Sort by folder year Z-A first THEN by filename A-Z

Support
1

I have struggled to get 2-column sorting to work properly. I've researched and found the common answer is to make a custom column with a sort by set to %column A% %Column B%. This sort of works, but the ordering isn't good in my circumstance.

So in my case I sort by pathing and then filename and it comes out like this:
2020\bandA - songA
2020\bandB - songB
2021\bandC - songC
2021\bandD - songD

or I can sort the column in reverse and get this:
2021\bandD - songD
2021\bandC - songC
2020\bandB - songB
2020\bandA - songA

The problem is, I'm looking for the entirety of the sort to be displayed in this order:
2021\bandC - songC
2021\bandD - songD
2020\bandA - songA
2020\bandB - songB

So the problem I have is year folder should always have precedence before filename (I use artist -title). Is there any sane way to do this?

2

First click on the column with the filename, then click on the column with the YEAR.

3

I'm not using the year column, because the folder is named after a year to designate when I found the songs chronologically. I try to Click Path and then Artist column but it will only sort by 1 or the other. Effectively what I'm doing is building chronological playlists by year songs A-Z. Not by song release years.

4

The path is already unique. So you will get only 1 order.
If you have the year in the property _DRIECTORY, add this column to sort by.

5

The simplest way I can describe the issue is that:

  1. Years folders will sort oldest - newest because 2020 < 2021 and I prefer it to be newest first which is Z - A ordering
  2. Artist - Song is preferable to be sorted A - Z

A column of path then filename almost works, except if you sort by 2021 folder first, you'd get Z - A song ordering. If I create a special sort it doesn't help me overcome this problem. There is reverse ordering being paired between 2 columns and I need it to take folder precedence always before sorting the songs. I tried: %_folderpath%%_filename% but then I have to sort A-Z and go to the bottom and pull out 2021, move up, pull out 2020, etc.

The best way I could explain this problem is in the OP.

6

Please: add a column for _DIRECTORY.
Sort by _FILENAME or TITLE so that this is in the right order
Then sort by the column for _DIRECTORY (which should contain the year data)

7

Thanks, I think that was the right info given the info I provided. It was a little more complicated, I had same-named subfolders of rating numbers as well that caused a bad sorting. However, it lead me to the ultimate answer. All that was required was:
value
field
sort by %_directory%

... and then sorting the result column descending. Then the Z-A order gets paired to the A-Z song order.

8

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