My long wishlist

[Orclev]

Just a long list of things that I'd like to see added to the software, some may be planned, some may be impossible or take a month to code for some minor change, some may already be there I just don't realise it - although it's pretty great as it is...


Interface :

More buttons to add icons to a movie, even just 'a,b,c,d', currently I use 'wished' to mean 'HD', and particular ratings I give alternate meanings ('excellent' means 'ongoing series with a new season coming soon' etc.).

Icons/buttons for bitrate (SD, 720, 1080)

Able to set Ordered + Wished for the same title (have it on DVD, ordering the Blu-Ray)

Block delete for owned films (so if you accidentally assign 200 episodes to the wrong series you don't have to delete each one slowly by hand)

Group edits - set/remove an icon, edit a field, for several movies at once.

'Select Random Film' from the currently filtered list, for when you can't decide what to watch.

When scanning a folder - a button to say, 'set all to use folder name', for series where the folder name is accurate but individual files aren't (without having to rename potentially hundreds of files or press the 'use folder name' button hundreds of times)

Also when scanning, some way of saying, assign all files (or all files with a clicked checkbox' to a specific movie (to be fair the only problem I've ever had with this is Lost, I couldn't find a way to assign files to the series Lost 2004, rather than the film, Lost 2004)

Another minor one - if you just miss clicking on a button and click the background instead, it changes the left pane to person search, ideally the area just around the buttons on the right wouldn't have this behaviour.


Filtering :

Allow searching by range (popularity less than 30%, rating > 6.0 etc.).

Related to this, search by decade (80's movies, 1940's movies etc.)

Have a 'person' search field in the main filters, in fact two (so you could look for, sci-fi with Lance Henriksen, or films with Karloff and Lugosi in.

Have a filter for filename, or path (so you could search for all movies in 'Movies 1', 'Movies 2', etc.

Search by IMDB ID.

A 'date added to db' field; perhaps also a filter for the 'date created' data that windows stores for a file.

'no genre' as one of the genre list, for films that only have a country listed and nothing else.


Misecllany :

Some kind of scratchpad or notelist, for listing movies that can't be currently added (music, not in IMDB), so everything is stored in one place, and you don't need a second list in excel or the like.

Add scores from other websites (rotten tomatoes, metacritic), these might not be easily queried, or searchable by IMDB ID however.

More advanced export options, multiple fields (location, year, IMDB ID), and select the ones you want exported, and to other formats than text (excel readable, HTML)


Thanks,

[(cool) Hector]

More buttons to add icons to a movie, even just 'a,b,c,d', currently I use 'wished' to mean 'HD', and particular ratings I give alternate meanings ('excellent' means 'ongoing series with a new season coming soon' etc.).

Icons/buttons for bitrate (SD, 720, 1080)

I plan to add a tag feature. You'll be able to define (and search) any tag you want.

Able to set Ordered + Wished for the same title (have it on DVD, ordering the Blu-Ray)

You can own and order at the same time, no problem. What's impossible is order and wish at the same time.

Block delete for owned films (so if you accidentally assign 200 episodes to the wrong series you don't have to delete each one slowly by hand)

Yes, it's on my todo list.

Group edits - set/remove an icon, edit a field, for several movies at once.

I don't visualize how that feature would work.

'Select Random Film' from the currently filtered list, for when you can't decide what to watch.

I have plans for something close to what you describe. My plan is first to add a "watch" feature that records how many times and when (and where) you've watched a movie. Combined with the rating you gave to the movies, it'd be possible to create a nice feature to help you decide what movie to watch again.

When scanning a folder - a button to say, 'set all to use folder name', for series where the folder name is accurate but individual files aren't (without having to rename potentially hundreds of files or press the 'use folder name' button hundreds of times)

When you rename a folder, all the files inside that folder that were associated based on the folder name are associated again. Please tell me if it's not the case, as that would be a bug.

Also when scanning, some way of saying, assign all files (or all files with a clicked checkbox' to a specific movie

I think that it'd require an important interface change for a feature that's almost never necessary.

(to be fair the only problem I've ever had with this is Lost, I couldn't find a way to assign files to the series Lost 2004, rather than the film, Lost 2004)

I don't understand what problem you've add. Since the series Lost is more popular than the movie, the files are normally associated to the series. I need more explanation.

Another minor one - if you just miss clicking on a button and click the background instead, it changes the left pane to person search, ideally the area just around the buttons on the right wouldn't have this behaviour.

We need to have a way to switch the panel focus. I think that if clicking the panel wouldn't work because we are close to a button, that would be strange and look like a bug for the persons who don't know it's intentional.

Allow searching by range (popularity less than 30%, rating > 6.0 etc.).

The filter search already allows many things. When I consider making a new thing possible, I consider how useful the new feature is vs. how much it'll require to make the interface more complex.

In this case, I think it's not worth making the interface more complex.

Currently, there are 2 things that I plan to make possible: year range, and video file location.

Related to this, search by decade (80's movies, 1940's movies etc.)

Yep, year range. I'm ok.

Have a filter for filename, or path (so you could search for all movies in 'Movies 1', 'Movies 2', etc.

Yep, video file location. You're good !

Have a 'person' search field in the main filters, in fact two (so you could look for, sci-fi with Lance Henriksen, or films with Karloff and Lugosi in.

I have considered this feature in the past, but I haven't been able to come up with an elegant solution. I'll probably never add this feature.

Search by IMDB ID.

I know that would be useful to not request a movie that is already in the database. My plan is to modify the way how movie requests are made. And that new process would include IMDb ID checking.

A 'date added to db' field; perhaps also a filter for the 'date created' data that windows stores for a file.

Yes, there are many things that could be done in that direction.

'no genre' as one of the genre list, for films that only have a country listed and nothing else.

What's the point ? The movie do have a genre. We just don't have that information.

Some kind of scratchpad or notelist, for listing movies that can't be currently added (music, not in IMDB), so everything is stored in one place, and you don't need a second list in excel or the like.

Sorry, I don't see the point to have this list inside Coollector.

Add scores from other websites (rotten tomatoes, metacritic)

Yes, that's something that I'd like to add. As well as links to other sites than IMDb.

More advanced export options, multiple fields (location, year, IMDB ID), and select the ones you want exported, and to other formats than text (excel readable, HTML)

Absolutely. The current export feature is far too basic. I hope to improve it as soon as possible.


Thank you very much for your feedback. You said you had a long wishlist, but mine is in fact much longer than yours

[Orclev]

Thanks for your reply - some explanation where needed...

Orclev wrote:
Group edits - set/remove an icon, edit a field, for several movies at once.

I don't visualize how that feature would work.

- so, if I want to set 'ordered' on 20 movies that are 'wished', I can select them all at once instead of one at a time (this is more because I use some of the ratings buttons to mean other things )
- for editing lots of fields at once, this is where 200 movies are in path say L:\movies2, but now it is J:\movies 2, I can change them all at once (the software will do this a bit slowly when you click on 'play', and find the new location, but it doesn't remember it, and changing 200 movies individually would take a long time.
- or, if you add the 'tag' feature you describe, I could add 'HD' to all the HD movies at once (currently they are my 'ordered' films)

(it's not at all an important feature, I am thinking of the way that for example mp3 tag renamers work)


Orclev wrote:
When scanning a folder - a button to say, 'set all to use folder name', for series where the folder name is accurate but individual files aren't (without having to rename potentially hundreds of files or press the 'use folder name' button hundreds of times)

When you rename a folder, all the files inside that folder that were associated based on the folder name are associated again. Please tell me if it's not the case, as that would be a bug.

- ah, ok, so if I have 200 episodes of Mystery Science Theater associated to the movie, not to the series, if I rename the folder appropiately and scan again, it will remove all the files from the movie, and link them to the series instead?


Orclev wrote:
(to be fair the only problem I've ever had with this is Lost, I couldn't find a way to assign files to the series Lost 2004, rather than the film, Lost 2004)

I don't understand what problem you've add. Since the series Lost is more popular than the movie, the files are normally associated to the series. I need more explanation.

- when I scanned the 'lost' folder, with the episodes in, it always tried to associate them with the movie 'lost' from 2004, not the series (normally when films have the same name, putting the year as well will let the software recognise the right film - but with lost, or lost 2004, etc., the scanner will always link them to the movie, not the film)


Orclev wrote:
'no genre' as one of the genre list, for films that only have a country listed and nothing else.

What's the point ? The movie do have a genre. We just don't have that information.

- it's because mostly they are documentaries or documentary series (I know, not the point of the software ) - and there is no way to search for them from your collection (you could include the 'documentary' tag from IMDB I suppose but that would perhaps be admitting defeat )


Thanks,

[(cool) Hector]

- so, if I want to set 'ordered' on 20 movies that are 'wished', I can select them all at once instead of one at a time (this is more because I use some of the ratings buttons to mean other things )

Yes, the problem is how you select multiple movies. If all the movies must have something in common, it's not a good way to select multiple movies, because it works only for very special cases.

- for editing lots of fields at once, this is where 200 movies are in path say L:\movies2, but now it is J:\movies 2, I can change them all at once (the software will do this a bit slowly when you click on 'play', and find the new location, but it doesn't remember it, and changing 200 movies individually would take a long time.

Changing the location of your files is a common problem that is solved by using CONTROL + L. That will invoke a window to modify all the 'L'ocation fields, to replace a string by another string.

For example, you 'll replace "C:\My Movies" by "G:\Videos" if you've moved your files from "C:\My Movies" to "G:\Videos".

Note that in the case where it's only the drive letter that has changed (which can easily happen with Windows), then you don't have anything to do, because the program, if it can't find the file you ask him to play, will automatically try all the other drive letters.

ah, ok, so if I have 200 episodes of Mystery Science Theater associated to the movie, not to the series, if I rename the folder appropiately and scan again, it will remove all the files from the movie, and link them to the series instead?

Not at all. That's not what I wanted to say. You should always check the associations suggested by the scanning algorithm, and prevent a bad association before it happens, because it'll be much more difficult to fix afterwards.

What I wanted to say, is if the scanning algorithm suggested an association that is wrong, and that association is based on the folder name, and you modify the folder name to have a good association, then all the files that were suggested a bad association based on the old folder name will receive a new suggestion based on the new folder name.

when I scanned the 'lost' folder, with the episodes in, it always tried to associate them with the movie 'lost' from 2004, not the series (normally when films have the same name, putting the year as well will let the software recognise the right film - but with lost, or lost 2004, etc., the scanner will always link them to the movie, not the film)

I just made the test: "Lost.avi" is associated with the series, but strangely "Lost (2004).avi" is associated to the movie.

Thank you for reporting this problem, I'll fix it with the next version.

it's because mostly they are documentaries or documentary series (I know, not the point of the software )

We are relaxing our policy about documentaries (as long as it stays manageable, meaning that I hope we won't be inundated by addition requests).

And it'll probably take many weeks to complete, but I'm currently in the process of adding several new genres: Documentary, Short, Crime, Thriller, Sports, History...

[(cool) Hector]

Have a 'person' search field in the main filters, in fact two (so you could look for, sci-fi with Lance Henriksen, or films with Karloff and Lugosi in.

I have considered this feature in the past, but I haven't been able to come up with an elegant solution. I'll probably never add this feature.

I might finally have a solution

There would be 2 new filters: Person1 and Person2. Person1 would propose the name of the person currently displayed in the person panel. This way, you could filter the films from that person, for example listing all the Lance Henriksen sci-fi movies that you own on Blu-Ray. And as soon as a Person1 is selected, then the Person2 filter would propose the names of all the persons that have worked with that Person1.

What do you think ? Do you have a better idea ? Any suggestions ?

I have a second variation on that solution, so please tell me which one you prefer. In that second solution, Person1 would propose the name of all the persons from the movie currently displayed in the facing movie panel. Personally, I think it's a better solution, because you could change the displayed movie from the filtered search as soon as you decide to refine your filtered search with a person criterion (or the view of a person name in the movie panel might be what decides you to make a search of this kind). I also like it better because it's easier to understand where the names proposed by Person1 come from (in the first solution, the person panel is hidden below the movie filtered search).

[Orclev]

I think the second variation sounds better; this kind of filtering I think is much more likely to arise from a thought when you see such-and-such a person is in the film you're currently looking at, at least that's when it comes to mind for me. The only drawback might be the number of people that could then be an option for Person2 (some will have worked with 1000's of others); but, I suppose the only other alternative would be every person in the database so much longer .

So, as long as the query 'everyone this person has worked with' doesn't take too long a time to run, the second would seem the best.

[(cool) Hector]

Thank you for your feedback

I think the second variation sounds better

The only drawback might be the number of people that could then be an option for Person2 (some will have worked with 1000's of others);

That would be exactly the same with the first variation. The difference between the first and the second variation, is just how we select the first person to use as a filter.

So, as long as the query 'everyone this person has worked with' doesn't take too long a time to run, the second would seem the best.

Don't worry, filling Person2 will be instant, or at worst "nearly" instant.

[kakashi]

Damn this topic was a long read. Pretty good stuff though.

I also like it better because it's easier to understand where the names proposed by Person1 come from

I agree, it makes sense.

I'll try not to comment on the rest of the suggestions or this topic might never come to an end...

[Gl3nn75]

Interesting indeed. But I could feel Hector slowly die with every next line.

I think that with the current list of features/changes to add, he's busy until 2015 already. Let alone the things that will be added to the list along the way.

[(cool) Hector]

I think that with the current list of features/changes to add, he's busy until 2015 already.

My todo list goes well beyond 2015

It's both frustrating and exciting.

[(cool) Hector]

Another minor one - if you just miss clicking on a button and click the background instead, it changes the left pane to person search, ideally the area just around the buttons on the right wouldn't have this behaviour.

We need to have a way to switch the panel focus. I think that if clicking the panel wouldn't work because we are close to a button, that would be strange and look like a bug for the persons who don't know it's intentional.

By thinking twice, I've changed my mind on this one.

Giving the focus to a panel by clicking it, it's not a fundamental feature, and in the end it's more annoying than useful. It's quite enough to be able to switch the focus by clicking a grid row.

I'll completely disable that feature with the next update, and hopefully it shouldn't be missed by anyone.