Overview

A key function of Jamcast is to serve media you've stored on a hard drive to networked media devices or other computers in your home. In order for Jamcast to index and serve your media, you must first share one or more local or network folders. This configuration is easily performed via the Jamcast Server Manager

Sharing a folder

To share a local or network folder, launch the Jamcast Server Manager and click the Sharing tab, then select the My Music tab. Right-click in the empty area and choose "Share music folder...". When the dialog appears, browse to the folder you'd like to share and click OK (you may also manually type the folder path in the provided text field at the bottom of the dialog box). The selected path will be added to the list of shared folders and Jamcast will queue a job to scan your media and add it to the database. For more detail, see My Music Tab in the Server Manager User's Guide.

Sharing network folders

When sharing network folders (folders located on another computer or network attached storage device), it is critical that the Jamcast service has read permissions to that folder and all media within that folder that you wish to share. When the Jamcast service is installed, it is configured to run as the LocalSystem built-in Windows account. Your network folder must allow read access to the LocalSystem account on the computer where Jamcast is running, or the Jamcast service log on user must be changed to a user that has read permission for the network folder. Note that network folders and their contents cannot be monitored for changes, and therefore need to be manually re-scanned as necessary.

Removing a shared folder

To stop sharing a folder, launch the Jamcast Server Manager and click the Sharing tab, then select the My Music tab. Right-click the folder you'd like to stop sharing and click "Remove". A job to remove this folder and all associated media from the Jamcast database will be queued for execution. Note that this does not delete any files from disk, and the folder can be re-shared at any time.

Media scanning

The Jamcast service uses a variety of processes to keep its database in sync with your media on disk:

Initial Scan

When a shared folder is added for the first time, a full scan of the folder and all of its subfolders is performed. All supported media files are scanned and added to the Jamcast database.

Startup Scan

Each shared folder is queued for a quick scan when the Jamcast service starts up. Any media file that has not been modified since it was last scanned is ignored.

Manual Rescan

Shared folders can be rescanned at any time via the Jamcast Server Manager.

Realtime Monitoring

While the Jamcast service is running, shared folders (on local disks only, this feature not available on networked folders) are monitored in realtime for changes to your media collection. Any time a file or folder is added, modified, renamed, or removed, the Jamcast database is automatically updated accordingly.

Non-shared playlist references

When scanning playlists, if Jamcast encounters a media file that is not beneath a folder you've explicitly shared, Jamcast will add it to a special folder that is displayed as "". These files are exempt from realtime folder monitoring, but are rescanned and removable along with the shared folder that contains the parent playlist.

Diagnosing media scanning issues

The import logfile is very useful when determining the cause of issues with the media scanning process. To view this logfile, launch the Jamcast Server Manager and click the Server tab, then select the Logging tab and click the corresponding "View logfile" link. The logfile, named "importlog.txt", can also be opened manually from the Jamcast installation directory.