Confused about folder structure (winamp related)

[ToastMaster]

Hello. Hope someone can help. :sarc:

Why does Windows 7 list your files in two different structures? I.e.

C:\Users\Jody\Music\albums

C:\Documents and Settings\Jody\My Documents\My Music\albums

It's EXACTLY the same content in each structure (any change I make to one folder, is mirrored in the other). This appears to be causing my Winamp to add all my music twice - I put one of the above locations as the 'watch folder' (winamp monitors this file for additions / changes) but it pulls in every mp3 twice: one will be located in the first folder above, the other in the second, even though it's exactly the same file.

Is there a setting to change change the way windows works, to prevent duplicate winamp files?

I'm using a new PC btw - this isn't an upgrade from XP.

Many thanks

 

[dnorris]

In Vista (and in Windows 7), "Documents and Settings" is not a folder.
Vista/Win7 uses a different file structure than XP does/did. Those familiar
folder names you may be used to, like "My Documents", "Documents &
Settings", etc. are not folders in Vista/Win7. They are junction points,
and are used for legacy programs which were written to utilize the XP file
structure.
They will redirect the programs to use the equivalent Vista/Win7 folders.
If you keep the protected operating system files hidden, you won't see them.

In Vista/Win7......
Documents & Settings -> \Users
My Documents -> \Users\youraccount\Documents
My Music -> \Users\youraccount\Music
Application Data -> \Users\youraccount\AppData
etc.

 

[ToastMaster]

Hi dnorris,

Thanks for the explanation.

I've changed my options to hide "protected operating system files" but winamp still sees those two folder structures, so still adds tracks twice. Any further ideas, please?

I can also still navigate to (by pasting it)

C:\Documents and Settings\Jody\My Documents\My Music\albums

I've also posted this on a winamp forum btw, but after nearly a week, still no reply.

Thanks

Jody

 

[CarlTR6]

Unless I totally misunderstand, those files are not in two places physically. They are in one folder. Libraries reports them in two locations because you have two ways to access them. The C:\Documents and Settings\Jody\My Documents\My Music\albums merely points you to the actual physical location which is in \Users\youraccount\AppData. Your files are physically located in a folder under users.

 

[ToastMaster]

Hi CarlTR6. That's how I understand it too, but winamp doesn't seem to think that way.

Taking an example, I have the following song appearing in winamp twice:

Jeepers Creepers
Jeepers Creepers

I right click the top song and request file location and get:
C:\Users\Jody\Music\albums\Frank Sinatra\Songs for Young Lovers-Swing Easy!\Jeepers Creepers Frank Sinatra.mp3

I right click the bottom song and request file location and get:
C:\Documents and Settings\Jody\My Documents\My Music\albums\Frank Sinatra\Songs for Young Lovers-Swing Easy!\Jeepers Creepers Frank Sinatra.mp3

This is what is happening for every song I own. Winamp is placing two files in the directory, thinking they are two seperate files in two seperate places.

Any suggestions greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

[fseal]

Clearly Winamp is broken on 7

I'd file a bug report with them directly. They should not be using the old folder structure at all on 7.

 

[CarlTR6]

Clearly Winamp is broken on 7

I'd file a bug report with them directly. They should not be using the old folder structure at all on 7.

I right click the bottom song and request file location and get:
C:\Documents and Settings\Jody\My Documents\My Music\albums\Frank Sinatra\Songs for Young Lovers-Swing Easy!\Jeepers Creepers Frank Sinatra.mp3

C:\documents and setting is not a physical location. The Documents and settings folder is a junction, a pointer that points to the real physical location.

Are you sure you have two copies of the file? If you delete one does the other disappear also? I am thinking these are the same location. One is the actual physical location and the other is pointing to that location using the XP method. I have no idea why Winamp is doing this.

Now I'm confused!

 

[whs]

I would download XP mode and run Winamp there. It was apparently not properly adapted to Windows7.

 

[stormy13]

Clearly Winamp is broken on 7

No it isn't, at least not for me it isn't. I have all my music on a separate hard drive and linked in the Music library, and it only lists everything once.

This almost sounds like it was an upgrade install of Windows 7 from XP, and the C:\Documents and Settings folder from the windows.old folder got copied over to the new install.

 

[CarlTR6]

Clearly Winamp is broken on 7

No it isn't, at least not for me it isn't. I have all my music on a separate hard drive and linked in the Music library, and it only lists everything once.

This almost sounds like it was an upgrade install of Windows 7 from XP, and the C:\Documents and Settings folder from the windows.old folder got copied over to the new install.

That is a possibility. If that is the case, he can delete a file in one and it will remain in the other.

 

[MilesAhead]

I would download XP mode and run Winamp there. It was apparently not properly adapted to Windows7.

I had occasion to use Winamp on W7 through another tool that showed play times of media files. If you double clicked in the other tool, it's supposed to play the file in the default player for the file type.

Turned out sometimes it would open Winamp if that was the player for that file type, and sometimes it wouldn't. I messed around with it and tracked it down to skin type if you can believe that. Winamp skins with one file extension worked, while all the Winamp skins with an alternate file extension failed. Really really weird!!

 

[fseal]

It's still a winamp bug.

It's finding the documents and settings path to your music folder THEN it's going through the Users folder to the same place and thinking it's two different folders with two different sets of files (which it isn't).

And be careful, since they do point to the same place, deleting stuff from one will delete it from the other. There really is just ONE file but there are two "folders" that point to that one file.

Winamp should be smarter, use the users folder and ignore documents and settings on W7.

 

[stormy13]

That may explain why I have never seen it on my machine. I don't keep any music in the Music folder, it is all on a separate hard drive.

 

[ToastMaster]

Hi all,

Some more detail on this:

> If you delete one does the other disappear also?

Yes. If I open both locations and move / delete a file from one, it immediately removes from the other location too. So I don't have two copies of the file - it's one file being shown under two locations.

> This almost sounds like it was an upgrade install of Windows 7 from XP, and the C:\Documents and Settings folder from the windows.old folder got copied over to the new install.

When I bough the new PC and re-installed winamp, I wanted to keep my ratings and play counts etc from my old PC, so I exported my library as a file, then loaded that into my new Win7 PC setup. Could it be this that's causing the problem?

My PC is definitely new - not an OS upgrade.

Thanks for the continued help on this

Jody

 

[CarlTR6]

Hi all,

Some more detail on this:

> If you delete one does the other disappear also?

Yes. If I open both locations and move / delete a file from one, it immediately removes from the other location too. So I don't have two copies of the file - it's one file being shown under two locations.

> This almost sounds like it was an upgrade install of Windows 7 from XP, and the C:\Documents and Settings folder from the windows.old folder got copied over to the new install.

When I bough the new PC and re-installed winamp, I wanted to keep my ratings and play counts etc from my old PC, so I exported my library as a file, then loaded that into my new Win7 PC setup. Could it be this that's causing the problem?

My PC is definitely new - not an OS upgrade.

Thanks for the continued help on this

Jody

Jody, I do not have a solution; but now, at least, you know that you do not have duplicate files. I have the same thing ocurring with Pictures in my library. I have some files were created when I was running XP. After a clean install of Windows 7, I moved them back and they display both in pictures and in the old My Pictures. However, I only have the one set of files. After I figured out what was going on, I just ignore it.

 

[pcguy]

It's not Winamp

New Win 7 PC here - not an upgrade.

It's the way Windows 7 has been made to work. The duplicate files referred to in this thread are not imaginary and Winamp is not the only program that processes duplicate files when searching the hard drive for importing data, especially data captured and transferred by Windows Easy Transfer.

I struggled with this early on and never found a solution. This thread is as close to describing the problem, as I encountered, when trying to find an answer a few weeks ago.

All the email programs I tried (no Outlook Express in Win 7) including Outlook 2007, Windows Live Mail, Mozilla, Eudora, Zimbra and one other that escapes me at the moment, all tried to find my files for me, without asking exactly where the files I wanted to import were located.

When that happened, each of these programs imported 4 copies of all email and contacts. I had a hell of a time figuring out how to fix it - end result was manual and time consuming. Same thing for Windows Media and my music.

Today I still struggle with the architecture of Win 7 - can't leave well enough alone - change for the sake of change.............

 

[fseal]

It's all part of the opposing ideals of making Windows a real multi user OS (Creating a user home folder) and yet not breaking tons of legacy apps. Frankly, it can't be done. I'd just as soon have had it break legacy apps rather than create the phantom Documents and Settings "folder", but here we are.

The solution in all cases is to update your software to windows 7 compatible versions. And by compatible, that partly means knowing how to search the HD and not follow hard links if necessary.

 

[Trucidation]

As CarlTR6 pointed out earlier, the location beginning with "\Documents and Settings\" is a junction. There are no files physically there, it's like a virtual signpost pointing to the other location, the one beginning with "\Users\". That's why if you include it, any files in \Users\ get shown twice.

Solution 1, clear your Winamp playlist then re-add your My Music folder. Select the folder, not the junction. I really don't see why Winamp is "duplicating" your entries unless you've added the junction as well.

Solution 2, do what stormy13 (and I myself) do: store your music in a different folder. Really, anywhere is fine. You're only having this issue because of the whole libraries/junctions thing.

I'm with fseal btw. I don't dislike the concepts of libraries and junctions per se; they can be useful. But bending over backwards and creating default ones just to cater to apps whose programmers were lazy enough to hardcode folder locations is not helping.