Flac Tags

[MusicMeister]

I did a quick search and found out that Vorbis Comments lack a strict structure - and that lack of structure makes it hard to work with.

This is a direct contrast to the ID3V2 tags in MP3 that's very clear for much of the major tags.

Sometimes a lack of standards, even defacto standards, makes implementing them quite difficult for Cross platform/Cross software use.

http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php ... is_Comment

[Marxon]

Yes, tag field names can be choosen freely if you mean this.
May we could agree to the same field names like they are shown in Cross mediabase colums

[MusicMeister]

The problem is deeper than that.

If you only ever used the tags in Cross and nothing else life would be so very very simple...

The problem is any other application needs to see and use the same parameters.

For example, with ID3V2 tags, they say, "Here's all the tag formats that are defined under the spec, but you can do whatever you want besides that - but support is guaranteed to just you." For example, the Serato Whitelabel files and even their tagging gets creative with ID3V2 tags and storing additional data. That's why if you tagged your tracks with certain tools which 'cleaned up' the ID3V2 tags you would loose all the metadata associated with the track in Serato.

But with FLAC, there are some general suggestions, but not much more. There are currently 2 suggested competing standards (that I found) and there really needs to be a consensus on this by more than one company.

I'm hoping with the most recent ALAC codec being released as open source by Apple that at least ALAC support can be forthcoming. While it's not the most efficient codec, Apple did a pretty decent job of defining the spec well enough that there aren't a lot of questions when you write tags or do other things.

I'd love to see FLAC more widely supported but it has some struggles in tagging right now. And unfortunately, it's not the only one (Vorbis uses the same tagging mechanism).

[Support@MixVibes]

Et voilà... now you understand why "simple" things can be hard to do sometimes.

[MusicMeister]

I've worked in organizations with in house software development before...

Simple things rarely are.

[Marxon]

Hi again,

The problem is deeper than that.

If you only ever used the tags in Cross and nothing else life would be so very very simple...

The problem is any other application needs to see and use the same parameters.

i understand your concerns. there is no way to make it work for all different softwares users may use. but at least for me (sorry i dont mean this egoistic but i dont know how to express myselff better in english) this would be no problem because i only use one tag programm which is adjustable non standart tags. so there will be a way user can "use" flac tags made by Cross.
but again you are right, i allready can see all the forum posts by user who dont know about all the "specials" and messed up tags because copying it on theire ipod wth iTunes.
so what do...? i might should change to alac?

[MusicMeister]

It's hit and miss. ALAC has it's issues, but now that it's open source, I'd expect to see more software implementing the codec in the near future.

The main advantage would be that Cross already handles M4A tracks and the tags are the same - only the underlying codec for lossless is different. In other words I can already modify the tags on my ALAC files from within Cross - I just can't play them.

Yes, there's some factors that might have you learn more to one codec over another and ALAC isn't the fastest to encode or decode but it's also designed for low powered devices. There aren't a lot of options either. And yes, it lacks the ability to do error checking of itself. But as far as sound quality goes, it's the same as FLAC.

Here's a good breakdown on the different lossless codecs:
http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php ... ison_Table

Does that mean you should change? It depends... how important is changing tags from within the software to you? If it's not that important then it doesn't matter... if it's a big deal and there is an option that works, I'd consider it. I just had to create MP3's of all my ALAC files for an event I'm working this weekend after I spend months re-ripping CD's to ALAC and deleting the MP3's. (I didn't know I was going to Cross at the time or that it wasn't supported in Cross. ).

Everything is give and take and unfortunately, choices made in supporting or not supporting stuff means either end users complaining because it 'doesn't work' or in reality, 'Doesn't work the way I expected' or 'has a limitation I don't understand'... or.... people posting and asking for them to implement something which could prove to be a support nightmare.

The sooner they define a clear tagging standard for FLAC - even if it's a defacto standard - the sooner it can be implemented and reinforced as the standard.

Think about all those people who bought movies on HD DVD... when the standard became Blu-Ray they're left holding the bag. Same thing with BetaMax. DAT. MiniDisc (which I LOVE BTW).

It's tricky....

But your English is fine. I've worked with a lot of eastern Europeans when I was in Alaska and spent a lot of time with western Europeans when I was in the Army. The fact that you tolerate my failure to speak your native tongue and speak mine is humbling to me and a sad sign of the state of the US educational system.

[Marxon]

Does that mean you should change? It depends... how important is changing tags from within the software to you?

it is important for me Cross can read the tags.

[MusicMeister]

BTW, I wouldn't switch to ALAC - it can read those tags but it can't play the files.

[daniel clark]

But your English is fine. I've worked with a lot of eastern Europeans when I was in Alaska and spent a lot of time with western Europeans when I was in the Army. The fact that you tolerate my failure to speak your native tongue and speak mine is humbling to me and a sad sign of the state of the US educational system.

ditto ,,