the wrong reasons, causing all kind of problems.
So for Connect, we’d rather implement User Defined Fields, so that users can keep using the built-in fields for what they are meant for.
It’s not a challenge, it’s just unneeded, as Connect never has unused pick list items, these are cleaned up automatically.
And the mobile app already has a Remove Unused feature.
@CLZ_Alwin I think I must be missing something. Using Connect with Safari on an iPad, in the pick list I can’t figure out how to add a musician. If I type in a name that isn’t in the list, it just says it’s not found but doesn’t give me the option to add new.
That is the MPL screen, you cannot add entries there. That has never been possible in Connect.
Connect uses “auto-cleaning” pick lists, so you never have unused items in your pick lists. But that also means you cannot just add an entry without also immediately using it.
So to add a Musician, you need to go to the Edit screen, then to the Select Musician screen. There, use the blue New Musician button top right.
