[Desktop] Local files with special characters or non-English letters in their name not working

[maxchaos93]

Plan

Premium

Country

France

Device

Desktop Windows

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

The local files scan seems to be broken (again) on the Spotify Windows desktop app (so not the Microsoft store version, the version downloaded from the Spotify website).

I tried to add some new local files a few hours ago and it wouldn't work so I removed the local-files.bnk file because I found countless messages on this forum mentioning this exact problem with this solution. However that did not work and worse, some files went missing in the process after the fresh scan.

So I completely uninstalled Spotify and reinstalled it from the website. Everything worked, however, after waiting for it to finish updating the local files, a new version was download by the client. So I installed it and... the same local files disappeared again. So I guess something is crashing regarding local files indexing in the latest version (1.1.46.916.g416cacf1) while it was not in the version still delivered from the website (1.1.45.621.gdddebadc).

However that is not the first time I encounter this kind of problem (and it seems that a lot of people encounters them periodically, judging from the messages here) and it's sad to see that something as simple as files indexing (which should be the basics for a music player) gets broken so often on a stable release channel 😕 . Not being able to merge the local files with the online ones is starting to become really annoying...

[Frenzleboy]

Sadly not. I tried to do that already. And besides, what's the point in changing the name if I can't recognize them anymore when I look at the title.

[johnlukemiller]

Yes. Same problem here. I tried a few different things that have worked for the countless other times that there have been an issue with local files in the past. Does anyone know a good way to diffuse this thread so spotify may respond faster or that help may come sooner? cuz im out of ideas and obviously upset I can't listen to my music!

[slug_camargo]

I guess you can try talking to the @SpotifyCares twitter, but in my experience, unless it's such a massive issue that it makes some headlines they'll just give you the PR spin --and this doesn't seem something a lot of people even noticed.
Your best bet really would be to revert back to a previous version and lock the app from updating in the future, as stated elsewhere in this post.

[slug_camargo]

We're talking about this **bleep** over here https://community.spotify.com/t5/Desktop-Windows/Local-files-broken-again/td-p/5071755
Piece of advice: Revert to an older version and lock the app from updating again.

[-a42tn_q49ev]

How does one setup an older version without it auto updating. It seems to do it before the Appdata is even available to me.

[slug_camargo]

Here's a guide to stop auto updating: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Desktop-Windows/Stopping-Auto-update/td-p/4785101
Basically you're setting up an "update" folder in %localappdata%\Spotify\ and set it up as Admin and Read Only.
If all goes well, whenever you go to Edit -> Preferences -> About Spotify you should see a version number lower than 1.1.46.916 and a link saying "click here to dowload new version" (don't click that, though).

One of the posters of that other thread said they got an older version from the official "download" link on the very Spotify page. Otherwise, you'll have to look for an older version around the web --which, granted, might carry some risks, which makes the whole situation rather ridiculous.
TechSpot stores older versions of a lot of programs, and I understand it's a pretty trusted website. You could try over there.

[-a42tn_q49ev]

My issue as of right now is that appdata folder does not become availble to me until after I have installed Spotify. Every time I install Spotify it auto-updates. So I can’t really get the files in before it updates.

[Teddington]

How do you revert to an older version? I’m having the same issue.

[Alex]

Hey folks,

Thanks for reporting this issue to us.

We’ve passed your info on to the relevant team, who are currently looking into it.

If you’re experiencing this issue, make sure to click +VOTE and Subscribe to the thread to be notified of any developments.

Could you also make sure to provide us with the following info, if you haven’t already:

• Device + OS version
• Exact Spotify version
• Does this occur on the MS Store app of the same version or not.

Thanks! We’ll keep you posted and let you know as soon as we have any updates on this.

[Repka]

I'm having this. I am using:

• Windows 10 version 10.0.18363
• Spotify version 1.1.46.916.g416cacf1
• Yes, it happens on the MS Store app and the version downloaded from the Spotify website. There doesn't appear to be any difference in what tracks are greyed out between the two.