permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

[jbmccune]

Is there a way for me to save all of the metadata that I'm scrubbing/customizing for my CDs, such that if I ever want to rerip the CDs at a later date dBpoweramp will be able to use that metadata? I know the program has a local cache, but I believe it's only a temporary cache of a limited size.

Is a local freedb database an option? Can dBpoweramp populate that somehow and then reuse it later? The only threads that I could find that talk about a local freedb database are from 2005 or older, and I'm not sure if they still apply (plus they were rather confusing). Ideally, I'd be able to use the wonderful new PerfectMeta feature to get the metadata, automatically have that saved off to an (initially empty) database, and then on subsequent rips point to that database instead of PerfectMeta. Is that possible? Can a local freedb database hold custom tags as well, or is it limited to only the basic metadata tags? I'd want to be able to store all of the customized tags that I use of course.

Suggestions? Even better - instructions? Thanks!

-Jesse

[Spoon]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

There is no caching of Perfect meta, it would breach our contract with the 2 commercial suppliers.

[Porcus]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

There is no caching of Perfect meta, it would breach our contract with the 2 commercial suppliers.

Suggestion: Cache "what metadata source did the user choose?". That is, not the metadata itself, but the user's choice.

[jbmccune]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

Suggestion: Cache "what metadata source did the user choose?". That is, not the metadata itself, but the user's choice.

This wouldn't really meet my needs either as I'm doing a bit of customization of the tags. I understand the contract limitations...that makes it tough. The grey area is that I'm not using their metadata as-is, I'm editing, combining fields from different providers (that's the point of PerfectMeta), and then even adding some additional custom fields of my own.

Let me ask this a different way...of the local metadata sources that dBpoweramp can use - a local freedb database or CDPlayer.ini - would either of them meet my needs if I could figure out a way to get it populated outside of dBpoweramp? Would either of those options hold custom tags that dBpoweramp could then read?

If I have to do some work on the other end to read the metadata out of my files to populate the database, that's fine - as long as I have a way for dBpoweramp to use the database I build up.

[Spoon]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

Try the [Audio Info] codec to batch extract tags.

[jbmccune]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

Try the [Audio Info] codec to batch extract tags.

OK, that's an easy enough way to get the data out of the tags. Then how would I get it into a format that dBpoweramp could use for re-ripping?

I dug a little bit into the CDPlayer.ini and freedb options, and it doesn't seem like either of them would fit the bill - they can't hold the custom tags I create, unless I'm missing something. Looks like I may need to figure out some post-ripping method of putting my customized tags back.... Re-rip from dBpoweramp, letting it put whatever default metadata it wants, then run something to match the ripped songs to albums in the database I generated using the Audio Info codec and replace the tags.

Or does somebody have a better idea? Is there a way (besides reverse engineering the protocol and spoofing my routing tables...hmm) to run a local AMG, GD3 or MusicBrainz service? Do any of them support more than just the basic tags? I know AMG supports Style data at least....

I like PerfectMeta a lot...it certainly helps...but it's still not really perfect all the time, so trading a permanent, reusable CDDB repository for PerfectMeta because of contract constraints with the providers is a tough call, especially since I often add tags they don't have. Tagging is a lot of work I don't want to do twice.

EDIT - I found this http://musicbrainz.org/doc/VirtualMusicBrainzServer...it seems like it could be made to work, but...it's quite complicated. I don't know how many of the fields from MusicBrainz dBpoweramp is pulling though...it might not accept them all even if I populated them, though I could finish the job later.

[Spoon]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

Musicbrainz implements limited tag values, it does not even have genre.

[jbmccune]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

Musicbrainz implements limited tag values, it does not even have genre.

Yeah, I know they don't have it by default, but once you download the server/database, you could extend it any way you want, according to the documentation at least. Of course dBpoweramp wouldn't read that data, but at least I could get it to read my edited Artist/Album/Band/Title from there, and then I could do a post-processing step to add the additional tags from the database afterwards. Compilations might be a problem.... I'm just throwing out ideas here....

I suppose it'd be better just to generate a database with the Audio Info codec, then write a custom GUI app that allows me to match ripped album folders to albums in the database and then write all of the tags from the database to the matching track number in the folder, replacing whatever tags are already there. Most of the time the matches would be easy as I don't have to edit Band/Album very often.

...or I could just rip everything, fully tagged, to lossless, store the files in an ultra-secure, fully redundant, read-only location so I never need to touch the CDs again, and then use the Music Converter to make copies from the lossless files to my regular formats. It's a major added cost in storage, but it has its advantages....

Which lossless format has the best tag support?

[Spoon]

Re: permanent local metadata cache for later reripping?

All the modern ones are the same tagging wise (apple lossless, flac, wmal, wavpack).