Windows Vista Security: Praxisorientierte Sicherheit für Profis

Building Your Media Library

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Building Your Media Library

Windows Media Player is designed to help you create and organize a media library.

Your media library contains any folders you’ve added that contain media files, audio

CDs you’ve ripped, and TV shows you’ve recorded. Within your library, your media

is organized by category with separate areas for music, pictures, video, recorded TV,

and other media and subcategories for artists, albums, songs, genre, year created,

and so on. Windows Media Player adds all the media information automatically for

audio CDs, movie DVDs, and recorded TV when your computer is connected to the

Internet.

Because Windows Media Player handles most of the heavy lifting for you, building

your media library is easy. All you need to do is add folders containing media files to

your library, copy your audio CDs to your library, and let Windows Media Player

handle the details. Using the built-in audio CD and data CD/DVD features, getting

your media out of your library is just as easy. You can save copies of your music and

other audio files to audio CDs, and you can save copies of your media to data CDs

and DVDs. If you have an MP3 player or other device with removable storage, you

can sync your media library to your device as well.

Adding Media Folders to Your Media Library

The easiest way to add media to your library is simply to move the media files to the

appropriate personal folder. To add music or other audio to your library, simply

copy or move the audio files to your Music folder. To add digital pictures to your

library, simply copy or move the digital pictures to your Pictures folder. To add vid-

eos or recorded TV to your library, simply copy or move the video or TV files to your

Videos folder.

Wondering how this works? Well, when you start Windows Media Player, the player

checks your Music, Pictures, and Videos folders for any audio, picture, or video files

you’ve added, and then updates your media library to reflect these changes automati-

cally. You can have Windows Media Player add media from and monitor other fold-

ers in exactly the same way by completing the following steps:

1. In Window Media Player, right-click Library and then select Add To Library.

2. In the Add To Library dialog box, shown in Figure 8-25, the “My personal fold-

ers” option is selected by default under “Select the folders to monitor.” This is

why the player monitors your Music, Pictures, and Videos folders. If you want

Windows Media Player to add media from and monitor your personal folders,

shared media in the Public Music, Public Pictures, and Public Videos folder, and

the personal folders of other users on the computer, select “My folders and those

of others that I can access.”

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Chapter 8: Creating Your Media Library with Windows Media Player

You can monitor files stored in another user’s personal folders only if

that person has shared the folder with you. For more information on

folder sharing, see Chapter 11.

3. Click Advanced Options to display a complete list of monitored folders and

additional advanced options.

4. To monitor additional folders, click Add. In the Add Folder dialog box, select

the folder to monitor and then click OK.

5. To stop monitoring a folder that you previously added, select the folder in the

Monitored Folders list and then click Remove. Removing the folder tells Win-

dows Media Player to stop monitoring the folder. The folder still exists on your

disk drive.

Figure 8-25. The Add To Library dialog box