question on itunes + keyboard shortcuts + other on XP -> OSX

1) today I noticed that itunes has all my music copied in a separate folder under itunes music and sorted by artists. So instead of having 15GB of music, I now have 30GB of music. What should I do? Delete my old files (which are actually sorted neatly by genre) or delete the itunes files?

2) How can I change the keyboard shortcuts? I hate how DELETE from windows (which I think is called forward delete) is Fn + delete. I'd rather have it set up as command + delete.

3) In windows, ENTER would open a file or folder. In Aqua, ENTER opens the renaming field for files and folders. How do you open something without a mouse?

4) In windows, when composing a new message in hotmail on Firefox, when I started typing a name or e-mail address in the 'To' or 'CC' or 'BCC' fields while composing a new email, firefox would automatically complete the name or email address. So it was synchronized with the contact list (NOT the same thing as auto form complete or whatever it was called). How can I have that feature in OS X? FF didn't have it, neither does Safari or Camino.

5) How do I make Camino remember my search words and forms?

Thanks.

 

well for the iTunes issue. i would just let iTunes sort your music, unless you really need it sorted by Genres, but then again, isn't that the whole point of having iTunes? it allows you to have neatly organized music without having to organize it your self.

just turn on the options to allow it to organize your music and copy to the itunes folder. in preferences.

select a new itunes folder, and then go to advanced in the upper menu, and select consolidate library, basically what consolidate library does is, copy all of the music in your itunes library, everything that is actually in your main library within itunes, to wherever you have your music folder selected as.

i think the original itunes setup is the best, in windows, in the my music folder you just have a folder named itunes, in that all the library files then the iTunes Music folder, within that all of your music automatically organized by artist, you never really need to get into the music folder as it can just be accessed in itunes much easier, anything you want to do to the file you can do it from itunes just as you would from the finder or explorer.

so what i would do is consolidate the library to a new location, and then delete all of your old files, and make sure to back up all your music to an external or dvd's, etc. it is definitely worth doing.

and if you just follow the regular itunes structure, all you have to do to copy your music over to another computer, is just copy the entire itunes folder to the new location, and you will still have all your ratings/play counts/playlists etc.

good luck.

 

The thing is that all of that makes sense to me, but I've had my folders organized by genres for the past 8 years. And yeah, I actually never browse to the music folders as everything I want is in itunes and if i want to find a song in a browser, i just use the options in itunes to open it in a browser (e.g. Finder in OS X). I guess it's kinda hard to depart from a music-folder structure which I've kept for so long, even though now the structure is useless.

UPDATE on camino and hotmail: the automatic contact fill-in or whatever it's called actually does work with firefox in OS X. i guess that's because firefox can use the full version of windows live hotmail, and only the classic version is supported by camino. But I don't want to use FF as it just takes too much memory and my CPU actually runs hotter with FF.

So, the question now is, how to have the the FULL version of windows live hotmail on Camino.

 

I completely understand what you are saying about the folder structure, but you just have to realize that iTunes itself works much better as a way to organize all of those files, it took me awhile to realize that also, but once i did, it is just like, well now all of this is completely unnecessary, all well, let's do something more important, haha.

i would highly recommend letting go of keeping it organized yourself as it will save you a lot of time and needless thinking, so you can just enjoy your music.

you should take some more time to learn more about iTunes by checking out Apple's support section, quite a bit of info on their about how iTunes organizes files, etc.

and for those that have never used it, Picasa 2 does an amazing job of doing the exact same thing for all of your photos as well, it can completely leave your file structure alone, but still "organize" all of your photos in an easy to search and use program.

for your problem, I highly recommend you tell iTunes to keep your music in the iTunes/iTunes Music folder if it isn't already doing that, consolidate the library to that folder or if there is already random music in that folder, like stuff that you have imported etc. make a new folder, make it your itunes music folder and then consolidate to that folder, this will give you a completely new location for all of your music and files that is in your library, then once you are satisfied that everything is their in the new location, delete all of the other old files folders etc. remake the folder in the iTunes folder/"iTunes Music" point iTunes back to that folder and consolidate again, which will bring you back to the original iTunes organization.

that was probably ridiculously confusing but I am pretty sure it actually makes sense it is basically what i did with my files when I realized i had basically duplicates of each files on my computer, which came from not knowing what I was doing with iTunes, but now, I know everything that iTunes can possibly do, and how it works, even if it took me awhile. ;D

 

I know what you mean... I have a folder structure for my photography which I have developed over the years which isn't really compatible with iPhoto so I have ended up storing the bulk of my pictures outside of the iPhoto system.

For music though I just let iTunes take care... it sorts everything in folders by artist which is pretty much what I was doing anyway.

Of course it isnt for anyone to say the iTunes system is 'better' than yours any more than it is for them to tell you where you should keep your socks But OTOH I don't really see any added value by filing your music by genre... particularly where genre ID Tags will work on pretty much any music software

 

K thanks a lot. itunes has already duplicated everything into its own folder and the library reads from there. Sigh, i guess I'll go and delete the original copies.
Thanks
Now that was Question #1. What about #2,3,4,5? Here they are again:
2) How can I change the keyboard shortcuts? I hate how DELETE from windows (which I think is called forward delete) is Fn + delete. I'd rather have it set up as command + delete.

3) In windows, ENTER would open a file or folder. In Aqua, ENTER opens the renaming field for files and folders. How do you open something without a mouse?

4) In windows, when composing a new message in hotmail on Firefox, when I started typing a name or e-mail address in the 'To' or 'CC' or 'BCC' fields while composing a new email, firefox would automatically complete the name or email address. So it was synchronized with the contact list (NOT the same thing as auto form complete or whatever it was called). How can I have that feature in OS X? FF didn't have it, neither does Safari or Camino.

5) How do I make Camino remember my search words and forms? I don't see the option in preferences.

 

No one? Well if it's too much, then just #2 and #5, pa-lease.

 

Anyone home????
I found out that Camino can't save search histories. That sucks. So just #2 please: How can I change the keyboard shortcuts? I hate how DELETE from windows (which I think is called forward delete) is Fn + delete. I'd rather have it set up as command + delete.