Playlist (.pla) maker

[edmikeca]

Just a wild guess: make sure the file system on your memory card is FAT, not FAT32.

If I look thorough Win Explorer -> Properties is shows FAT. I also tried to re-format MC and it didn’t help either .

But thanks anyway.

P.S. Is there any differences how to run this program? I mean I run it from my hdd and point to MC which is in the phone.


My new post:

Solution for my problem:

I guess I’ve figured out my particular problem. Here is a format of the .pla file:

8 byte – header of the file:
2 byte – number of records
2 byte - interval in sec (for slideshow), 00 01 для for playlist
4 byte - 00 00 00 00

8 byte – per each record:
2 byte - 01 01 – card memory, 02 00 – phone memory
2 byte – last record’s (LFN-record) index of file in the folder
4 byte – folder’s sector number

So for some crazy reason, second byte of each record (which tells location of the file) was 01 40 instead of 01 01. As soon as I modified it playlist started working just fine. I think it can be phone related problem…

Thanks.

[mrkva1]

So for some crazy reason, second byte of each record (which tells location of the file) was 01 40 instead of 01 01. As soon as I modified it playlist started working just fine. I think it can be phone related problem…

Thanks.

Thanks for posting the format of .pla file. I guess you're right about phone-related difference - I have 01 40 in my playlists in it works just fine. Apparently, even .pla file format isn't consistent between different Motorola phones!

[gabosaic]

would you post a link to this "converter"??

[__susanu__]

here it is

[a3h]

I tried this, exactly point by point.
I format MC, move a few songs through winamp to get the Exact structure, start makepla.
I get this:
Makepla.exe (<drive>)
Note: 'Audio'
Press enter to exit

I goto the audio catalogue, where there actually IS a folder called _Playlists, wich is, of course, empty.

Quite annoying.

/a

[shottah]

good post man...

[a3h]

It's just so bizarre that it works for some ppl and for some ppl not.
What's the friggin deal? o_O;

When I format my MC it asks for file system (FAT) and file allocation size.
I set the latter to standard, by default it is 16kb.
Suggestions? Solutions?
This is giving me a headache pretty badly. @@;

[xsandu]

So for some crazy reason, second byte of each record (which tells location of the file) was 01 40 instead of 01 01. As soon as I modified it playlist started working just fine. I think it can be phone related problem…

Yes, these bytes are dependant on the phone's model.
I have L7e and L9.
While changing memory cards between them I've noticed that playlists created by L7e phone can not be played on L9 phone (list appears to be empty). But playlist created by L9, yes, can be played both on L9 and L7e phones.

The only difference between two *.pla files was '01 40' (L7e) and '01 01' (L9) on every raw in playlist file.

Thus, playlists made by MAKEPLA program (with '01 40' sequence) are incompatible with L9 phone (but works well for L7e and many others)...

After I have replaced '01 40' to '01 01' in the MAKEPLA-generated playlist (with HEX editor XVI32.exe) my L9 phone could play modified playlist well.

I guess, Motorola has updated *.pla file format in L9 and newer phones, and new format is backward-compatible with old phones. So, the MAKEPLA program should be updated too, and should insert '01 01' instead of '01 40'.

Attachment: look at two playlists created manually on L7e (left, '01 40' sequence) and on L9 (right, '01 01' sequence) - see the difference.

Hint: If you have L9 you may use Freeware Hex Editor XVI32 to edit playlist to match your phone - just do 'find and replace' '01 40' to '01 01' in every generated pla-file. If you have a lot of music this way will be faster than manual editing.
http://www.chmaas.handshake.de/delph...vi32/xvi32.htm

[xsandu]

Playlists are created on a folder named /mobile/audio/_Playlists, the starting _ makes the folder the last on the list.

Starting symbol '_' does not make this folder the last if there are any folders with non-latin letters (in russian language, for example).

See attached screenshot: '_Playlists' folder is in the middle of the list of categories (after english names and before russian names). It is quite annoying.

As far as I know sorting order is: latin letters -- special symbols -- other national letters.

Have this program any command-line parameters to change the name of the created '_Playlist' folder?

[pila]

It's just so bizarre that it works for some ppl and for some ppl not.
What's the friggin deal? o_O;

If you think this is wierd, how about this: I was among the first who used makepa. It workd on my K1 as documented.

Now it does not work any more! Create the _playlist folder, but empty! The same computer as before, the same phone. Tried different computer, also, does not work. But, this time I tried a smaller card, 256 MB. I am sort of afraid to try it on my original card, since it works now

Could anybody who used makepa successfuly before, verify that it still works for them? Could it be date related? If we changed tothe date new when it was written?

The original author seems to be unavailable, could someone else code this program now that the file format is known?

[tauro_kpo]

I think that this post should be refloated, because the matter hasn't been finished at all.

I've recently downloaded the program, used the tree listing format, but I just get the _playlists folder empty.

Can anyone that uses this in a regular basis (or just someone that knows) give a hand here?

thank you a bunch!

Mauricio

[IanB]

Here is a format of the .pla file:

8 byte – header of the file:
2 byte – number of records
2 byte - interval in sec (for slideshow), 00 01 для for playlist
4 byte - 00 00 00 00

8 byte – per each record:
2 byte - 01 01 – card memory, 02 00 – phone memory
2 byte – last record’s (LFN-record) index of file in the folder
4 byte – folder’s sector number

Great info, thanks very much.

Since I primarily use Linux, I've used this to write my own playlist generator.
If any other Unix/GNU-Linux users are interested, they can find it here.

[dead_wanderer]

Hello, everybody. Sorry for my extremeily bad english.

It is only one place in the net where some tools for automatization of playlist generation is provided.
Great respect to FaberfoX.
But i have some problems with provided solution.
First at all, at my L6 playlists are named "*.apl" not "*.pla". From experemential data i figured out the same format (8 bytes header, 8 bytes per record). So it is not a big problem.
Second, my motorola maintains different directory tree. Without album subdirectories. Each directory is named "category" in phone. So i need solution for such directory tree:

-/audio
--/Bauhaus
--/Joy Division
--/Current
--/Best

At last, i want to write my one tool. I plan to combine it with file copy and file conversion (bitrate decreasing) operations in the future. But i do not understand what those two magic numbers mean (2 byte – last record’s (LFN-record) index of file in the folder,4 byte – folder’s sector number). I guess it is something from fat, but could anybody explain to me how to obtain those numbers from file and that is their meaning.

Thanks to everybody for reading this. Once again sorry for my bad language.

[pila]

How about compiling it for DOS or Windows? It would be of great help for many people since the original program does not appear to work any more.

Since I primarily use Linux, I've used this to write my own playlist generator.
If any other Unix/GNU-Linux users are interested, they can find it here.

[BrunoIgor]

Ohh..for me don't work....i have a Z3....danm!!!...T_T