Playlist of Playlists // mod: Apply "Limit To" per rule group when filtering

Feature Suggestions
1

I want to make a smart playlist that is kind of complex, built up of several different possibilities. E.g.

  • Songs added within the last 4 weeks
  • Songs rated > 2 stars
  • Songs not played in the last 120 days
    etc.

I want to limit the number of songs that each of those bullets can contribute to the overall play list. E.g., 20 new songs, 30 >2 songs, 20 not recently played songs.

With Advanced Filters, there is a final field LIMIT TO, but that is global to the entire playlist.

It would be ideal if each Rule Group had its own LIMIT TO field. Lacking that, the ability to make a playlist of playlists, that would allow a Playlist to be one of the rule items. [mod-edit: duplicate (see below)]

The LIMIT TO field would also benefit by offering a selected by option, like what iTunes/Apple Music has:

  • Random
  • Artist
  • Album
  • etc…

[mod-edit: already implemented/available; see sorting option when creating/editing filter criteria]

2

There’s already an existing feature suggestion discussing an option to filter for items of a certain playlist (blacklisting or whitelisting them). With regards to this aspect you can comment/vote in that thread.

As for specifying the order based on what the Limit to field is applied → you can already sort the smart playlist when creating/editing its filter (the same way you’ll otherwise set the library order).

With that in mind, let’s focus this suggestion on having an option to specify a Limit To field for each rule group.

3

Hi @tom80H – Thanks for the pointer to the already existing selection.

Regarding my suggestion for Limit To with a Selected By option, Plex doesn’t support what iTunes/Apple Music offers.

An example: A complex rule that’ll get 100s of songs. I want to set Limit To to 100 songs, but I want it to select those songs by Albums. That is, give me full albums worth of songs that match my rule, up to (but not more than) 100 songs.

4

I just tested this and I’m getting pretty much the same result between Apple Music and Plex:

  1. Set the filter rules according to your liking
  2. Set display mode: Tracks
  3. Click on the Album column header to sort the table by Albums (click 2x to sort descending)
  4. Set your limit

I believe the only key difference I’ve noticed is how Apple sorts special characters.
The last album of the selection might be cut if it has more tracks than what’s set to fit your playlist limit – though that applies to both to Plex and Apple Music.

The only significant difference I’ve seen is that Apple Music offers an option to set a limit based on duration (minutes, hours) and file size (MB, GB) in addition to limiting by item count (which is available on both platforms).

5

Thanks for the added info @tom80H.
I’ll happily wait for the other enhancements requests to see if they get implemented.
Got my vote in on the black/white list feature and this one.

6

A follow on: A can’t figure out how to make a smart playlist limit to 100 tracks selected by Random. The 100 part I got, but not Random. I can do Artists or Albums randomly.

Any tips would be appreciated.

7

It seems this isn’t supported via the user interface but can be achieved using a workaround by manually editing the URL when filtering the playlist. The procedure is detailed in the related feature suggestion:

8

I believe it you set the playlist to view by artist, you will be able to select “randomly” as the sort method. This will infact sort the tracks randomly during playback.

9

It’d be really cool to be able to create a playlist of 100 songs that are made up from :

rule group 1 <contains 50 songs>: limit to 20 sorted by some rule (recently played, last skipped, etc)
rule group 2 <contains 50 songs>: limit to 30 sorted by some rule (recently played, last skipped, etc)
rule group 3 <contains 80 songs>: limit to 50 sorted by some rule (recently played, last skipped, # plays, etc)

I feel like this would be a really versatile option and allow for some really cool playlist builds.

1 Like
10

That is exactly what I used to do with iTunes. I made a smart play list filled with:

20 random songs added within the last 6 months
30 random songs rated 3 stars or higher.
30 random songs not rated 1 star (my marker for I don’t really like this song), that I haven’t listened to in 6 months, and that I haven’t skipped in the last 2 months.

11

Exactly, I migrated from iTunes to plex for my music and have been really happy with it, but this is one admittedly niche thing I used to do that doesn’t seem possible in Plex.

12

I would like to see this as well, but with video playlists. I have 3 different TV shows, and I would like to grab 5 episodes from each show and put them in a smart playlist. I would then have Plex optimize this playlist and sync the playlist (vs individual shows) to a tablet. This would allow me to control what is synced to the tablet without actually having to open Plex on the tablet.