FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

[d2b]

In dbpoweramp's Configuration > Codecs > Advanced Options > FLAC Encoder options, there is a defauilt setting of 4K for FLAC IDTag Padding.

Since there are optional values for this setting, I would like to know what the padding does and why a particular setting is chosen.

Just telling me that "It's best to leave it at the default setting unless you know what you are doing." is not the feedback I'm looking for. I'd like to know what I'm doing...and why a different setting might be appropriate. Please explain.

Thanks in advance for the enlightenment!

d2b

[Spoon]

Re: FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

Padding is there so if there is a tag modification, the whole audio does not need to be moved (the tags are at the beginning of a flac file)

[d2b]

Re: FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

Padding is there so if there is a tag modification, the whole audio does not need to be moved (the tags are at the beginning of a flac file)

If I look at the track data with a hex editor/file viewer such as HxD, shouldn't I see some 'empty space' that represents padding, somewhere at the end of the vorbis comments and before the music data begins? It seems that no matter how many tags I include (barcode, performer, composer, copyright, label, etc.) the vorbis comments are all there with no gap for additional metadata. We tend to add a lot of metadata as vorbis comments, with sometimes as many as thirty tags, some of which comprise a large number of characters.

Here are examples of 'long' vorbis comments that are representative of many others in the same file, as suggested above.

PERFORMER=Annalisa Tornfelt (Lead vocals, violin, background vocals, Nyckelharpa, phono fiddle and claps)
PEFORMER=Jenny Conlee-Drizos (Accordion, pump organ, piano, claps, background vocals)
PERFORMER=Chris Funk (Dobro, banjos, Weissenborn, slide ukelele, Autoharp, Marxophone, lap dulcimer, claps and gong stand)

So the real question is: "Is it desirable to adjust the padding to a higher value and if so, how do I estimate how much to increase it in order to allow for a variety of additional tags?"

Your help with this is appreciated very much!

-d2b-

[Spoon]

Re: FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

Padding is in KBytes, the examples you gave did not add up to one KB, the default should be fine. Padding might not be obvious to a hex editor, as there is no requirement for the tagging values to be 0

[d2b]

Re: FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

OT: I tried to include a *.png image of an mp3tag window showing ALL of the vorbis comments in a single file to further explain my question, but could not figure out how to do that. Can you advise? The "Insert Image" function asks for a URL but when I posted the query, I only saw the path between the IMG and /IMG tags, and I could not view the image by clicking on the URL.

[Spoon]

Re: FLAC IDTag Padding - Please explain

This forum can only link to images, not store them.