mkvtoolnix destination folder

13th Aug 2020 14:50 #1

Member

Hi everyone

Apologies for asking such a basic question, but I've been using mkvtoolnix for years to add subtitles to video files, and I have always used the same destination folder for all outputs, a location where I can check I've got everything right before committing to a final destination.

I've upgraded to a new PC, and installed mkvtoolnix, but I can't find a way to set a default destination folder. Instead, mkvtoolnix seems determined to output files to the same folder as the input file.

I have a 50-episode Korean TV series to which I want to add subtitles, and it's frustrating to be constantly overriding the output location to prevent the output files from getting mixed up with the input files.

I suspect I've missed something obvious, but I'd be very grateful if someone could tell me how to set a default destination folder!

Thanks, and apologies if I've broken any rules.

Quote

13th Aug 2020 15:28 #2

abolibibelot

Member

It's probably a problem related to the “user account control” cr@p and the mkvtoolnix-gui.ini file can't be modified as a result. I'm not sure how it works exactly to be honest, all I know is that it can be a real PITA. On my Windows 7 system I used to disable UAC completely, but it started causing unwanted issues with Firefox (drag-and-drop of text and URLs to other programs would no longer work), so now I do something that is probably not recommended either : UAC is activated, but each time the system starts, I open the Task manager with administrator privileges (Start menu => "taskmgr" => right-click and "Open as administrator"), then, from the Task manager, close explorer.exe, then re-open it with administrator privileges, "File" => "New task" => explorer.exe and check "Create this task with administrator privileges". It's quite convoluted, probably insecure, but at least I can use the damn thing somewhat peacefully and don't have to hear that obnoxious sound that comes with the obnoxious prompt “Do you want to let this program make changes on your computer ?” 50 times a day.

Another option in this specific case, if you don't want to mess with the system's settings, would be to copy the mkvtoolnix folder to a non-system partition (or decompress it from the installer, in case copying the folder from the system partition retains unwanted security restrictions).
Or if that doesn't work either, use MKVToolNix GUI only to configure tasks, then run mkvmerge scripts based on the command line obtained from the GUI.
1) Configure a task from the GUI.
2) Instead of clicking on "Start multiplexing", go to "Multiplexed" then click on "Show command line".
3) Then with this base you can create a single script for all 50 episodes (either by copying the script 50 times and changing files names accordingly, or with a FOR loop if the files are conveniently named, i.e. each subtitles file has the same base name as the corresponding video file, and all video files have the same tracks in the same order), and specify the output directory. It should be quicker than doing it all from the GUI.