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Did rating just become impossible in iTunes 12?

R

Riku7

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 18, 2014
208
95
I know I can right-click a song, then access the menu to go to rating and pick a star. But that's so cumbersome. I'm big on ratings. Back in the day, I used to assign an easy iTunes shortcut so I could rate the currently playing song, using numpad numbers. Then, some stupid update broke it. Later, I created some cumbersome applescripts which would first go to the currently playing song, select it, then go to the iTunes top menu and select a rating from there. I used BetterTouchTool to assign those applescripts to the num pad keys again. Made the rating process slower than it used to be, but I managed to rate songs.
Now with the newest iTunes update, the ratings are no longer found from the top menu so obviously my shortcuts are broken again! Is there any way over this? How on earth can I make rating iTunes songs a NICE and DOABLE task that I can do on the go, without a mouse, without using my whole life browsing some tedious sub-menus? :eek: Do I need to get to know some more third-party background apps which would communicate with iTunes and would be scriptable or customizable enough to allow me to assign keyboard shortcuts? Wow, Apple, what's going on.
 
Yes, it truly is! Doing everything with a mouse is insanely tedious and I don't want to spend my whole life looking at the iTunes window. What I'd like to do is, carry on with my work and other business that I have to do on the computer, and just quickly rate and sort music in the background as I go about the day. That's how it used to be – nice.
I also have a vision problem so flashing and bouncing stuff all over a large screen basically means that I simply won't be able to cope with work.
 
Mouse insanely tedious? Haha, sorry, can't help you. Hopefully someone else can sort it for you.
 
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Fine, I get it, someone without a vision problem can't understand what it's like, but believe me, I know what is bad for my workflow, I didn't come to ask for opinions on what's a correct way to experience the world. Welcoming ideas on third-party apps, settings, scripting workarounds and so on, practical tips.
 
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Good use of italics there bub.

So no mouse usage. Just checked Kickstarter and there's nothing there for mind control.
 
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Performing multi-step mouse actions requires the user to follow the cursor with one's eyes, and since that's a no-no, I'm trying to replace as many actions with keyboard shortcuts as possible, that's what they're for. If it still seems like magic to you, keyboard shortcuts have actually existed for a pretty long time now and it's got nothing to do with mind control. I've expressed a completely realistic inquiry here regarding a simple task that used to be a norm for a long time but ceased to be so. If all you have is sarcastic remarks, please don't waste your time on forum trolling.
 
Thank you Jessica! That's a decent response there. Those scripts seem to function, even with iTunes in the background.
 
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Glad those scripts are working for you.

I don’t think Apple meant to do that, but with the new splitscreen stuff and the change to using a heart, it was probably an issue and they haven’t figured out how to fix it yet.
 
What's that splitscreen stuff? I did a quick search but only found El Capital references; I haven't updated to it because I'm slowly growing sicker of the recent Apple software updates. Are you talking about an OS feature or something in iTunes?

I don't exactly get the heart thing, it seems so populistic, as if they felt like they were missing out for not having a Facebook-style "like button". I already find the star ratings merely "ok" for describing – mainly because I think it doesn't make sense to put a three-star rock song next to a three-star funk song or a three-star classical. An on/off kind of heart button seems even more vague. I just hid the heart column from view immediately as I saw it, because heart symbols in general are so against my character that I'd rather not see them anywhere near my workspace.

On another note – iTunes seems to be quite nicely optimized for me now: Background rating and even background add to playlist is nicely mapped to keyboard shortcuts. The only last thing that I'm still trying to figure out is how to display the current song's genre and edit it on the go whilst in the background. So many genres are plain incorrect, and often because every album has a fixed genre despite of what the individual songs are like. Not sure yet if it's even theoretically possible, but I'm probing these existing scripts to see if I can find a way.
 
It is the El Capitan feature I'm talking about. Would think things are starting to overlap and they feel like it's going to be the most problematic.

I notice that Command-# switches between the different views too. So that could be really why.

I use the heart button to indicate my absolute favorite songs and albums. I also have all these various smart playlists based on genres, moods, etc. But yeah, I get it's not the greatest symbol in the world. Lots of people don't like that Twitter implemented it recently either.

I'm sure there's a way to do what you want. Your shortcuts are going to start getting really complex though. I have a hard time with shortcuts that use three keys myself as my other hand barely functions.
 
Right-click the iTunes icon in the dock. Look for a Ratings submenu. Select your rating.
 
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