[a.mik]

Is it possible to map one audio file to two different sheet files, but without the need to import the audio file 2 times?

I haven't found any possibility for this in the program or any respective mentioning in the handbook.

Background:
In our accordeon orchestra, I play different voices for the same musical pieces, depending on the availability of my colleague players.
For practicing at home I'd like to have the one single audio mapped to the both of the voice sheets.
Of course I could import the mp3 file a second time, but this expands the database unnecessarily, eating up storage space on the mobile device(s), increasing database transfer time between my mobile devices and increasing backup time.

Any hint?

Is there maybe a way to do it by using the MobileSheets Companion on another PC? (giving the Windows tablet a helping hand via another Windows PC ;-) )

Current version:
I'm using MobileSheets v3.1.9 on MS-Windows10 and, as fallback, on the Samsung Android Tablet.

Many Thanks in Advance!
Kind Regards

[McAroni]

Just go to the edit dialog of your sheet file, select the audio tab press the plus button and select the audio file you want to assign. Do the same with the second sheet file. There is no need to import the audio file twice. Hope that is what you are looking for. You could also assign multiple audio files to one sheet file.

[a.mik]

Just go to the edit dialog of your sheet file, select the audio tab press the plus button and select the audio file you want to assign. Do the same with the second sheet file. There is no need to import the audio file twice. Hope that is what you are looking for. You could also assign multiple audio files to one sheet file.

Thanks for the hint.
It was my first approach as well. Unfortunately, this doesn't work.

In the audio tab, when I press the plus button, I get a small menu where I can select where to load the file from: Local File - Dropbox - Google Drive - OneDrive
The audio file already sitting in the database cannot be select in that way.

By the way:
Same situation on the Android tablet, with just the small difference, that I can choose from: Local File - Dropbox -Google Drive - System-Filemanager

Remark:
I don't keep the original audio files on the mobile device after having them imported into the database. Would be a waste of storage space on the mobile device.
Those files still sit on my home NAS device.

[McAroni]

Ok i do not import the Audio Files into the Database. My Audio Files are stored at one folder on my sd card. I always point to the Files at the folder and with this i could connect multiple sheet Files with one Audio file. But i think the size overall size will be the same no matter where the Audio Files are stored. At one folder or at the Database.

[a.mik]

Ok i do not import the Audio Files into the Database. My Audio Files are stored at one folder on my sd card. I always point to the Files at the folder and with this i could connect multiple sheet Files with one Audio file. But i think the size overall size will be the same no matter where the Audio Files are stored. At one folder or at the Database.

On closer look, keeping the audio files outside of the MobileSheets Database, in a separate subdirectory (-structure), seems to have some advantages.
On one hand, for my special situation, with multiple sheet files using the same audio file.
On the other hand, of course, for the backup.

But:
In the Windows version of MobileSheets, there is no possibility in "Settings" - "Storage" to keep the audio files outside of the MobileSheets database.
This exists only in the Android version.
So I don't see a chance to keep the audio files on a separate subdir and point from multiple sheets to the same "external" audio file.

One of those nitty gritty differences between the operating system specific versions of MobileSheets.


Maybe I need to change from "one subdir per song" to "all songs in a single subdir" mode, which I don't really like.

Best regards

[BRX]

Maybe you just misspoke, But to clear up a possible misunderstanding: There are no files neither sheets nor audio in the database. The database is in the mobilesheets.db which stores the information where your files are and how they are used and displayed. You can choose to let MSP managing where it puts the files or maintain your own file and folder structure.

Having said this, you can in both cases reuse any sheet or audio file for other entries after the first import. You just have to use the local file browser in the audio edit tab and find where the audio file you want to reused is saved and select it. If you have the audio file already attached to your first sheet you can look in the audio tab for the path it is saved in.

(And you can manage your own structure in the Win version. I always do. But I'm not sure if you need to have the file location set for that in the initial install and if switching from one to the other is possible or easily done. Maybe you have to reinstall MSP for this.)

[Zubersoft]

If you want to manage your files/folders in the Windows 10 version like on Android, you just need to make sure your files are already in the storage location before importing. You can change the storage location folder by going to Settings->Storage->Set MobileSheets Storage Location. So if you set the storage location to "C:\MobileSheets" and under that folder you had a folder called "Audio Files", any audio file you import from that folder is not going to be moved. So that means you can have multiple songs reference a single file if you want, and you can also set up the folder hierarchy in any way you want. 

I should mention that with Android 11, there is a possibility that I may have to start managing the Android folders in a similar way. In fact, I may not even be able to let users choose their own folder. I have to see if Google will grant my app an exception so that it can still access the entire internal storage. If they reject my request, that means the only folder MobileSheetsPro will be able to access is /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.zubersoft.mobilesheetspro/files (the default storage location). This is referred to "Scoped Storage" if anyone wants to read more about it.

Mike

[a.mik]

Maybe you just misspoke, But to clear up a possible misunderstanding: There are no files neither sheets nor audio in the database. The database is in the mobilesheets.db which stores the information where your files are and how they are used and displayed. You can choose to let MSP managing where it puts the files or maintain your own file and folder structure.

Having said this, you can in both cases reuse any sheet or audio file for other entries after the first import. You just have to use the local file browser in the audio edit tab and find where the audio file you want to reused is saved and select it. If you have the audio file already attached to your first sheet you can look in the audio tab for the path it is saved in.

(And you can manage your own structure in the Win version. I always do. But I'm not sure if you need to have the file location set for that in the initial install and if switching from one to the other is possible or easily done. Maybe you have to reinstall MSP for this.)

Thanks for clarifying.

In my case, I've left MobileSheets to handle the file location. Under its "data root", it created 1 subdir for each song, and within each of these subdirs are the files for the respective song (in my case the sheet pdf and the audio mp3). So if I "reuse" an already existing audio file, it will be stored a second time in the subdir of the other song (which, in my case, is the same piece of music, but a different voice).

Probably I would have been better off to organise the files in my own directory structure. This would also give the advantage of having the different voices of the same piece of music within one subdirectory, together with the respective audio file. And I could have the files in a hirarchical structure which also suits my needs outside of MobileSheets.
Maybe I find a good way to switch, as long as I still have only ~1000 sheet files in there - I'll report it here.
And I have to see how it works when importing the backup of the Windows version into the Android version of MSP.