Author Topic: MusicBrainz Picard q & a thread  (Read 89828 times)

Forcen

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That works! I only used the first script though, I don't need extra remixer stuff.

Thanks for the help and thanks for the script! :D

hiccup

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@Psychoadept: I have a question concerning the issue you raised on the fake MB forum.
(better to do it here, the moderators here are more relaxed and less trigger happy ;-)

I don't think I understand the exact circumstances where and when this issue occurs.
Picard can't probably overwrite any existing MusicBee custom tags, since MuBr won't offer any content for them to populate Picard in the first place?
So at what stage and under what circumstances will Picard delete MusicBee's custom tags exactly?


edit:
Perhaps in Picard you have set: Tags > Before Tagging > 'Clear existing tags'?
(I don't, which then could account for me not running into this issue at the moment)
Last Edit: July 28, 2018, 06:56:45 PM by hiccup

psychoadept

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I do have 'clear existing tags' set, but that's never been a problem before.

The change that broke things was that existing tags are loaded into Picard before it applies scripts, so if a tag is unset in scripts then it is removed, even if it is in the preserve tags list. And if you remove the script to unset it, then blank tags are populated even if they are in the preserve tags list (which has always worked that way, although it would make more sense to me for it to just leave those tags alone).
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hiccup

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So if I understand correctly, for now things work well in this regard if you uncheck 'clear existing tags'?
It's of course not a solution for the underlying problem, but at least you could be using 2.0 with some confidence.

I will probably never enable 'clear existing tags'.
That feels a bit like enabling DMZ in a router, and then see if you can create some security after that.

psychoadept

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So if I understand correctly, for now things work well in this regard if you uncheck 'clear existing tags'?

No, 'preserve tags' overrides the 'clear existing tags' setting so that's not the problem. But even with 'preserve tags' set, Picard will still clear tags which are unset in scripts OR it will fill tags which are empty to begin with. (An easy solution would be to stop Picard from filling empty tags that are on the preserve tags list, but for some reason that's never been changed.) Also, I want to keep 'clear existing tags' because some of my tracks have junk tags I just want to get rid of.
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hiccup

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Picard will still clear tags which are unset in scripts ...

Are you saying that there is some mechanism in Picard that will erase existing tags, even if 'clear existing tags' is unchecked?

psychoadept

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Quote from: hiccup
Are you saying that there is some mechanism in Picard that will erase existing tags, even if 'clear existing tags' is unchecked?

ONLY if there is a script that affects them. Since scripts are entered by the user, they override everything (as it should be).

Hmm, now I'm wondering if there's a way to solve my problem with scripts... I'll have to play around.
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hiccup

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So if I understand correctly:
If you would disable 'clear existing tags' for the moment until there is a fix:

1. none of your populated tags will be erased (unless you have a script doing that), but some existing superfluous garbage tags will not be cleared up.

2. some of your custom tags that happen to also exist in the MusicBrainz universe and are populated with content there will be overwritten.

If that is a correct summary, the real threat to me would be the second issue.
Do you have some examples of custom tags that risk being overwritten by Picard because they sometimes occur at MusicBrainz too?
(I tried a few of my own, but couldn't find one affected)

psychoadept

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The 'clear existing tags' setting is irrelevant here, because I'm only concerned with tags in the 'preserve tags from being cleared or overwritten' box, which itself overrides 'clear existing tags'.

I can solve the problem of tags being cleared by getting rid of the $unset scripts (which previously removed MusicBrainz values without affecting the existing values).  The problem I can't solve is of empty tags being set with values I don't want. For instance, if Label (aka Publisher) is empty, I want it to STAY empty. There's no way to achieve that without using an $unset script, which in turn removes existing values.

So either I can preserve the existing tags, or I can keep empty tags from being set, but not both at once.
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hiccup

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I'll give this some more thought and perhaps a try tomorrow, but for the meantime, did you read the "for the moment until there is a fix" part from my previous post?

psychoadept

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did you read the "for the moment until there is a fix" part from my previous post?

I did, and it doesn't have any affect on this problem for the reason I stated, tags in the 'preserve tags' list are not affected by 'clear existing tags'.
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hiccup

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I can solve the problem of tags being cleared by getting rid of the $unset scripts

You probably have some more advanced scripts running then.
With trying out some of my straightforward $unset scripts, no tag ever gets deleted.

Reading your ticket, the issue is probably more a consequence of using $set then using $unset.
Last Edit: July 29, 2018, 12:18:48 PM by hiccup

psychoadept

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Huh. I swear I've tested that before, but I see what you mean. The 'preserve tags' list is NOT overriding 'clear existing tags'. That's not expected behavior, but you're right that it solves the worst of the problem for now.

Still, I would really like for Picard to have a setting that just says "don't ever change this tag, whether it's empty or not."
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psychoadept

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FYI, 2.0.2 is out. It may solve the hang you were experiencing. It fixed some crashes for me.
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hiccup

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FYI, 2.0.2 is out

Nice, I'll try it out.
And it looks like they will revert the change that caused the issue you raised too?