How to add details to mkv files for explorer?

Hi,
is there any way to add details to mkv files and with details I mean for example year? So I can sort my mkv files in folder by year?

Nice collection of films. Fill in the 'Year' field for each video. Then in 'Details' view, r-click page top and select 'Year'. Then r-click and 'Customize this folder' for Video and in File Explorer ribbon, click View options and set all folders of this type to match. You can createseparate folders for each year or sort by year column.

mrgeek said:

Nice collection of films. Fill in the 'Year' field for each video...

That is the problem. You can see in the 'Properties, Details' tab in the screenshot that 'Year' has been selected, but the field is not editable. Do the same for a .mp4 file and when you select Ýear' it is editable.

I've recreated the problem by converting one of my .mp4s to .mkv format. I can edit details for the .mp4 but not the .mkv. You can clearly see a text entry box appears when you select an item for the .mp4, but none appears for the .mkv.

I see, now. Why would I think it was that simple ?
As a work around, since he has added the year as a suffix, I would just do a Search by year and then move the results to a new folder with the date, until there are none left in the main folder.

Further research suggests that tags for the .mkv format are its Achilles Heel and have never worked properly...

That does indeed look like a design flaw. The tags are the way they are because back when they were specified only two people (Steve Lhomme and myself) were working on the specs, and tags were something we neither focused on nor something we were particularly interested in.

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/...or#post2388364

So this is more related to mkv not windows as I see? Is there possibility to contact mkv creators and ask for a suggestion to add year tag to mkv files?

mrgeek said:

Nice collection of films.

Thx, I have more lol

CaptainDianthus said:

I have thousands of movies and television shows and it's a horrible task to track and organize without the ability to sort by year. I know this is an old thread, but even if you're not still interested, this may help someone else who stumbles upon it. Here is how I manage to do what I believe you are asking for:

Using the techniques outlined by mrgeek above, I display columns for Date released and Comments. Then, in Notepad++, I create a simple XML file. You can use any text editor, such as WordPad, or even Notepad, as long as you save the file with a .xml extension. Here is a sample for the movie Blade Runner:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE Tags SYSTEM "matroskatags.dtd">

<Tags>
  <Tag> <!-- Movie -->

    <Targets>
      <TargetTypeValue>50</TargetTypeValue>
    </Targets>

    <Simple>
      <Name>DATE_RELEASED</Name>
      <String>1982-06-25</String> <!-- Release Date -->
    </Simple>

    <Simple>
      <Name>COMMENT</Name>
      <String>Extended Director's Cut</String> <!-- Comments -->
    </Simple>

  </Tag>
</Tags>

Simply place the value you want between <String> and </String> on the appropriate line and save the file in an easily-accessible location. The proper format for the Release Date field is YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS.MSS, but you can leave off anything you don't need (e.g. you can use just the year, or just the date, and truncate the time). You can also leave any entry completely blank, if you prefer.

When I multiplex the movie file with MKVToolNix (mostly to embed cover art), I go to the Output tab and fill in the title in the first field, then I click the file browser icon next to the Global tags: field and select the XML file I just saved (you can also just drag-and-drop the file into this field). After multiplexing is complete, the aforementioned columns will display whatever information you placed in the respective Strings.

There are seemingly countless data points that can be embedded this way, depending on how deep you want to go down the rabbit hole, but this is a good place to start and might satisfy your needs. To expand (slightly) on the topic, you may also want to add Season number and Episode number columns in a folder that contains television shows. Here is a sample for Winter is Coming, the first episode of Game of Thrones:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE Tags SYSTEM "matroskatags.dtd">

<Tags> <!-- Television Show -->

    <Tag> <!-- Season -->
        <Targets>
            <TargetTypeValue>60</TargetTypeValue>
        </Targets>

        <Simple>
            <Name>PART_NUMBER</Name>
            <String>1</String> <!-- Season Number -->
        </Simple>

    </Tag>

    <Tag> <!-- Episode -->
        <Targets>
            <TargetTypeValue>50</TargetTypeValue>
        </Targets>

        <Simple>
            <Name>PART_NUMBER</Name>
            <String>1</String> <!-- Episode Number -->
        </Simple>

        <Simple>
            <Name>DATE_RELEASED</Name>
            <String>2013-04-28</String> <!-- Date Episode First Aired -->
        </Simple>

		<Simple>
			<Name>COMMENT</Name>
			<String>Includes Commentary Audio</String> <!-- Comments -->
		</Simple>
	
    </Tag>

</Tags>

If any of this might suit your needs, please feel free to copy/paste the XML data here and adjust it to suit your needs... and don't forget the popcorn!

I dont know if you're still active CaptainDianthus, but you method is the only one I can find that'll work for me, so thank you for that. However, I am having a few problems. I can only get director, genre and comments to work and I was wondering if you knew what the names for year, parental rating and frame width would be. I have no experience with coding at all so any help would be greatly appreciated.