[HappyTalk]

Apologies for tone, I got really frustrated after trying out new tv server and then seeing over 13,000 thumbs! after doing the music db import I just thought bloat and wondered where it was all going. I don't know where all the thumbs came from in my case (< 2000 folder.jpg's exist I just checked)? Maybe a lot of the mp3's have embedded artwork or something, though 'use embedded artwork for thumbs' was set to off before import so still unsure why so many?

Re " hidden "use folder thumbs" config setting" I presume you mean
Setup|Music Database|Use folder .jpg to create thumbs
I had set this on and option below 'create artist....first file'=off before doing import thinking this would avoid the thumb generation, that I had seen in the past in Thumbs\Pictures but not in Thumbs\music which until 0.2.2.0 had remained blank.



OK on looking at the thumbs generated I realise there are in fact closer to 18,000 as there are in fact another 5,000 in Thumbs\Music\Folder.

I see that the huge number in the Albums thumb folder comes about because a unique thumb is generated for every artist on a compilation album so a compilation album with say 40 tracks all by different artists will create 40 identical large and 40 identical small icons, I presume this is not the intended result? I understand why you use thumbs and am not knocking the concept, it's a good idea but the duplication seems unneccessary. I would have thought a db field pointing to the thumb filename would ensure both Albums and Folder could use the same thumb and compilation albums could all point to the same single thumb for every track on the album.

I can see you may not want to have to key off the db to locate which thumb to use for folders though (as user may be in shares view not using the db but still want thumbnail caching), so would have thought Folder might contain thumbs named based on the path substituting dot for slash
e.g '...\thumbs\music\folder\d.mp3.a.air.moon safari.jpg'

For albums you would have to access the db anyway to know what albums there are. I guess you used artist-album for uniqueness which causes compilations to generate lots of files and might not be unique anyway. Looking at the db I figure album.StrAlbum + '.' + album.idAlbum
e.g '...\thumbs\music\albums\Now Music 69.1020.jpg '
would be unique + by prefixing with real album name adds the human readable format and is easily tracked for future deletion.

One last thing is on a Hidef 1080i LCD is 300x300 (large thumb res) enough resolution when in filmstrip mode or does this just access the original jpg? I presume 300x300 is enough for the large icon view on such a hidef setup? Hmmm I just tried setting to 'album view' in filmstrip mode and nothing appears in the large filmstrip box, it does work in shares view though

Sorry again for earlier tone, now trying to resolve issue.