The VideoLAN Forums

just got the update 3.3.4 (Android) and dont like it. it force displays file names using idk their detail file name instead of whatever the user names them, no way to change that in settings. it also now forces a video screen for audio only files, with also no way to change in settings. audio seems much quieter than it did pre-update. feels like the ui was updated for the worse. definitely seems like the users ability to customize settings was restricted. i think it searches the internet for relevant data to videos or audio, idk could be wrong but if it does i'd like a setting to turn that off. definitely dont like that it can access local networks phone is connected to, and would like a setting that turns that off. created playlists always corrupt over time, something about the names of files and how vlc continously changes file names, or fails to recognize files.
overall i feel a lot of these issues could be fixed by updating the setting feature and giving users more freedom over how the app works on their device.

VLC has two file search systems, Audio/Video (the song information is in the file via ID3) and Browse (by directory and filename). All that has happened in the latest version is that Browse has been made more prominent, for example, in the menu at the bottom of the screen (sometimes).

Perceived volume depends on a lot of things. Here it depends on refrigerator and space heater! I don't think VLC did or does anything with volume but send it to Android so you can control it with the volume buttons.

I don't think VLC goes out to the internet for song information.

I agree that the more dynamic interface is hard to understand, controls appear and disappear as you scroll, and agree that user configuration settings should exist to disable parts of this.

no no what i mean is for playlists it will save a file name and be unable to find that name later because it reads differently later. i can find the file again through the browse function and it simply displays a different name. sometimes it just wont play those files at all, but i can still use other media players to open that file, which leads me to think its VLC. lotta other times i'll go to open a playlist and nothing is saved in the playlist but its name. it just auto deletes after a time. might be android doing that, i have no way of knowing.

"VLC reads the "Title" string in the file description to display the name of the file, normally this coincides with the actual file name, but if you rename it it will display the Title string as long as there's one."
taken from the reddit, 2y old post.
file metadata? im not really computer savvy.
I would like the setting option for which, uh, string, vlc displays. on mobile editing the title of a file rather than the file name seems complicated, so adding a setting to let users choose whether vlc displays title or file name would be cool.

This is different! This may coincide with the thread "VLC is deleting my songs!" nearby.

Specific example? Does it contain special characters? What is changed to what?

One thing I know, if you add files, either over the wire or by popping out microSD, VLC does a poor job refreshing. My formula now is: Disable the directory from auto-scan, refresh, enable, and refresh again. It is as though VLC uses its own database and doesn't actually go out to the device to see which files are there now.

"Metadata" means the information on artist, title, album that may be inside the MP3 file. The song itself being the "data."

oh, thx!

This new update is not just cosmetically changed but clearly re-written structurally.

Unfortunately that has resulted in a lot of (years and years) of improvement and fine-tuning to be destroyed and washed away in one fell swoop.

Example: If I set "landscape" for the video display it now goes landscape on only one side of the phone, not the other. This was not the case in the all-yellow "pre revamped" VLC for android. Then it used to go landscape either way (skipping only the portrait modes on both sides). Now it stays fixed in one landscape mode no matter how I rotate the phone

@xdaedonx : I don't really understand your missing files issue. Maybe you could share a sample file that is corrupted or give a clear reproduction procedure for this issue.

About the Filename vs title issue: if you want your music displayed as tagged (by artist, album etc), use the Audio tab. If you want it sorted by folder and filename, use the Browser tab.