Ubuntu – Mass re-tagging of music files

music

My collection of music files has grown organically over the years, and
it has no consistent tags nor file names. Especially, older files may
have weird ID3v1 tags or no tags at all, which makes them inconvenient
to use with tag-based browsers (like the "Music catalog" display of
Rhythmbox). Can you suggest any good program for mass re-tagging of
the files?

Ideally, I would like the following features in a re-tagging program:

It lets me choose an arbitrary set of files and re-tag them all,
updating tag values selectively (e.g., only update "Artist")
It can populate tag values from the filename or the containing folder name (e.g., for files organized like <album>/<track no.> - <song name>)
It can detect whether there are inconsistencies between ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags (e.g., the song title is different in the two versions)
It lets me search for songs on CDDB or MusicBrainz and then use the fetched metadata to populate the tag values.
Bonus points if it has a two-step approach: first populate tag
values from filename or MusicBrainz, then let me edit them, finally
re-tag files.

I understand that 1. and 2. are pretty standard, but what about points
3.-5.?

Best Answer

Puddletag should do everything you asked for. There's also an article on it at Ubuntu Geek

MusicBrainz Picard can automatically identify albums via audio finger-printing. If the music is not popular enough to be entered into their open database, you can add an entry and finger-prints for future users.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Rename Music Files with Missing File Extensions

Here's a bash script that renames the files passed to it based on their guessed format. It calls file to figure out the format by looking at characteristic patterns in the first few bytes. file -i prints lines like /path/to/file: type/subtype where type/subtype is a MIME type. The script then associates extensions to known types and renames the file to have the extension. Files that already have the extension are left alone. Files that have an unrecognized type are left alone. The script will prompt before overwriting a target file.

#!/bin/bash
# usage:
# fixmime ./{**/,}*
file --mime-type "$@" |
while read -r line; do
  file=${line%:*}
  type=${line##* }
  case $type in

    #Audio
    audio/x-flac) ext=flac;;
    audio/mpeg) ext=mp3;;
    application/ogg) ext=ogg;;

    #Video
    video/mp4) ext=mp4;;
    video/x-flv) ext=flv;;
    application/octet-stream) ext=webm;;
    application/x-shockwave-flash) ext=swf;;

    #Images
    image/png) ext=png;;
    image/jpeg) ext=jpg;;
    image/gif) ext=gif;;
    image/x-ico) ext=ico;;

    #Text
    text/plain) ext=md;; #markup your notes, even when they are plain
    text/html) ext=html;;
    text/x-pascal) ext=py;;
    text/x-c++) ext=js;; #conflicts with .cpp, so use prefered
    text/x-c) ext=scss;; #usualy it is .c
    text/x-shellscript) ext=sh;;
    application/pdf) ext=pdf;;

    #Fonts
    application/x-font-ttf) ext=ttf;;
    application/vnd.ms-opentype) ext=otf;;

    #Archive
    application/x-gzip) ext=tar.gz;;
    application/x-bzip2) ext=tar.bz;;

    *) continue;;
  esac
  [[ $file = *.$ext ]] || mv -i -- "$file" "$file.$ext"
done

Save the script as ~/bin/rename-based-on-content-type (or whatever you like) and make it executable (chmod +x ~/bin/rename-based-on-content-type). Pass the names of the files you want to rename to the script on the command line. If you have a directory tree /path/to/music/directory that you want to traverse recursively, invoke the script as

~/bin/rename-based-on-content-type /path/to/music/directory/{**/,}*

Ubuntu – Is there a CD Ripper compatible with Creative Zen MX

I think the issue could be the tags that CD Rippers use - they usually create ID3v2.4 tags which some Zens can't handle.

Possible Solution 1

Asunder CD ripper will rip to either ID3v1 or ID3v2.x tag format depending upon the information on the CD.

Install asunder and lame from the software center.

Run asunder - and select the preferences button followed by the Encode tab.

Tick the MP3 checkbox and uncheck the ogg checkbox.

Then rip your CD.

Possible Solution 2

Use Banshee or another tool to import your CD. Banshee will tag your mp3 in ID3v2.4 format

Correcting ID3 Tag information

Since Asunder will sometimes not write ID3v2.3 tags and Banshee will write to a tag format that your Zen will not understand, you will need to use another application to correct the tag format.

EasyTag is such a program - just to confuse everyone, there are two versions in the Software Center. Check EasyTag - Help - About - Extensions. If it says v2.3 support is disabled, then install the other "easytag" in the software center - on natty this is version 2.1.6.

Ensure EasyTag Settings - Preferences look like this: enter image description here

highlight the file or files and add some text to the comment field. N.B. you can use the usual shift - click method to highlight multiple files.
click the save button - a prompt should display indicating that it would like to write the changed tag information back to the file. Click Yes

Transfer to your Zen and confirm that the tag information is displayed correctly.