Disable tag inference from filename

[getmusicbee_account1111]

I have recently realized most of my tracks are missing the Artist tag. I had no idea until a few weeks ago when I started seeing tracks with an empty Artist field.

I couldn't figure out what was happening until someone suggested that my media player might be inferring the tags from the filename and suggested I test it out by renaming the file. The test revealed that that is in fact what is happening, and the reason it has only now become apparent is I changed my naming from Artist - Title to Artist-Title (no whitespace) causing tag inference to fail.

I now need to identify how many tracks are missing the Artist tag (maybe other tags, like the Title, in case those are inferred too?) in order to hopefully find a pattern and see what causes this. For that I'd need to disable inference, but I'm unsure how to do that.

I don't think this inference functionality should be active by default at all. Artist is probably the most important tag. It should be obvious when it's blank by being shown blank.

[TateB]

Search for Artist, Has No Value

Assuming all filenames have the same pattern, select Infer Tags from Filename.

At the bottom of this screen, change the filename template to match your pattern, e.g. <Artist>-<Title>.

Re: your larger question, I think that you might be mixing up Infer Tags from Filename with Autonaming that pulls from 3rd party databases, but I may be mistaken.

[getmusicbee_account1111]

Yes, now that I know I have that problem, I can take measures. But it took someone else taking an educated guess what the culprit is. I suspect this has been happening for well over a year. It would have been nice if MusicBee had made it apparent from the get-go by displaying blank fields.. blank.

Assuming all filenames have the same pattern, select Infer Tags from Filename.

In my case, the filenames are problematic, and there are lots of corner cases. I have identified what was causing this, and moving forward both Title and Artist will be populated, but for the existing tracks there will be a lot of manual work, and I expect some errors to still slip through the cracks.

Re: your larger question, I think that you might be mixing up Infer Tags from Filename with Autonaming that pulls from 3rd party databases, but I may be mistaken.

I just came up with the name to describe the feature where some tags in the Main Panel are replaced with "pseudo-tags" inferred from the filename if missing. I was not referring to any auto-tagging or internet functionality, so sorry for any confusion.

[hiccup]

I suspect this has been happening for well over a year. It would have been nice if MusicBee had made it apparent from the get-go by displaying blank fields.. blank.

I don't understand the source of your issue.
What has been happening over a year that wasn't happening before?
Are you saying that MusicBee has been deleting artist tags, or has been changing filenames without you knowing about it?

[tjinc]

If I understand you correctly, you are suggesting the following:
Where an <Artist> tag is missing, MusicBee will infer this field from the track filename, using the first part of the filename and the characters ' - ' as a delimiter.

I am pretty certain that MusicBee does not do this - unless you have set up a virtual tag to do so (and presumably you would remember doing this).
I am very certain that MusicBee does not do this by default as it would be foolish in the extreme to assume everybody uses a consistent filename format.
(AFAIK, the only place MusicBee infers anything is when <Album Artist> is missing and it is assumed to be the same as <Artist>).

There must be something else going on here - maybe you could provide screen shots of where this 'inferred' artist tag is being displayed along with a screenshot of its tags in the edit window. Maybe someone could get a hint as to how to proceed in order to track this down.

[phred]

The -only- time MB will assume the filename contains tags, is when the user manually selects tracks and invokes:
right-click on selected track(s) > Auto-tag by Track > Infer and Update Tags from Filename.
MB can not and does not do this automatically.

[getmusicbee_account1111]

Thanks for chiming in everyone.

Demonstration:
https://i.imgur.com/2cUaOAC.mp4
https://i.imgur.com/2cUaOAC.gifv

So yes, it's both Artist and Title.

[getmusicbee_account1111]

I suspect this has been happening for well over a year. It would have been nice if MusicBee had made it apparent from the get-go by displaying blank fields.. blank.

I don't understand the source of your issue.
What has been happening over a year that wasn't happening before?
Are you saying that MusicBee has been deleting artist tags, or has been changing filenames without you knowing about it?

No MusicBee isn't actually modifying these tags.

The tracks I've been adding to my library have been missing most tags (actually all tags but one) for a while, and I only found that out yesterday. I could've found out this immediately as the problem arose had MusicBee not inferred the tags from the filename (to display them, not modify) and instead shown them as is (blank). I have now fixed the culprit that was causing the missing tags (it was a very easy fix unrelated to MusicBee), but the existing tracks from the past year or so are still all like this so I'll need to fix them manually.

[tjinc]

It is a little hard to see what you are doing in that video as some of the screen is cut off but it does appear that the Artist and Title tags are being modified on filename change - and I would say they are being modified and not inferred as you can clearly see 'TESTEST' is now written in the <Artist> tag field - you could confirm that by looking in the Tag Inspector at the top of that edit window.

The only thing in MusicBee that I can think of that could possibly do that would be an auto-executed preset in the Advanced Tagging and Reporting plugin. I am no expert on that plugin so maybe someone else could chime in there.

Does it happen when MusicBee is not running? Maybe try MP3 tag: View tags, change filename, view tags again.

If I can think of anything else I will pipe up.

[getmusicbee_account1111]

it does appear that the Artist and Title tags are being modified on filename change

I'm pretty sure that is not the case:

Code

> ffmpeg -i '.\TESTEST - sulky FOOBAR baby-y-01zJlK0xQ.opus'
ffmpeg version 2022-03-28-git-5ee198f9aa-full_build-www.gyan.dev Copyright (c) 2000-2022 the FFmpeg developers
...
[ogg @ 000002597c5ec9c0] 5646 bytes of comment header remain
Input #0, ogg, from '.\TESTEST - sulky FOOBAR baby-y-01zJlK0xQ.opus':
  Duration: 00:04:39.02, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 171 kb/s
  Stream #0:0(eng): Audio: opus, 48000 Hz, stereo, fltp
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf59.20.101
      title           :
      date            :
      purl            :
      synopsis        :
      comment         : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-01zJlK0xQ
      track           :
      artist          :
      genre           :
      album           :
      album_artist    :
      disc            :
      show            :
      season_number   :
      episode_id      :
      episode_sort    :
  Stream #0:1: Video: png, rgb24(pc), 1280x720, 90k tbr, 90k tbn (attached pic)
    Metadata:
      comment         : Cover (front)
At least one output file must be specified

Could you try reproducing? I'm still unsure if this is something on my end.

I think I only have one non-default plugin:

[tjinc]

OK, after a lot of messing around I have managed to replicate something slightly like you are reporting. I have no understanding of it and my brain hurts but I will try to detail what I am seeing here:

1. View an album in the Computer Node (Tracks view)
2. Edit tags of a file: Delete both <Title> and <Artist> - the tags disappear as expected.
3. Search > Locate in Windows Explorer
4. Edit filename
5. In MusicBee refresh (F5) - the new filename appears in the <Title> column
6. Right click > Edit - this new filename also appears in the <Track Title> field
7. Go to Tag Inspector - no entry for Title.

I've got nothing to say about this at the moment (except maybe 'its weird man'). Perhaps someone else has some insight.
At least you might consider that you are not going mad........or at least not on your own.

I'll keep playing, but not tonight.

[getmusicbee_account1111]

Thanks so much @tjinc.

Yes, these are more or less my steps (which I should've probably included along the recording) as well, only major difference being I switch from Library to Inbox around the 20 sec mark because the renamed track is considered new by MB.

My steps:

The filename is Artist-Title-Id (no spaces).

1. Check the displayed tags in the Library and the Edit menu
2. Locate in Explorer
3. Go to Inbox
4. Close MusicBee
5. In File Explorer, Rename the file to Artist - Title - Id (but can be anything; the important part is the whitespace; I used TESTEST and FOOBAR to make it more explicit)
6. Re-open MusicBee

[tjinc]

I have managed to spend a little more time looking at this so here is my report:

Setup:
1. Created a copy of an album.
2. Renamed all files in the format <Artist> - <Album> - <Track#> <Title>
3. Removed all tags from all tracks.
4. Clean install MusicBee 3.5, patched to ver 3.5.8699 P, and pointed at this one tagless album.

Initial Result:
Filenames are displayed in the title field. All other fields remain empty as can be seen here:

On right-click > Edit, the filename is also displayed in the title field.
On checking the Tag Inspector there are no tags saved.
If you 'save' the tags at this point, the filename does get written to the title tag.

My comment would be that it is not what I would have expected but it does appear to be intentional.
Is it desirable? To be discussed (maybe), but I would understand an argument for this if only to display something (so you have a idea of what is there, or at least that something is there).

Using the Computer Node to view:
Editing the filename and then refreshing causes the displayed 'title' to be updated with the new filename.
I have been entirely unable to reproduce what you are seeing with the Artist field being populated, no matter what I tried with filename structure.

Conclusions:
This is not a 'feature' that can be enabled/disabled.
I believe this behaviour is intended.
I cannot explain why you are seeing the Artist field being populated (other than maybe you are using an older version of MusicBee).

Further (rhetorical) question:
Where on earth are you getting all these files with no title or artist tags?

Suggestions:
If you feel strongly you could post a wishlist request to prevent this behaviour. (Note that this is probably a niche case - I have not noticed this until now and I don't remember any other similar reports.)
Other than that you may just have to come up with a workflow that checks for this before sending to your library (are you using the Inbox?)

[frankz]

Further (rhetorical) question:
Where on earth are you getting all these files with no title or artist tags?

I'm going to guess that, if it can populate comment with the original URL, whatever tool OP is using to "obtain" these files can also be set up to automatically populate these basic tags.

[tjinc]

Further (rhetorical) question:
Where on earth are you getting all these files with no title or artist tags?

Ah yes, blindingly obvious - although it seems that I needed a big red box for it to be so.