Recognizing Updated m3u8 Playlist

[LordGSama]

Since I updated to V3 about 15 months ago, I've been having issues with Poweramp recognizing that an external playlist file has been altered.  I make playlists on my PC and transfer them to my Android device, usually overwriting old playlist files in the process. After this process, Poweramp has no trouble at all recognizing that a new playlist has been added or that a playlist has been deleted. The UI immediately updates to show the changes. However, in the case of overwriting an existing file, Poweramp V3 has not yet once immediately recognized that the playlist file has changed (despite the change in the file's creation and modified dates). The new additions to the playlist do not appear on the UI and the track count is not updated. Triggering a manual rescan (even completely rebuilding the library) does not correct the playlist.

Usually, if I wait a while, Poweramp will eventually update the playlist. I can't really detect a pattern in how long it takes to update or the circumstances surrounding it. Sometimes it only takes a few minutes to recognize that the playlist has changed, sometimes it doesn't recognize it for hours, and sometimes it doesn't recognize it at all.

When I update the playlist using a text editor on my android device, Poweramp can immediately detect the change. The problem seems to occur when I overwrite the existing m3u8 files with new ones. It's as though Poweramp can detect when the file is changed but not overwritten (which I don't particularly understand).

I don't necessarily think this is a bug but I'm wondering if someone could possibly come up with a way I could avoid this. The m3u8 files that I am transferring to my android device definitely have updated creation and modified dates.

Thanks and I'd be happy to provide any additional detail or conduct any tests that might be requested.

v3-build-860-arm32-play

Android 6.0.1

SM-G900V

[andrewilley]

What happens if you do the overwrite with a file manager on your device? (such as first copy it to somewhere else on your phone, and then use the File Explorer app on the phone to move it you your normal music location).

Andre

[LordGSama]

Thank you for your response. I copied the m3u8 file to a different location, modified it (deleted one of the song references), and overwrote the existing one. Poweramp did not detect that it had changed and the deleted song remained in the playlist. I waited a few minutes and it still did not update.

However, this time, when I conducted a manual rescan, Poweramp was able to identify the change and updated the playlist accordingly within seconds. This is the first time that rescanning corrected the issue (and I mean first in literally hundreds of times).

A little bit more information that I'm not sure is related but maybe it matters. When I update the playlists, I turn my Android device off, physically remove the microSD card, and plug it into my PC to update. I imagine this is not a frequently performed operation so maybe it causes something odd to happen. Maybe Android maintains a file table that includes last modified dates but doesn't rescan the contents of the microSD card for changes.

Thanks again. Please let me know if there is anything else you'd like me to try. I'd really like to find a way around this that doesn't involve me opening and the playlist files on the Android device itself.