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Tripped over this (minor) issue whilst fighting a different problem:

 

SETUP:   Mac running Sonos Controller 16.4.2.

music (nee iTunes) library lives on the Mac (Users/dan/music/iTunes)

iTunes library exported to "iTunes Music Library.xml"

Mac iTunes file structure entirely copied to USB drive hanging off router (\\NASMOUNT\iTunes)

Sonos library location only knows \\NASMOUNT\iTunes.

 

This has been working for years. 

I recently noticed that Sonos had a couple of extra imported playlists: Library and Music. They each appear to contain all songs.

 

Reading posts here, it sounds like Sonos no longer needs the XML file, so I tried different variations.

 

1) updating library after deleting  xml file on the NAS:

library and music are created in imported playlists, my imported playlists are there.

xml file on Mac was modified. 

this was surprising, as I wasn't aware Sonos knew about the Mac iTunes location.

 

2) updating library without xml file either on NAS or Mac iTunes library

Mac iTunes XML file is created

imported playlists are empty

3) updating library after exporting iTunes library to XML and copying it to NAS

imported playlists are there, but so is a new on called Downloaded - seems to contain all songs

library and music imported playlists disappeared 

the Mac iTunes XML file was  modified, the XML file on the NAS was not modified.

 

I have verified there is no other xml file in either of the file structures.

 

apparently, Sonos will create it's own XML file (in Mac iTunes path), but it doesnt handle iTunes playlists very well.

This make any sense?  Like I said, not a big issue, but it is screwy...

 

thx

Dan Wills 

Hi ​@Dan.Wills 

Thanks for your post!

This is expected behaviour - when iTunes became Apple Music, the usage of this xml file changed.

iTunes (sticking with the old name) will only use the file if it already exists. As Sonos can’t pull the playlists from wherever else iTunes stores them and so needs that file to exist, if it doesn’t find the file in the iTunes folder, it will create it so that iTunes will then populate it with the needed data.

If a NAS is involved, the xml file will need to be copied over manually (this behaviour may change if the NAS folder is set to be the store location for iTunes in iTunes’ settings - I am not sure).

Personally, I prefer to use individual .m3u playlists files for each playlist. I believe iTunes can export to .m3u - you may find you prefer this too.

I hope this helps.

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