Getting Started
***************

Welcome to beets! This guide will help you begin using it to make your
music collection better.


Installing
==========

You will need Python. Beets works on Python 3.7 or later.

* **macOS** 11 (Big Sur) includes Python 3.8 out of the box. You can
  opt for a more recent Python installing it via Homebrew ("brew
  install python3"). There's also a MacPorts port. Run "port install
  beets" or "port install beets-full" to include many third-party
  plugins.

* On **Debian or Ubuntu**, depending on the version, beets is
  available as an official package (Debian details, Ubuntu details),
  so try typing: "apt-get install beets". But the version in the
  repositories might lag behind, so make sure you read the right
  version of these docs. If you want the latest version, you can get
  everything you need to install with pip as described below by
  running: "apt-get install python-dev python-pip"

* On **Arch Linux**, beets is in [community], so just run "pacman -S
  beets". (There's also a bleeding-edge dev package in the AUR, which
  will probably set your computer on fire.)

* On **Alpine Linux**, beets is in the community repository and can be
  installed with "apk add beets".

* For **Gentoo Linux**, beets is in Portage as "media-sound/beets".
  Just run "emerge beets" to install. There are several USE flags
  available for optional plugin dependencies.

* On **FreeBSD**, there's a beets port at "audio/beets".

* On **OpenBSD**, there's a beets port can be installed with "pkg_add
  beets".

* For **Slackware**, there's a SlackBuild available.

* On **Fedora** 22 or later, there's a DNF package you can install
  with "sudo dnf install beets beets-plugins beets-doc".

* On **Solus**, run "eopkg install beets".

* On **NixOS**, there's a package you can install with "nix-env -i
  beets".

If you have pip, just say "pip install beets" (or "pip install --user
beets" if you run into permissions problems).

To install without pip, download beets from its PyPI page and run
"python setup.py install" in the directory therein.

The best way to upgrade beets to a new version is by running "pip
install -U beets". You may want to follow @b33ts on Twitter to hear
about progress on new versions.


Installing by Hand on macOS 10.11 and Higher
--------------------------------------------

Starting with version 10.11 (El Capitan), macOS has a new security
feature called System Integrity Protection (SIP) that prevents you
from modifying some parts of the system. This means that some "pip"
commands may fail with a permissions error. (You probably *won't* run
into this if you've installed Python yourself with Homebrew or
otherwise. You can also try MacPorts.)

If this happens, you can install beets for the current user only by
typing "pip install --user beets". If you do that, you might want to
add "~/Library/Python/3.6/bin" to your "$PATH".


Installing on Windows
---------------------

Installing beets on Windows can be tricky. Following these steps might
help you get it right:

1. If you don't have it, install Python (you want at least Python
   3.7). The installer should give you the option to "add Python to
   PATH." Check this box. If you do that, you can skip the next step.

2. If you haven't done so already, set your "PATH" environment
   variable to include Python and its scripts. To do so, open the
   "Settings" application, then access the "System" screen, then
   access the "About" tab, and then hit "Advanced system settings"
   located on the right side of the screen. This should open the
   "System Properties" screen, then select the "Advanced" tab, then
   hit the "Environmental Variables..." button, and then look for the
   PATH variable in the table. Add the following to the end of the
   variable's value: ";C:\Python37;C:\Python37\Scripts". You may need
   to adjust these paths to point to your Python installation.

3. Now install beets by running: "pip install beets"

4. You're all set! Type "beet" at the command prompt to make sure
   everything's in order.

Windows users may also want to install a context menu item for
importing files into beets. Download the beets.reg file and open it in
a text file to make sure the paths to Python match your system. Then
double-click the file add the necessary keys to your registry. You can
then right-click a directory and choose "Import with beets".

Because I don't use Windows myself, I may have missed something. If
you have trouble or you have more detail to contribute here, please
direct it to the mailing list.


Configuring
===========

You'll want to set a few basic options before you start using beets.
The configuration is stored in a text file. You can show its location
by running "beet config -p", though it may not exist yet. Run "beet
config -e" to edit the configuration in your favorite text editor. The
file will start out empty, but here's good place to start:

   directory: ~/music
   library: ~/data/musiclibrary.db

Change that first path to a directory where you'd like to keep your
music. Then, for "library", choose a good place to keep a database
file that keeps an index of your music. (The config's format is YAML.
You'll want to configure your text editor to use spaces, not real
tabs, for indentation. Also, "~" means your home directory in these
paths, even on Windows.)

The default configuration assumes you want to start a new organized
music folder (that "directory" above) and that you'll *copy* cleaned-
up music into that empty folder using beets' "import" command (see
below). But you can configure beets to behave many other ways:

* Start with a new empty directory, but *move* new music in instead of
  copying it (saving disk space). Put this in your config file:

     import:
         move: yes

* Keep your current directory structure; importing should never move
  or copy files but instead just correct the tags on music. Put the
  line "copy: no" under the "import:" heading in your config file to
  disable any copying or renaming. Make sure to point "directory" at
  the place where your music is currently stored.

* Keep your current directory structure and *do not* correct files'
  tags: leave files completely unmodified on your disk. (Corrected
  tags will still be stored in beets' database, and you can use them
  to do renaming or tag changes later.) Put this in your config file:

     import:
         copy: no
         write: no

  to disable renaming and tag-writing.

There are approximately six million other configuration options you
can set here, including the directory and file naming scheme. See
Configuration for a full reference.


Importing Your Library
======================

The next step is to import your music files into the beets library
database. Because this can involve modifying files and moving them
around, data loss is always a possibility, so now would be a good time
to make sure you have a recent backup of all your music. We'll wait.

There are two good ways to bring your existing library into beets. You
can either: (a) quickly bring all your files with all their current
metadata into beets' database, or (b) use beets' highly-refined
autotagger to find canonical metadata for every album you import.
Option (a) is really fast, but option (b) makes sure all your songs'
tags are exactly right from the get-go. The point about speed bears
repeating: using the autotagger on a large library can take a very
long time, and it's an interactive process. So set aside a good chunk
of time if you're going to go that route. For more on the interactive
tagging process, see Using the Auto-Tagger.

If you've got time and want to tag all your music right once and for
all, do this:

   $ beet import /path/to/my/music

(Note that by default, this command will *copy music into the
directory you specified above*. If you want to use your current
directory structure, set the "import.copy" config option.) To take the
fast, un-autotagged path, just say:

   $ beet import -A /my/huge/mp3/library

Note that you just need to add "-A" for "don't autotag".


Adding More Music
=================

If you've ripped or... otherwise obtained some new music, you can add
it with the "beet import" command, the same way you imported your
library. Like so:

   $ beet import ~/some_great_album

This will attempt to autotag the new album (interactively) and add it
to your library. There are, of course, more options for this command
---just type "beet help import" to see what's available.


Seeing Your Music
=================

If you want to query your music library, the "beet list" (shortened to
"beet ls") command is for you. You give it a query string, which is
formatted something like a Google search, and it gives you a list of
songs.  Thus:

   $ beet ls the magnetic fields
   The Magnetic Fields - Distortion - Three-Way
   The Magnetic Fields - Distortion - California Girls
   The Magnetic Fields - Distortion - Old Fools
   $ beet ls hissing gronlandic
   of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? - Gronlandic Edit
   $ beet ls bird
   The Knife - The Knife - Bird
   The Mae Shi - Terrorbird - Revelation Six
   $ beet ls album:bird
   The Mae Shi - Terrorbird - Revelation Six

By default, a search term will match any of a handful of common
attributes of songs. (They're also implicitly joined by ANDs: a track
must match *all* criteria in order to match the query.) To narrow a
search term to a particular metadata field, just put the field before
the term, separated by a : character. So "album:bird" only looks for
"bird" in the "album" field of your songs. (Need to know more? Queries
will answer all your questions.)

The "beet list" command also has an "-a" option, which searches for
albums instead of songs:

   $ beet ls -a forever
   Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
   Freezepop - Freezepop Forever

There's also an "-f" option (for *format*) that lets you specify what
gets displayed in the results of a search:

   $ beet ls -a forever -f "[$format] $album ($year) - $artist - $title"
   [MP3] For Emma, Forever Ago (2009) - Bon Iver - Flume
   [AAC] Freezepop Forever (2011) - Freezepop - Harebrained Scheme

In the format option, field references like *$format* and *$year* are
filled in with data from each result. You can see a full list of
available fields by running "beet fields".

Beets also has a "stats" command, just in case you want to see how
much music you have:

   $ beet stats
   Tracks: 13019
   Total time: 4.9 weeks
   Total size: 71.1 GB
   Artists: 548
   Albums: 1094


Keep Playing
============

This is only the beginning of your long and prosperous journey with
beets. To keep learning, take a look at Advanced Awesomeness for a
sampling of what else is possible. You'll also want to glance over the
Command-Line Interface page for a more detailed description of all of
beets' functionality.  (Like deleting music! That's important.)

Also, check out beets' plugins.  The real power of beets is in its
extensibility---with plugins, beets can do almost anything for your
music collection.

You can always get help using the "beet help" command. The plain "beet
help" command lists all the available commands; then, for example,
"beet help import" gives more specific help about the "import"
command.

If you need more of a walkthrough, you can read an illustrated one on
the beets blog.

Please let us know what you think of beets via the discussion board or
Mastodon.
