Please help with getting multi-category screen working

[jji666]

Greetings:

My music videos database is organized as follows:

x:\music videos a-f\artist1 - song title1 (album or concert location)
x:\music videos a-f\artist1 - song title2 (album or concert location)
x:\music videos a-f\artist2 - song title1 (album or concert location)
x:\music videos a-f\artist2 - song title2 (album or concert location)
etc.

Such that they, other than being split alphabetically due to drive size limitations, are all contained in the same directory and all the appropriate database tags are built into the filename.

I have a multi-category screen built that has a category called "music video artists" that I filter by artist in order to have each artist displayed by a single thumbnail. I have a second category on the screen called "music video main" that is intended to show the details from the artist selected from within the category "music video artists" -- either album thumbnails or all tracks depending on whether I use filter by album or reset the "music video main" category.

On the "General" tab for the "music video artists" category, the Detais Cat is set to "music video main." I am trying to set up a screen that works best with a touch-screen panel. So I cannot hover the cursor over any category and the equivalent of the mouse click is the only thing that can be used to select a category item.

Questions:

(1) Whenever I click on an artist item from the "music video artists" category instead of having the details show up in the "music video main" category, I get each track from that artist displayed in the "music video artists" category box. It works right while using a mouse to hover over the "music video artist" category but the mouse click (on touchpanel remind you) does't send the details to the music "music video main" category. But that is what I want. The problem is compounded by the fact that when I do use the mouse, any straying over another artist while I am on my way to the "music video main" category to click on a track changes the details in that category to that other artist. So I also don't really want the mouse hover to highlight or select the artist until I actually click. Any idea how to get the hover and the click to work right? If this isn't do-able, is there any way to use an overlay to get there?

(2) Is there an automated way to have the thumnail jpegs for each music video in a different directory from the music videos? I can name them the same filename with the jpg. extension but I prefer not to have them in the same directory if possible. There is no way I can change the path for each item in the database editor.

(3) Any way to have a scrollbar on either category?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[jji666]

C'mon guys someone must know how to do this. I've seen it on the music layout pages but I can't figure out how it works.

[m_ski]

Have you tried Baddabing's post? - http://xlobby.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=4778&p=31597&hilit=#p31597

[jji666]

I've tried using the analogous screen from the default skin. I think that relies on the mp3s from an album being in the same folder. I can't confirm since I can't download Baddabing's skin files since they are not posted now.

[jji666]

To reply to my own post, in case this helps others, I solved this problem by assigning a click event to the music video artists category to a bogus event that doesn't execute anything. This makes the click work only like a rollover and doesn't then go into displaying details within the same category. While this might break something else, so far it has not appeared to do so.

I'd still be interested in soaking up some expertise in multi-category screens and being able to drill from artist to album to music video tracks gracefully if anyone has anything they would be willing to impart.

I'd also still be interested in learning if there is an automated and not manually intensive method of assigning coverart thumbnails to individual music videos without having the jpg thumbnail being required to be in the same directory as the music video. I've also had troubles with the actual import of the thumbnails, due to their reverting to a single jpg after importing about 300, as per another post here in support. Any clues are appreciated.

JJI