Newbie mpc --format question

[awr042]

How do I generate a list of all the songs in my database with the position? I want something like

position number - artist - album - title

I tried this:

mpc listall -f "%position% - %artist% - %album% - %title%"

That gave me output like this:

1 - The Butterfield Blues Band - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - Love March
1 - The Butterfield Blues Band - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - Everything's Gonna Be Alright
1 - Sha Na Na - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - Get A Job
1 - Sha Na Na - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - At The Hop
1 - Sha Na Na - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - Get A Job (Reprise)
1 - Jimi Hendrix - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - The Star Spangled Banner/Purple Haze/Woodstock Improvisation
1 - Chip Monck - Woodstock: 40 Years on: Back to Yasgur's Farm - Woodstock Farewell
1 - Woody & Arlo Guthrie - This Land Is Your Land - Howdi Do

Why is it listing the position of every song as "1"?

I'm frustrated because yesterday I found a command buried in some documentation that gave me the output I wanted. Today, I cannot find that command.

Standard newbie question: want don't I know?

TIA

[awr042]

OK, I found the command I found yesterday:

mpc playlist -f "[%position%) - %file%]"

However, it stills lists the %position% of every song as "1".

1 - Zombies/RIP aka The Lost Album 2014/15 If It Dont Work Out mono single mix .mp3
1 - Zombies/RIP aka The Lost Album 2014/16 Dont Cry for Me mono single mix .mp3
1 - ZZ Top/Tush.mp3
1 - ZZ Top/Afterburner/01 Sleeping Bag.mp3

Again, what don't I know?

Thanks!

[MaxKellermann]

But what output do you want?

[awr042]

What I'd like is a list of songs with their positions that I can use as a menu for the mpc play command. When I want to play a particular song, I can look it up in the saved file and get the position value.

This is day 2 of my mpd/mpc experience. Should I be looking for a better way?

Thanks!

[MaxKellermann]

I repeat: what does "position" mean?
I told you MPD's definition of "position", and explained that it doesn't make sense in the way you use it.

[awr042]

I'm trying to understand position because of this from the mpc document page:

play <position> - Starts playing the song-number
specified. If none is specified, plays number 1.

Your replies and the document page make me realize I need to understand the differences between the database, playlists, and the queue. I see now position only applies to the queue. After your initial response, I thought it should apply to playlists, just not the database.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but playing a song with mpc is a two-step process. First, move the song into the queue. Second, play the song from the queue. If correct, this is the source of my initial confusion. I thought if I knew the position of a song in the database, I could specify that with the mpc play command.

My original goal was to create a file with all the songs in the database with their positions. If I wanted to play a song, I look it up in that file, gets its position, and execute the mpc play command that position. Now I see I can make this work but with a couple of extra steps. First, to create the menu file, I need to move the database into the queue and print the queue to a file:

# mpc add /
# mpc -f "[%position% - %file%]" playlist | tee allsongs.list

Later, if I want to play a specific song, I look it up in allsongs.list to get its position. Playing it with that info requires these steps:

# mpc add /
# mpc play <position>

If there is a question in all this, it would be this. Is playing a song with mpd/mpc a two-step process?

1. Move the song into the queue
2. Play the song from the queue

Thanks!

[MaxKellermann]

Yes. The queue is what MPD should play, and the "play" comman starts playback of songs that are already in the queue. Many clients provide a combined command, e.g. in ncmpc you can just press "Enter" in the library browser to add+play.