PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums Band-in-a-Box for Windows Unable to open a BB song files from Windows Explorer

This is a problem that was addressed in some details back in February 2012 when I was able to solve the problem from the advice given. Some time ago the problem reoccurred and I am no longer able to open files from Windows Explorer (or Internet Explorer but that function is not one I use often).

I use a TOSHIBA notebook.
My Operating System is Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
I use Band-in-a-Box 2013 Audiophile Edition with all updates.
I run BB from the external hard drive supplied by PG Music.
My BB song files are on the hard drive of my computer - not the external hard drive.
My BB song files are filed in Explorer as follows: Libraries, Music, My Music, BAND-IN-A-BOX FILES, Sub headings (75 of them) such as "A-Jazz_MODERN_AZ", and then the song file name which is the full name of the tune, such as "Afternoon In Paris.Mgu". It works for me! I can find any tune in any style for any specific band use in a few seconds. I was just wondering if this file tree had anything to do with my problem.

When I click on a tune in Windows Explorer, BB opens up but not with the song selected. It opens depending on how I have the setting "At program bootup....".

Things I have tried but which did not solve the problem:

* File, File Utilities, "Remove File Associations (songs, styles) with Windows" for the purpose of making sure old BB associations were not in place.
* File, File Utilities, "Associate File Types (songs, styles) with Windows" the process of removing and re-establishing was recommended in the previous solution.
* I tried all the settings for "At program bootup...". Previously it was suggested that it was necessary to have "Do not open song or style". That was the one that fixed it for me last time, but not now.
* "Return to Factory Settings". I know Mac will suggest that one but I only used the "MOST" one because it just takes far too long to re-establish all the settings that I have set up for my program.

I am not alone in having this problem. All my close Aussie band mates running BB are unable to open from Windows Explorer. Also there are several forums I frequent where people are experiencing the same problem - one current in the Band-in-a-Box Group in Yahoo. Maybe all my mates, associates and me are a particularly 'thick' mob. I don't know, but I wish one of us was able to fix the problem. Maybe I missed a further solution after Notes Norton raised it last year?

Sorry that I can't be much help on Explorer file trees but will just share my approach.

I just store my songs within BIAB as:

BB/JimSongs

Then each song is saved by title alphabetically not by genre. (What genre is Route 66)? (-:

Then, my titles are standard "call out" titles like "Dock of the Bay" not "Sittin' on...."

And "San Francisco" not "I Left My Heart...."

That way by using the scroll bar, I can navigate to any song in a matter of seconds.

Just my approach.

Best,
Jim

Graham, I am intrigued by your problem.

I wish I still had Windows 7 on my Toshiba laptop to test whether your problem also occurs on my setup, but alas, the hard drive died, so I put in a SSD running Windows 8.

As far as I know, the folder structure - the place you keep your BIAB songs - has no bearing on your problem.

I would have done the same troubleshooting steps that you tried.

The one piece of information missing is, did you install BIAB? You said you run it from the supplied PG Music hard drive (which is fine) and keep your songs on the internal drive (also fine). But did you do the install choice to put the program on the laptop's boot drive? I realize you don't need to, to just run the program, but I'm wondering if it makes the Windows file association work by doing so?

Hi Graham,
If biab is already running, do you have the same problem ? With my Biab explorer, I have to wait that biab is loaded to load the songs. Just an idea...

You could copy one of your song at another place with a short name (c:\test.mgu) and see if it works ?

Exactly the same problem here.

Graham,

Have tried setting the association in Windows Explorer itself?

I don't have Windows 7. In Vista the process is as follows ...

Navigate to an .SGU or MGU file and right-click on the file (#1), select "Open With" (#2) and then select "Choose default program" (#3). These numbers are marked on the image below.



On the window that pops up, select "Browse ...



... and then navigate to the \bb folder and select BBW.EXE. "Ok" your way out of all the windows.

Now double-click on the filetype you've just set and see if it opens. Note, .SGU and .MGU need to be set separately.

Hope this helps,
Noel

Hi Graham,



I tested that exact path and file name on Windows 7 64, and it worked for me, so the path is probably not the issue.

Here is a test you can do:

First, choose a song in your main bb folder. Let's say your BB hard drive is drive G: - choose a song in the bb folder on that drive, say G:\bb\bolero1.mgu. Choose a song with no spaces in it's file name. Try double-clicking on that song to verify that you have the same problem with it, as you do with the songs on your C drive. Assuming you do have the same problem, then...

1. Open a command prompt window. To do this, go to the Start menu and type cmd.
2. Navigate to the bb folder. To do this, first type "G:" (without the quotes) to go to your G drive. Then, type "cd bb" to go into the bb folder.
3. Type the following to launch Band-in-a-Box and open your chosen song: bbw.exe /Open G:\bb\bolero1.mgu
   Of course you will replace G with whatever your drive letter is, and boler1 with whatever your chosen song is. There are spaces before and after the /Open.

This is the command that should be stored in the registry for "Band-in-a-Box song", so if it works when you do it manually, then maybe there is something wrong with the registry keys (or they aren't there at all). One thing that would cause them not to be there at all would be if UAC was enabled when you used the "associate" menu item in BB. Though in this case, BB would give you a message informing you of that. There could be some other security software running on your computer that is preventing it from happening.

Running a Band-in-a-Box installer would be more likely to succeed at setting the values, since it would be probably be running with more privileges than bbw.exe - so that is something to try (e.g. run the Setup.exe file on your latest hard drive, and choose the minimal install).