This discussion boils down to the use of TPE2. This is my understanding of the history of TPE2 and its use in various apps:
The standard for id3v2.3 (there is one for mp3, but it's not great), says that TPE2 represents Band or Orchestra. Due to the lack of an Album Artist frame in the id3v2.3 standard, several companies invented different ways to store that album artist information. I believe it was Microsoft that we have to blame for mis-using TPE2 as Album Artist, when they released Windows Media Player. WMA format spec noticed the need for album artist, and so a specific tag was added. Other apps then came along. iTunes for example want people to use their format, but also included compatibility for mp3. Other apps wanted compatibility with WMP, so they included Microsoft's annoying frig. Around the same time, I believe some programs defined some additional tags using TXXX frames, which is the way the standard says that additional content should be stored. SlimDevices wanted to be standards-compliant, and thus TPE2 meant Band. They also added support for TXXX ALBUMARTIST, as that's what other applications had been storing album artist tags in. That's a good thing; users of SqueezeCenter could store two distinct pieces of information. Bad was the lack of information on what tags SC understood and how it used them. That's not particularly bad, in that it was doing exactly what every file format specifies. It's just unfortunate that mp3 id3v2.3 is mis-used by other apps that such confusion exists. The other confusion comes from internet metadata source providers, and how applications map data retrieved from such sources into their internal libraries, and how their internal libraries write that data out to tags in files. There are many different ways that users may enter data in tags to submit to the sources, many ways that the data may be retrieved by apps, and finally written to tags in files. Standards are not always followed. Now it can be claimed that as WMP and iTunes have a rather large user base, all other apps in the world should follow suit. i.e. that they effectively own the standard for id3v2.3 and everyone should copy their lead. I don't agree with that. I accept that apps should allow a compatibility mode, but they must also follow the true standard as close as possible. Some people may actually want to store band information in BAND tags, after all! SC now offers such an option, for people who don't want to add Album Artist tags. I'm okay for that, as long as it remains optional. Should SC default such option into compatibility mode? No. Various reasons why I think no, but SC should be it's own driving force to bring standards back to the table. It's a bit similar to web browsers in a way. Microsoft broke a lot of things in the web browser world with Internet Explorer. Other browsers have since materialised that have now forced IE to adopt better standards. Who's to say that iTunes or WMP or other apps won't change in the future. With other companies breaking through, they may be forced to support other formats, other standards, etc. That would be for the good. Don't give up and join their evil ways! >>obviously they intend to mismatch TPE1 on comps. >> > >> No, they are not saying that at all. They don't mention album artist, >> band or TPE2 at all. > >thats EXACTLY what i said. You said that they are obviously intending to mismatch TPE1 on compilations. They were saying that they would set performing artist to "Various", so that there wasn't a mismatch. > >> track-artist in the track-name, using the syntax "artist / track-title" >but they [freedb] do mention track artists for comps. They do mention track artists - that they insert the track artist in the song title. They are avoiding Album Artist and Compilation tags by making every track have the same artist called "Various". That's how I read it. >that just isn't true. what mainstream app isn't setting TPE2? It's been a long time since I used anything other than EAC to rip to FLAC files. I simply store artist, album, song, track number and year tags, and then correct tags in Mp3Tag for consistency. You will never achieve consistency through internet metadata sources. I know that hasn't answered your question - I plan to find a couple of test albums and rip in a variety of formats using a variety of rippers and compare the differences. I'll find one album that has one guest performer (where I would define a true album artist tag), and another true compilation album for the comparisons. Phil _______________________________________________ ripping mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/ripping
