Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
from Rating on the menu that appears or by clicking under the Rating heading
to the right of the filename if you have Column view activated.
You can use the star ratings you've applied to arrange the order of your song
collections by clicking the Rating heading, which will list all your favorite
media files first. The information is also used by iTunes to divine your favorite
music for playlists.
But if you're a truly discerning music critic, you might not think five stars is
enough. One song might be worth only four-and-a-half stars, for example.
Well, using a secret setting, you can activate half-star increments within
ratings.
Activating and Using Half-Star Ratings
Quit iTunes, open a Terminal window (open Finder, select the Applications
list, and then in the list of applications double-click Terminal within the
UTILITIES
folder), and type the following:
DEFAULTS WRITE COM.APPLE.ITUNES ALLOW-HALF-STARS -BOOL TRUE
When you restart iTunes, you can apply half-star settings to your media by
switching to List view (hit
OPTION
+
COMMAND
+
3
) and then clicking and dragging
right and left within under the Ratings heading of a song's entry within the
list. You have to be subtle when dragging, however, because the half-star
ratings are only a nudge away from the full-star ratings.
Alternatively, you can select the file, hit
COMMAND
+
I
, and in the dialog box that
appears select the Options tab. Then click and drag in the Rating box, as
described earlier.
Deactivating Half-Star Ratings
If in the future you'd like to return to full-star ratings only, again quit iTunes
and open a Terminal window, before typing the following:
DEFAULTS DELETE COM.APPLE.ITUNES ALLOW-HALF-STARS
When you restart iTunes, you should find that any items you previously gave
half-star ratings to are now rounded down to the nearest full-star rating.
