MediaggLocal media
The music and video on your device, and the chips that cut it different ways.
Local media is what is on the device itself, rather than anything fetched from a feed or a server.
It is one section with chips rather than several sections, because songs, videos, books and folders are the same question — what is on this device — asked different ways.
The chips
Songs, Videos and Audiobooks lead, because they are what the section holds. The ones after them are ways of cutting the first — where the files are, then what their tags say:
| Chip | What it shows |
|---|---|
Songs | Every track |
Videos | Every video |
Audiobooks | A cover per book, however many files it is — see Audiobooks on your device |
Folders | Every folder holding something, by name |
Filesystem | The device's storage, walked one level at a time — Android only |
Albums | A grid of sleeves; open one for its tracks |
Artists | Grouped by the artist tag |
Genres | Grouped by the genre tag |
Years | Grouped by year |
Albums, Artists, Genres and Years are built from the tags inside your files. Folders and Filesystem ignore the tags entirely and show where the files actually are, which is what to reach for when a file's tags are wrong or missing.
Each chip has its own sort, from As listed, Name, Date added, Length and Size — only the ones its rows can answer — and remembers it separately. Audiobooks also has a filter beside the sort — All, New, In progress and Finished.
Folders and Filesystem
Folders is the quick way to a folder you already know: a flat list of every one that holds something, by name. Open one and you are in the same place the tree would have walked you to.
Filesystem is the tree itself. Each row is a directory, .. takes you up a level, and a trail under the chips says where you are. A folder you added yourself is a starting point of its own here, beside the device's own storage.
It is worked out from the files themselves, not from a list you maintain. Every track and video already knows where it came from, so the folder structure is read from that — nothing to set up, and nothing to keep in step.
This also means it can only ever show you folders Mediagg was allowed to read. A folder that produced no files is not there at all.
Where the files come from
This is the one part that works differently on each device.
On Android, the phone keeps a media library of its own, and Mediagg reads it. Your music and video are simply there. Scan for media in the toolbar looks again, and which kinds of audio and which folders are included is yours to set — see Scanning.
You can add a folder as well, with Add a local folder on the Add subscription screen — useful for anything the phone's own library does not cover.
On iOS, there is no device-wide music library to read, so local media is the folders you choose. Add a folder in the toolbar opens the Files app; pick a folder and everything in it fills the chips above — the folder itself is listed under Folders, as there is no Filesystem chip on iOS. Choosing it is the permission — there is no separate grant to give.
Scan for media re-walks the folders you picked, to catch anything added since.
Permission
On Android, Mediagg has to be allowed to read the device's media before it can find any: Mediagg needs permission to list the music on this device., with an Allow access button. Video is asked for separately — Mediagg needs permission to list the video on this device. — and where only one of the two was allowed, the folder chips say which half they are missing, for instance Video is not shown here: Mediagg has not been allowed to read this device's video.
Playing a whole chip
Play all and Shuffle all are in the toolbar.
Where a chip lists groupings rather than files — books, albums, artists, genres, years and folders — you open one first. Shuffling every track on the device from a screen of sleeves is not what the button would mean there.
Radio, and mixes
An artist's page under Artists has a Radio button beside Shuffle: the artist's own songs, spread through songs from other artists who share their genres and their years — all from this device, with nothing asked of a server.
For a mix to start with, add Local Media Mix to Home — Track mix, Artist mix, Genre mix, Year mix and Rediscover. See Mixes from your device.