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[Matt]

We want to make sure all of our audio tagging is as updated as possible for v12.

The only little tweak we have on our list is to map rating in an ID3v2 tag to the POPM field. (currently we use a COMM field)

Are there any other tagging tweaks like this that MC could use?

Thanks.

[Alex B]

Hmm... I think I have mentioned a few more in the main MC forum. I'll try to gather them and perhaps also add something that I have had in my mind.

I suppose you mean mostly ID3 tagging or are you willing to make changes to other tag formats if needed for better integration with audio libraries that were initially tagged with other programs?

The "Media Jukebox:" APE v2 and Vorbis tags are naturally not compatible with commonly used plain tag headers like "Album Artist" and so on.

In general, I like Scthom's approach with FLAC tags. The tag header is literally the same as the field name. With that approach you can easily define any new custom field and MC can import and write a file tag with the same header.

[Alex B]

A quick forum search for ID3 & my name found these:


TOPE (Original Artist)  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=29081.0

- MC already supports this correctly if the user creates a custom field. Since that is not obvious you should add Original Artist to the default fields.


TPUB (Publisher)  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=29583.0


PCNT (Play Counter)  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=34213.0

- perhaps this could be added to the standard library fields and mapped with MC's play counter if possible. It could be useful if someone has previously added playcounts to the file tags with other programs. Then MC could import the old values. (Naturally tag writing should not be enabled by default.)


PIC (the old ID3v2.2 version of APIC)  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=32596.0

- read support?


TIT1 (Content group description)  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=34634.0

- iTunes uses this for its "Grouping" tag. You could add a default field named "Content Group"


TXXX  http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=33515.0

Foobar, Mp3tag and most other dedicated taggers use TXXX tags for custom tags. For example, "TXXX ALBUM ARTIST" is common.

I understand that it is difficult to change the curretly used "comment frames with content descriptors" system, but could you add a tickbox like "use TXXX ID3v2/MP3 tag" in the user field options. Then the user could define a custom field that uses TXXX instead of "Comment: Media Jukebox".


WXXX (User defined URL link)

- for a web address, quite common too



In addition, a small v.2.3 UTF-16 bug (if not already fixed):

As I said there is a compatibility problem with v2.3 UTF-16 tags. A couple of weeks ago I asked about the problem at Mp3tag forum and got this answer:

MC sets the language of comment fields to 3 null bytes. Mp3tag always sets the language to eng. This seems to be a problem for MC.

The thread is here: http://www.anytag.de/forums/index.php?showtopic=3514

[hit_ny]

If diff tags are adopted now, what happens to media that is still using the older tags ?

Is there a way to transition from one to the other ?

[Alex B]

In general, the ID3 tags I mentioned would not replace any old tags.

Mapping the TXXX ALBUM ARTIST tag with the current ALBUM ARTIST library field should be considered because HW players, like portables and network players are starting to support it (... I hope). HW devices are not going to support "COMM Media Jukebox: Album Artist". This tag would be needed for making the various artists albums appear under a single album artist. Users could fill the Album Artist field if needed. MC could read both types and on next update write the TXXX version (Matt has done a similar change before.)

With APE, MPC and OGG the best thing to do for future interoperativity would be to remove the Media Jukebox: part from the tag headers completely. MC should be able read the old style tags, but on next tag update it should use the new system.


EDIT

WMP uses the TPE2 (Band or Orchestra) ID3v2.3 tag for Album Artist. However, this is not a common standard. Many MC users have used the Band tag for its original purpose for years so the TPE2 mapping should not be changed. The Band tag shows up fine and MC has a tool for mass copying or moving the field contents.

[jimn]

For the next build, ID3's popularimeter is mapped to MC star ratings; 1-255 converted to 1-5 and vice versa. As usual, comments on this are welcome.

JimN

[zxsix]

This isn't part of any ID3 standard, but just a reminder that there have been several requests on the forum for an additional rating field that can be displayed with 5 stars, just like the existing rating field.
Would be quite useful for those of us with multiple listeners sharing a library.
We're using an integer field with possible values 1;2;3;4;5, just like the Rating field.   Some sort of option under User Library Fields to display the stars instead of the numbers would be great!

[GHammer]

We want to make sure all of our audio tagging is as updated as possible for v12.

The only little tweak we have on our list is to map rating in an ID3v2 tag to the POPM field. (currently we use a COMM field)

This should be POPM not POPULARIMETER as it is now.

<Header for 'Popularimeter', ID: "POPM">
Email to user <text string> $00
Rating  $xx
Counter $xx xx xx xx (xx ...)

[GHammer]

I'd think these would be good things to 'standardize' on:

<Header for 'Play counter', ID: "PCNT">
Counter  $xx xx xx xx (xx ...)

<Header for 'Relative volume adjustment', ID: "RVAD">
Increment/decrement %00xxxxxx
Bits used for volume descr. $xx
Relative volume change, right $xx xx (xx ...)
Relative volume change, left $xx xx (xx ...)
Peak volume right $xx xx (xx ...)
Peak volume left $xx xx (xx ...)

[sonicbox]

I know I mentioned this in another thread/forum re: MC 11, but ID3 TPE2 being mapped to Album Artist is getting more common as time goes on.  It isn't just Microsoft's Windows Media Player.

Apple iTunes 7, Winamp 5.3, Windows, MediaMonkey, Windows Vista's shell, Sonos, Tag & Rename, etc.  From my point of view, it's a "de facto standard" now.

It would be nice to at least have a setting in MC to enable this mapping for cross-compatibility, so copying/juggling fields wouldn't be necessary.

[lepa]

Mapping the TXXX ALBUM ARTIST tag with the current ALBUM ARTIST library field should be considered because HW players, like portables and network players are starting to support it (... I hope).

With APE, MPC and OGG the best thing to do for future interoperativity would be to remove the Media Jukebox: part from the tag headers completely. MC should be able read the old style tags, but on next tag update it should use the new system.

WMP uses the TPE2 (Band or Orchestra) ID3v2.3 tag for Album Artist. However, this is not a common standard. Many MC users have used the Band tag for its original purpose for years so the TPE2 mapping should not be changed. The Band tag shows up fine and MC has a tool for mass copying or moving the field contents.

I agree. Those changes would increase compatibility with the other devices/players enormously.
Personally I would be very happy to see all these changes.

[rjm]

I have mentioned this in the past.

Please consider adding a URL type for custom fields.

Clicking the field would launch the browser to the URL.

Would be great for pointing at album reviews, etc.

I know there is a work around but it is not convenient.

Thanks, Rob

[Alex B]

camp-echo posted this in another thread. I decided to answer here because of the previous discussion.

Is it possible to configure MC library to display mp3 tag fields like TENC?  Could this be done with a user field?  I've got a few recordings of internet radio stations and would like to query by netradiostation, encodedby etc.

Any advice or direction sincerly appreciated.

Thanks

I don't think TENC is supported. MC supports many ID3v2.3 tag fields, but certainly not all of them.

Personally, I would like to use TSSE (Software/Hardware and settings used for encoding). I have a custom field named as "Encoder" and I save it to the files. Currently it goes to "COMM Media Jukebox: Encoder", which is a "comment frame with content descriptors".

[Alex B]

Here is how another program does the ID3 v2.3 and 2.4 tag mapping (quoted from: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Foobar2000:ID3_Tag_Mapping).

I added info about the support status in MC: + is supported, - is unsupported (please correct me if I made mistakes...)
 

	Field Name	ID3v2.3 Frame	ID3v2.4 Frame	Description	Comments
+	ALBUM	TALB	TALB	Album/Movie/Show title
+	ARTIST	TPE1	TPE1	Lead performer(s)/Soloist(s)
-	ARTIST WEBPAGE URL	WOAR	WOAR	Official artist/performer webpage
+	BAND	TPE2	TPE2	Band/orchestra/accompaniment
+	BPM	TBPM	TBPM	BPM (beats per minute)
+	COMMENT	COMM	COMM	Comments
-	COMMERCIAL INFORMATION URL	WCOM	WCOM	Commercial information
+	COMPOSER	TCOM	TCOM	Composer
+	CONDUCTOR	TPE3	TPE3	Conductor/performer refinement
-	CONTENT GROUP	TIT1	TIT1	Content group description
-	COPYRIGHT	TCOP	TCOP	Copyright message
-	DATE		TDRC	Recording time	The TDRC frame is officially to be used for the recording time, TDRL is for the release time but TDRC is generally used by most programs.
+	DATE	TYER		Year
+	DISCNUMBER	TPOS	TPOS	Part of a set
-	ENCODED BY	TENC	TENC	Encoded by
-	ENCODING SETTINGS	TSSE	TSSE	Software/Hardware and settings used for encoding
-	FILE WEBPAGE URL	WOAF	WOAF	Official audio file webpage
+	GENRE	TCON	TCON	Content type
-	INTERNET RADIO WEBPAGE URL	WORS	WORS	Official Internet radio station homepage
-	ISRC	TSRC	TSRC	ISRC (international standard recording code)
-	ORIGINAL ALBUM	TOAL	TOAL	Original album/movie/show title
+	ORIGINAL ARTIST	TOPE	TOPE	Original artist(s)/performer(s)	In MC you must first add a library field named as "Original Artist"
-	ORIGINAL RELEASE DATE		TDOR	Original release time
-	ORIGINAL RELEASE DATE	TORY		Original release year
-	OWNER	TOWN	TOWN	File owner/licensee
-	PAYMEMT URL	WPAY	WPAY	Payment
-	PUBLISHER	TPUB	TPUB	Publisher
-	PUBLISHER URL	WPUB	WPUB	Publishers official webpage
-	RADIO STATION	TRSN	TRSN	Internet radio station name
-	REMIXED BY	TPE4	TPE4	Interpreted, remixed, or otherwise modified by
-	SOURCE WEBPAGE URL	WOAS	WOAS	Official audio source webpage
-	SUBTITLE	TIT3	TIT3	Subtitle/Description refinement
+	TITLE	TIT2	TIT2	Title/songname/content description
+	TRACKNUMBER	TRCK	TRCK	Track number/Position in set
-	TOTALDISCS	TPOS	TPOS	Part of a set	Stored in the same frame with DISCNUMBER, separated by '/': e.g. '1/2'. Stored in TXXX if DISCNUMBER does not exist.
-	TOTALTRACKS	TRCK	TRCK	Total tracks	Stored in the same frame with TRACKNUMBER, separated by '/': e.g. '4/9'. Stored in TXXX if TRACKNUMBER doesn't exist.
+	UNSYNCED LYRICS	USLT	USLT	Unsynchronised lyric/text transcription
-	WRITER	TEXT	TEXT	Lyricist/Text writer

MC uses the "comment frame with content descriptors" system for all custom tags. As I wrote earlier, I would prefer the following system instead (which seems to cause less tagging incompatibility with other programs.)

All non-native supported field names will be stored in the TXXX (User defined text information) frame except for field names starting with "WWW" which will be stored in WXXX (User defined URL link frame) frames.

When a tagging program saves these frames the actual name of the custom tag is added after the TXXX or WXXX code.

[Alex B]

I know I mentioned this in another thread/forum re: MC 11, but ID3 TPE2 being mapped to Album Artist is getting more common as time goes on.  It isn't just Microsoft's Windows Media Player.

Apple iTunes 7, Winamp 5.3, Windows, MediaMonkey, Windows Vista's shell, Sonos, Tag & Rename, etc.  From my point of view, it's a "de facto standard" now.

It would be nice to at least have a setting in MC to enable this mapping for cross-compatibility, so copying/juggling fields wouldn't be necessary.

Hmm... you seem to be more and more correct as time goes by.

I suppose that the old MC users (like me) could use a custom field for the band/orchestra tag before updating the tags and filling the TPE2 field with the "Album Artist" values. MC would probably do that automatically if the tag mappings were changed.

In any case, a system for reading the TXXX ALBUM ARTIST tags would be good to have too.

[Alex B]

Matt & co,

I know, this is quite a can of worms and there is no single perfect solution that would work for everyone.

However, I think that a bigger tagging compatibility with other popular programs and devices would make switching to MC easier.

Perhaps these things could be considered for MC13 (12.1?) if tagging changes are not scheduled now.

[Listener]

I suppose you mean mostly ID3 tagging or are you willing to make changes to other tag formats if needed for better integration with audio libraries that were initially tagged with other programs?

...

In general, I like Scthom's approach with FLAC tags. The tag header is literally the same as the field name. With that approach you can easily define any new custom field and MC can import and write a file tag with the same header.

I use Flac files almost exclusively.  Being able to use Composer, Conductor and Band/Ensemble/Orchestra tags and to define custom tags such as Sub-Genre, Work Name  and Version is essential to me.  MC 12 would be far less useful to me if I couldn't do that.  I hope that nothing is done to compromise that functionality.

---
A suggestion:  For MP3 and other formats, place tag translation information in external files.  This would map the conversion from in-file tag names to the tag name and function used by MC 12MC 12 could provide an interface for modifying the translation.

Bill

[thenoob1]

That's not the topic but aac tagging would be cool.

tn1

[newsposter]

I believe that tagging, cover art, lyrics and the hassles thereof are the main reason why people tend to stick with a particular media player or library, even the excreable ones from MSFT.  Nearly every single track 're-tagger' or editor has significant shortcomings.  Player media import procedures and utilities are similarly messed up across the industry.  MC is one of the best, but we still have significant hassles be it funky access to yadb or mis-tagging tracks/albums or importing tracks/tags from other sources.

JR may want to consider building and maintaining a stand-alone utility that rationalizes / repairs / re-tags tracks and albums referencing yadb, cddb, or any other database.  One essential feature would be to tap into a user-defined database with mappings back to 'standard' MC and IDxxxx tag info.  Another essential would be user-defined linking to yadb, cddb, or any other user-defined (SQL dB???) database or reference.   A field-field mapping capability with lots of error cross-checking would be one key to success there.

The (significant) upside of a stand-alone utility is that the complexity and release/maintenance schedule could be separate from MC.  It might even reduce the overall complexity of MC if a decent and COMPLETE data dictionary for MC would be developed and published.