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Use iTunes4 smart playlist options for better randomization
Authored by: h2o on May 14, '03 05:27:37PM

Good idea. Some notes/ideas:

1. No need to use the "kind" match, as suggested by others.
2. Limit to XXX songs selected by LEAST RECENTLY PLAYED.
3. Click the Shuffle button for that playlist (at the bottom).

*. If you only select 25 songs, it will likely fill with stuff that has never been played all the way through (as robg reports). Fix this by, for a time, bumping the song count up to a 100 or more. This will improve the randomness across around 10 CDs or so.

*. As songs get played, the randomness will increase over time as the mixes are mixed and mixed in turn.

*. CAVEAT: I chose 250 at one point, and the Shuffle-play becomes not-so-random (sequential, in fact). 100 seemed sufficient to preserve randomness. This may be due to the lag between iTunes4 reconstructing the LIVE playlist and the shuffle-selector code not getting a sufficiently fresh seed...dunno.

*. Using the "Match by LAST PLAYED NOT IN the last 30 days" and turning back on "Last XXX songs selected by RANDOM" would work fine, too, initially, to mix up the last-played timestamps. This will not work, however, to insure that your entire library is played-through before starting over. Neither does method #1 (entirely), but it comes close. The smaller the XXX, the more likely it will churn through them all, but at the expense of variety.



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