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Author Topic: Reading FLAC multi-value metadata  (Read 3274 times)

aussie1

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Reading FLAC multi-value metadata
« on: May 19, 2007, 01:38:18 pm »

When a track has multiple composers or multiple styles, many tagging programs seem to store these as separate lines within the tag. For example, "Up on the Roof" by James Taylor might be tagged:

Composer = Carole King
Composer = Gerry Goffin

When MC reads this tag, it only displays one of the names.  I recognize that Composer is a standard field of type String, not list, but the same thing happens when I using a custom list field called "Style" and the tagging program that created the metadata created something like:

STYLE = Adult Contemporary
STYLE = Folk-Rock
STYLE = Pop/Rock

In this case, MC populates the style field with "Adult Contemporary" and ignores the other style data.

So, my question is, given that I have a FLAC file tagged with multiple rows of "STYLE" data, any suggestions about how I could convert this so that it populates a list field containing a list of values separated by semicolons?

S
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Alex B

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Re: Reading FLAC multi-value metadata
« Reply #1 on: May 19, 2007, 02:35:26 pm »

Mp3tag can combine duplicate fields and use a defined separator between the values. It has a feature called "merge duplicate fields" under its "actions". These are scripts that can be run on all files that are present inside Mp3tag.

After the file tags are changed you can do "Update Library (from tags)" for updating the database. Naturally you must have created a custom library field with the name Style first.

EDIT

If you want to keep the duplicate tags in the files you could do the following:

Do the tagging in smaller batches. Something like ten albums at a time would be a good amount. Inside MC create another custom field, for example "Styles".

- Select the files inside Mp3tag.
- right-click > Tag Copy
- run the action for merging the Style tags

- select the same files inside MC and run "Update Library (from tags)"
- run "Move/Copy Fields": move Style to Styles

- inside Mp3tag do right-click > Tag Paste

- process the next batch.


You will need to remove the Style field from MC's library before you do any further tag changes with MC. Otherwise MC would clear the value of the first Style tag.  Actually this is not necessary if you do "Update Library (from tags)" once again after all files are processed. MC will continue to use only the first of the three Style tags.

As a last step you may want to run "Update tags (from library)" in MC for saving the new Styles tag (Mp3tag replaced all file tags on "Tag Paste").


EDIT 2

Disable the Auto-Importer before proceeding.
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aussie1

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Re: Reading FLAC multi-value metadata
« Reply #2 on: May 19, 2007, 03:25:00 pm »

I had experimented with Mp3tag but wasn't aware of the merge function. It is just what I needed.
Thanks so much.
S
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Alex B

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Re: Reading FLAC multi-value metadata
« Reply #3 on: May 19, 2007, 03:32:20 pm »

I edited my post a bit more. Please recheck the details.
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scthom

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Re: Reading FLAC multi-value metadata
« Reply #4 on: May 20, 2007, 07:38:44 pm »

Also, please note that multiple tags with different values are perfectly valid Vorbis tags for flac files.  It's just that I implemented the decoder plugin to only find the first instance.
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