generating playlists problem

alec66

New member
after a test period, we decided to buy licence, but there are great problems experienced during playlists generations;

I have 5 songs categories, several playlist are automatically generated during the day, each one with a different logic/order (in some a category is more used, in other no etc.); heavy/hits is less used during each rotation/playlist cycle;
as we have news each 60 mins. usually a playlist is generated each hour from 7,30 am till midnight;

just to give exact numbers right now here are songs splitted into such categories:

1) heavy/hits 130 files
2) cat. jazz 500 songs
3) cat. fast 250 songs
4) cat. slow 500 songs
5) cat. singers 500 songs



I put for each kind of playlist  a general rule (usually never play before 5 days approx) except heavy hits (usually never less than 24/48h approx - sometimes fits criteria/sometimes not) ; for some other songs categories I have to put custom ?no repeat? rules that sometimes work and sometimes gives errors (cant fit criteria etc.) without any rational reason (to us)

also I added the following rules for each songs categories for all playlists

?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 1 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 3 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 5 day ago?
?increase priority by 10 for tracks where last played is greater than 7 day ago?

we are really struggling to find a good balance between songs less/more played, played recently/old played etc. sometimes I see playlists generated with songs from a category played few days ago; then I see after few days, with a new generation a song didnt played for 20 days or so; I dont see a real balance inside each generation, is like things are more done casually than with an exact logic;
another big problem is that also with all the rules reported ?never play and categories balance? lets say today are generated few playlists without any problem/error, tomorrow generating exactly that playlist at same time I see the following errors (those are just examples):

ERROR: Unable to find track that fits criteria (rule: norepeat-artist). Category: "abc"
10 errors
ERROR: Unable to find track that fits criteria (rule: norepeat-track). Category: "yyy"
> 20 errors.

we are really in trouble as often few songs categories are skipped and the playlist generated is totally unreliable with some categories played also 2/3 times in a row

thanks for help
 

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hope we dont have to pay extra to sort it out...if so I ask to admin to contact us pls, or we are forced to change ASAP dj system. thanks
 
alec66 said:
rules that sometimes work and sometimes gives errors (cant fit criteria etc.) without any rational reason (to us)
When it builds a playlist, it adds tracks one by one. Each next track has to fit all the defined criteria: priority rules, filters, repeat protection rules. If you see the error messages, that means your rules are too strict. To fix this problem you should:
- make the rules less strict: less filters and decrease the repeat protection periods, review the priority rules
- add more tracks to categories so that it has more tracks to choose from

You have to make sure there are no error messages when the playlist is created.

The error message provides you with information on what went wrong.
> ERROR: Unable to find track that fits criteria (rule: norepeat-artist). Category: "abc"
Means that your artist repeat protection ("Do not repeat artist for") rule is too strict.

> norepeat-track
This is about the "Do not repeat track for" rule.

alec66 said:
I dont see a real balance inside each generation, is like things are more done casually than with an exact logic;
It's random track selection and it simply makes sure that:
A. The tracks are carefully shuffled (internally it uses a high quality random number generator)
B. The created playlist fits the defined criteria: repeat protection rules, filters, category order etc.

You should use the priority rules to further refine the track selection:
- use priorities to increase probability for tracks that were not played recently (your rules "decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than..." will take care of that).


alec66 said:
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 1 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 3 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 5 day ago?
Please note that rules add up, and for a track that was played 12 hours ago, all those rules will apply and in total its priority will be decreased by 30.

alec66 said:
another big problem is that also with all the rules reported ?never play and categories balance? lets say today are generated few playlists without any problem/error, tomorrow generating exactly that playlist at same time I see the following errors
This is because the conditions are different each time. The "Last played" tag is updated as songs are played - it affects the priorities assigned and repeat protection. The tracks that were played recently also affect playlist creation as it checks what was played recently and it has to follow repeat protection rules.

alec66 said:
we are really in trouble as often few songs categories are skipped and the playlist generated is totally unreliable with some categories played also 2/3 times in a row
The solution is to lessen the repeat periods for all repeat protection rules. From the error messages you get, it is clear that the rules are the problem. Change the rules and then try to create playlist e.g. 10 times in a row. You need to be sure there are never error messages. If they are, the rules need to be reviewed further.
 
thank you very much for your answer, much appreciated!

here the current situation:

I changed most of playlists with only the following general rules for each one of them:

1) do not repeat track for 5 days
2) do not repeat artist for 12 hours

i launched creation command for each playlist manually at least 10 times each with playlist generator pro (vers. 1.7.0.12) to test and now no errors generated (in few of them I had to lower to 3 or 4 days instead of 5 days track rule for some songs category to avoid error, but thats just a small detail so we can survive with this till we dont grow in songs database)

Now I would like to focus on the priority rules settings;

here again our current rules:

?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 1 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 3 day ago?
?decrease priority by 10 for tracks where last played is less than 5 day ago?
?increase priority by 10 for tracks where last played is greater than 7 day ago?

can you suggest me a good and well tested during time (if any) set of rules to let everything run more balanced (cant find on this forum suggestions from other users)
of course any user that can suggest me priority rules combination based on my current number of tracks/categories could be great!

I was also thinking to add in the mix a new rule that try to push songs less played (recently added to database)

?increase priority by 10 for tracks where playcount is less than AVG?

it will improve the full balance?

what I noticed is that when a playlist is generated and goes live, all rules are well respected (do not repeat track etc.) but sometimes jumps to my eyes inside it a song that was played lets say on 27th of september (pls consider that such tracks category is often available in several playlists played during the day) while most are
how happens this? how is possible that during past lets say 5/6 days that song wasnt played/took in consideration?
p.s. referred to playlists generated today 12 october (most songs report as last played 4/5/6/7 october etc.)


here again tracks db numbers (if can help to give us good custom solution for priority rules)

1) heavy/hits 130 files
2) cat. jazz 550 songs
3) cat. fast 250 songs
4) cat. slow 550 songs
5) cat. singers 500 songs

-----------------------------------------

small question: can you confirm me that when you place a rule (ex. dont repeat track for 5 days min)  that rule will consider anything played, also from other playlists etc.? I mean is a general rule, also if I run 100 different playlists within that 5 days?
 
alec66 said:
can you suggest me a good and well tested during time (if any) set of rules to let everything run more balanced (cant find on this forum suggestions from other users)
This very much depends on the situation and therefore there's no one size fits all set of rules. First, I suggest further decreasing the no-repeat durations, 12 hours for artist and 5 days for track looks way too much: it restricts track selection possibilities, and priorities will not work as good as they can. The rules set you have is a good start, you can use them and see how it works in practice, then make adjustments if needed.

alec66 said:
I was also thinking to add in the mix a new rule that try to push songs less played (recently added to database)
This is a good idea and should be done if you want newly added tracks to play a bit more often.

alec66 said:
how is possible that during past lets say 5/6 days that song wasnt played/took in consideration?
From the probabilities theory standpoint, this is certainly possible. Please note that the less strict are your repeat protection rules, the more even the distribution would be.

alec66 said:
small question: can you confirm me that when you place a rule (ex. dont repeat track for 5 days min)  that rule will consider anything played, also from other playlists etc.? I mean is a general rule, also if I run 100 different playlists within that 5 days?
It considers when a track is played in RadioBOSS, regardless of how it was added there - from playlist generator, or added manually or using other means. Make sure that you have both "Read additional information" and "Use last played tag" options turned on in Playlist Generator on the Settings tab.
 
right now around 4.500 songs, rotation works well, a part that sometimes totally forget few songs (ex. a song was played last time around 1 month ago, and this seems without a logic).
anyway, I would like to reset the database/weight of all songs, like I'm going to start for first time radioboss, how to do this?
 
You can use the Music Library to bulk edit tracks, it's in the Tools menu in RadioBOSS. Add tracks, select all, right click and select Track parameters. In the window you can edit values like playcount and others. If your rotation is based on playcount, then setting it to 0 will reset it.

alec66 said:
a song was played last time around 1 month ago, and this seems without a logic
The selection is random, so it's possible, but I'd suggest to check filters and rules to see if such tracks are not excluded from playlist creation.
 
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