Author Topic: Album Art Order in Files Changed After Re-Scan of Library for New Custom Tags  (Read 1228 times)

Theodor

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Hi Steven, hi guys,

still as valid as it was many years before when I had first stumbled upon MusicBee and began realizing what a gem it is: Musicbee totally changed the way I experience music. I am deeply grateful for your efforts and the Bee, it has been a blast.

I discovered some strange behavior years ago concerning files with multiple embedded artworks, but when I didn't encounter it anymore, I forgot about it. Now it came up again and this time I have a theory about what may have "caused" it. I am using 3.3.7261, but the older encounters with the problem date back to the times of MusicBee 2.

The strange behavior: Some of the albums that have multiple artworks embedded into its files -- by far not all of them -- loose the correct artwork order, meaning that primary and secondary artwork are swapped. This is especially annoying since I often embed alternative artworks that cannot be made out as the wrong artwork just by a glance. (Things would be not as bad if it were just that Musicbee would show the album back instead of the front, which would be noticable right away.)

What seems to cause it: Immediately before I noticed the error, I added a new custom tag under Preferences>Tags. When I was done with the addition, Musicbee started scanning my library, which is, of course, expected behavior. Thereafter, I began noticing the wrong covers.

And the connection between this cover swap and the custom tag addition seems plausible in retrospect, because when I was encountering the error in the past more regularly, I was quite busy with custom tags.

So much on my hunches. Questions remaining are (1) how does a library or settings change affect files with embedded artworks and (2) why only some albums are affected. By the way, it's always the same albums or at least some of them seem always affected. Of course, when repairing them in the past, I didn't notice anything off with the artwork or the files as such.

I am very happy to provide settings or some of the problematic files if that is of any help.

Help would be very much appreciated! Thank you!

Stay safe!

Theodor
Last Edit: April 05, 2020, 01:40:30 PM by Theodor

hiccup

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... loose the correct artwork order, meaning that primary and secondary artwork are swapped...

I am curious: what is it that would define what is primary or secondary embedded artwork?
I don't think those are attributes that you can select or set within MusicBee?
Last Edit: April 05, 2020, 12:40:44 PM by hiccup

Theodor

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While repairing some of these albums with artwork mess-ups, I noticed cases where the artwork that was originally the primary artwork was completely missing and cases where -- besides the swapping -- one given artwork was embedded multiple times. For example, artwork A was embedded three times.
File sizes didn't change, though, at least from what I see when I have a look at a backup of my music files.

I have to stress that I have everything configured such that artworks always are embedded into the respective files.

Quote
I am curious: what is it that would define what is primary or secondary embedded artwork?
I don't think those are attributes that you can select or set within MusicBee?

You can do that here per (set of) file(s):
https://imgur.com/Kz0zB2o
Last Edit: April 05, 2020, 01:36:47 PM by Theodor

Theodor

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So just to be perfectly clear:

There are files with changed artwork status (swaps, missing artworks) such that

(1) the file sizes of the broken file and a healthy backup of that file are identical, as are the modification times -- according to Windows explorer, that is.
(2) the backup file looks fine when opened in MusicBee, down to MusicBee telling me that the artwork is embedded in the file
(3) the broken file is missing what originally was its primary artwork.

I am totally at loss here! If MusicBee didn't touch the files and the artwork was embedded correctly (a claim that I am eager to defend), how can that change be accounted for?


P.S.: Why was this thread moved into questions? Is it obvious that what I am reporting is expected behavior or due to me doing something the wrong way?
Last Edit: April 05, 2020, 01:46:05 PM by Theodor

Theodor

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I think I finally figured it out and it looks to me like a bug.

Steps to reproduce unexpected behavior with two up-to-date MusicBee installations:

(1) Have a file with (at least) two artworks. The primary artwork -- the one that is shown in the library -- is embedded into the file. One non-primary artwork is linked to a picture on disk.
(2) Add a new custom tag in MusicBee via Edit>Edit Preferences>Tags (1) which initiates a library rescan.

After the scan has finished, the linked picture is now shown as the file's primary artwork and the embedded one as non-primary. But, obviously, the scan should not have changed anything artwork-wise.
(Some files seem more messed up with respect to the artworks, but even for those the above remains valid.)
Last Edit: April 05, 2020, 11:37:50 PM by Theodor

Steven

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When files are rescanned, the "Tags(1)/artwork/ set which pictures are displayed" ordering is applied to the artwork.
However i do agree that automated rescanning due to adding a custom tag isnt an explicit rescan action by yourself so i will change it so the artwork ordering is untouched in that case

https://getmusicbee.com/patches/MusicBee33_Patched.zip
unzip and replace the existing musicbee application files
Last Edit: April 06, 2020, 09:37:41 AM by Steven

Theodor

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Thank you very much for both the explanation and the fix! This is greatly appreciated!