Help with Playlists, etc

Hey all,

I’m just getting back into all of this and need to re-arrange and update playlists and a few other things. Questions:
How do I re-arrange playlists–especially lists where I may not have those songs on my current computer?
With that in mind, can I save songs that are on my Beatbuddy to my computer so I can add them to other lists?

Lastly, is there a way to save some stuff like beats and intros, etc. I had created in the past, and save them to my computer to use for other songs?

Thanks for any help or advise

1 Like

Everything you’re asking about is available using the Beat Buddy Manager (BBM) software. Except maybe playlists full of songs you don’t have (but even those, you can use other songs as stand-ins until you build them).

Hey there,

You simply go to the playlist, and using the encoder, select the song you wish to move by scrolling to it and hold down the encoder, this will ask you if your wish to move, remove or cancel the operation.

This is possible with the BeatBuddy Manager, and we are working on a simple file manager that will also allow you to do this easily as well as manage playlists on the computer. Stay tuned!

This is exclusive to BBM, the file manager will not deal with the MIDI and wav files, just the song (.sng) and folder (.pbf) files

Thanks for your questions!

But how? That’s the issue. I can’t see a way to do any of this. I thought I had saved what was on the BB to a folder, but it does not appear that way.

I don’t have a clue what the “encoder” is and I am in BB Manager now and can’t see how any of this works.

1 Like

Also, the files I am trying to take out of songs to use in other songs were created in that old Beatbuilder and, since they actually work in BB songs, I am asking if I can copy those, or something to save them somewhere and use them in other songs. I assume this must be possible…my issue is HOW.

Okay, first, in BBM, save your current project (File >> Save Project) so if it all goes horribly wrong, you can get back to where you were.

Next: Do you have your SD card attached to your computer? Can BBM see it? It should currently have the same content as your BBM, so you could probably use File >> Synchronize Project, but, I suppose, the right way to do this is to File >> Open Project and navigate to your card.

Then…

Rearrange is drag-and-drop. To add songs as placeholders for songs you don’t have yet, File >> Import >> Song and add some random song. If you rename, you’ll be prompted to save.

Yes. Select the song you want to save in BBM, then File >> Export >> Song.

That depends entirely on their format. If they are MIDI files AND they conform to the drumkits in BB (which are NOT 100% identical to the GS MIDI drum instrument standard), then yes. Create a folder for them and you’re off to the races. If they do not conform but they are MIDI, you can still save them the same way, but they may not sound the way you expect.

When you’re done, File >> Synchronize Project to put it all on your SD card for your BB to enjoy. Note that Synchronize really means “Copy any updates to my SD card.”

Better?

Yesterday was an experimentation day. I get most all of the stuff you mentioned. Re-organizing songs in playlists is another issue. The only way I can see it would work is moving one at a time by exporting and importing. Seems ridiculously tedious, time consuming and getting one in the wrong place or order screws everything up. I exported every song I had. I am going to create playlists in the computer, put them in separate folders, and then create a playlist in the BB manager and import (I hope) in a batch. I swear I did this before, or something like it, but I can’t remember now. There has to be a better way somehow. Could I just import full folders? I’ll try.

Yes: File >> Import >> Folder

That will add the contents of the selected folder wherever you are in your folder/song list on the left.

The top level items in that left-hand pane are folders. Folders contain songs.

Good luck!

Remember that the interface is drag-and-drop, so fixing this/changing song order is not so hard.

PRO-TIP: BBM drops imported songs ABOVE the current song, so I always build new set lists starting with the last song and working backwards.

I’m not sure what you mean by drag and drop. Do you mean I could just pull songs from a folder on my computer and drop them into BBM? I’m assuming that’s the case.

Drag-and-drop: In some cases, you can drop things into BBM (like song parts), but I have not quite figured out the complete list of things you can do that with. But I was referencing your comment that getting things in the wrong order screws everything up: you can drag and drop songs that are already in BBM to re-order them. There are also little arrows on the left of each part within a song that you can uses to shift parts up and down the order within a song.

Are you referring to Playlists that are in the BeatBuddy Manager (BBM) or in the BeatBuddy (BB) pedal?

  1. If in the BBM,
  • to copy songs from one folder to another, you will have to use the BBM to export from one folder and import to another;
  • to move songs around within a BBM folder, you select the song to move and press and hold the shift and either up or down arrow depending on where you want to reposition the song within the folder;
  1. If you don’t have the songs on your computer (the BBM) but they’re on your pedal, place the SD card in your computer slot reader and use the BBM File Open Project (accept the prompts to save to your computer bbworkspace folder (BBW). You then export the songs to your desktop, use the BBM to Open Project and select the project from your computer where you want those songs; select the folder in the BBM where you want the songs and then import them. Use Joe’s pro-tip to save you a step or two.
  1. Yes. You can do that in your current BBM project by creating a new song (name it Template as a reminder that you only want to copy—not move—from that song when you are building other songs) and dragging the loops, beats, intro, outros, transitions and fills to the respective new song section where you want them. Easiest if your parts are on your computer desktop or within a folder on your desktop. Those song sections can be reused by copying and pasting them to other songs or new songs as well. You can also use alt-drag to copy them. Note: you don’t want to move them by simply dragging as this will move them out of your Template song. :unamused:

Late addition: Mac BBM users should be able to select and import several songs at once. Don’t know if same holds true for PC BBM users.

The BeatBuddy Loader is now available as beta and you can use this to edit playlists on a computer!

Hi,
I was using BBL today to create playlists.
I seem to have run into some issues. I have on my BB Firmware version 4.1.3. Perhaps the loader is not supported with it.
Issues:

  1. The new playlist do not appear in BBM. I made two playlists in BBL.
    Issues:
  2. Both playlists appeared in the BB but only playlist1 had songs. Playlist2 the 1st songs showed that there was no song. I put my disk back to the computer and checked in BBL, and removed those songs 7 songs. There was like a place holder there showing invalid data or similar, I did not write it down at the time.
  3. I went to add those 7 songs back to the playlist and BBL could not find them. Like BBL thinks they are gone. What happened? I loaded BBM and the songs are there - BBL does not see them. Is there a cache or something that is causing this? Can I clear the cache and see the songs again with BBL?
  4. When opening BBM the new playlists are not seen - they are only seen on the BB.
  5. I was under the impression that I could copy songs from one folder to another - was that incorrect?
  6. When naming playlists the names that I give do not stay. If I renamed the playlist1 to Banjo it will show at the time of rename but later that name is gone and only the name play list appears.

Thanks for your time. Looking forward to your response.