What is the point of the checkbox next to the song title in iTunes?

[animefx]

I've been using iTunes for awhile now, and I still don't know what the point is of those checkboxes to the side of the song titles (you can check or uncheck them). Could someone give me an example of what these are actually used for?

Also, does anyone know a way to have iTunes delete a song from the library if I delete it off of a playlist or smartlist? I have a smart playlist to only show podcasts... When I'm done listening to the podcast its easier to find the MP3 in my special smart playlist, and delete it from there, however, that won't delete it from the library... Most people would think thats a good thing, but there should be an option (say if you hold down the left shift button) that could do "would you also like to delete this file from the library?"

Thanks in advance,
Bryan

 

[iSaint]

I've been using iTunes for awhile now, and I still don't know what the point is of those checkboxes to the side of the song titles (you can check or uncheck them). Could someone give me an example of what these are actually used for?

Also, does anyone know a way to have iTunes delete a song from the library if I delete it off of a playlist or smartlist? I have a smart playlist to only show podcasts... When I'm done listening to the podcast its easier to find the MP3 in my special smart playlist, and delete it from there, however, that won't delete it from the library... Most people would think thats a good thing, but there should be an option (say if you hold down the left shift button) that could do "would you also like to delete this file from the library?"

Thanks in advance,
Bryan

The check is whether you want the song to sync with your iPod.

As far as the delete from playlist, I'm not sure about that. I'll bet one of our other highly intelligent MacRumors participants will help you, though.

Of course, I could be wrong about the sync thing, too.

 

[mad jew]

Although there's no way I know of being able to delete from an actual playlist, you can always select the song(s) in the playlist, select Get Info from the File menu and put something distinctive in their comments box (like DELETE). Then do a search for DELETE in the main iTunes library, select all, and delete. This is really only worthwhile if you have a lot of music from the playlist that you want to delete though.

As for the checkbox, I'm pretty sure iTunes wont play it, let alone sync it with an iPod, if it's unchecked. I could be wrong on that one though.

 

[James Philp]

The check can be used for various things:
1. When playing in random mode, unchecked songs do not play
2. For the ipod, you have an option "sync only checked songs"
3. Can be used in smart folders in the "Match only checked songs" option
4. If you don't want to import tracks on a CD you can uncheck them and click import

I think there may be a couple of other things it can do too.

Tip: If you want to check/uncheck a whole album, select the album in browser and command-click any track - voila the entire album is unchecked/checked (note: you can select multiple albums by command or shift-clicking them in the browser window and use the same method, OR do it to entire genres or artists the same way - whatever is shown in the tracks part of the window will be checked/unchecked)

 

[Lacero]

Also, does anyone know a way to have iTunes delete a song from the library if I delete it off of a playlist or smartlist?

Option-Delete.

 

[James Philp]

Also, does anyone know a way to have iTunes delete a song from the library if I delete it off of a playlist or smartlist? I have a smart playlist to only show podcasts... When I'm done listening to the podcast its easier to find the MP3 in my special smart playlist, and delete it from there, however, that won't delete it from the library... Most people would think thats a good thing, but there should be an option (say if you hold down the left shift button) that could do "would you also like to delete this file from the library?"

There are a multitude of ways to do this:

1. Google "Whack current track" - it's a script you put in (user)/library/itunes/scripts (create these folders if they aint there). Also "Doug's iTunes Scripts" is a great site for a lot of other powerful scripts
- play the track you want to kill, and use the "Whack current track" script.

2. If you have those little arrows (iTMS ones) option-click the arrow by the song you want to kill. You will be taken to the song in the standard Library view. Hit delete, and you're there!
EDIT:
Lacero i did not know this - great stuff!

 

[mad jew]

Option-Delete.

Thanks! Coolest Advice Ever! I'd always just assumed it was impossible.

 

[animefx]

Wow

Thanks for the replies everyone! It helped me out more a lot.

 

[PlaceofDis]

awesome info Lacero, and thanks for the details on the check-boxes, now we just need a view option to hide 'em if we dont want to use them