Split Values - What characters cause a split?

[daver88]

In  the Wiki it says that  " ; " indicates a split value. But when i use the multiple split function it also splits on " & ". Possibly it splits on other characters to.
eg :
Bix Beiderbecke / Paul Whiteman & His Orchestra ends up as :

Bix Beiderbecke
Paul Whiteman
His Orchestra

Which doesn't make a lot of sense. Is it possible to user define the split characters?.  I don't really want to rewrite all my "artist" tags.

[psychoadept]

The semicolon will automatically split a tag, meaning a tag like "Artist a; Artist b; Artist c" will always be interpreted as three separate values by MB.  Characters like "&" (and many other common join words/symbols) only apply to the manual artist splitter, where you can edit the results that you don't like.

[daver88]

Thanks for the info. I still have a problem with MB inserting a semi-colon even though there is no ";" in the original value. It then automatically splits the value, eg:

Original = Rock & Surf (Spook/Drag/Exotica)

MB = Rock & Surf; (Spook/Drag/Exotica) - which is split as -

1. Rock & Surf
2. (Spook/Drag/Exotica)

Is there some other rule that i don't know about yet?

[psychoadept]

Is it possible that the original has a null character (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_character) between the two?  That might cause it to be interpreted as multiple values.  If you manually enter "Rock & Surf (Spook/Drag/Exotica)", what happens?

[daver88]

I don't think there was a null value. Other files i've imported to MB before with this Genre didn't split.  Doing it manually doesn't split the value.
Maybe it's the bracket  "("  that's causing MB to insert a ";" . If i replace the first bracket with a dash"-" & import the tracks to MB  it doesn't insert the semi colon.

[Zak]

Just a guess but maybe MusicBee does that to split artist tags in the form "DJ MC Mike Master Spinnin' Grooves McNasty (featuring Lil' Sidekick-not-talented-enough-to actually-write-or-produce-their-own-music)". I can't remember that being mentioned before though.

[psychoadept]

I pasted the whole string into a genre tag, and it didn't split for me.  When I tried it in the Multiple Artist Splitter, it split as: "Rock", "Surf (Spook", "Drag", "Exotica".

Where did the tag come from?  Did you type it in, originally, or use tagging software?

[daver88]

These are Tags i've created & typed in myself via Foobar Properties Editor.  MB didn't split this format a few weeks ago when i imported my Library. but now it does. BTW i always use auto-complete for Genre so there shouldn't be any random characters applied.

[daver88]

I'd say this is definitely something to do with the Bracket "(". On import to MB inbox it sees the bracket no matter where it is in the string & places a ";" in front of it and  automatically splits the value.

I created a few genres to test this

Instrumental (Misca)
Instru(Misca)mental

end up in MB as

Instrumental; (Misca) split to Instrumental & (Misca)
Instru;(Misca)mental split to Instru & (Misca)mental

If i enter the Genre in MB directly (using auto complete) it works fine, but of course i don't want to have to manually reenter all my genres.

My first import to MB was a few versions back & i didn't have this problem. It only started when i went to v5524

[redwing]

I noticed that too years ago, since then I never use brackets in genre tag.