Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

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nohitter151
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by nohitter151 »

hintergrundrauschen wrote:new in 3.1:

0004938: Make separator configurable for multi-attribute properties
You can configure it at Tools | Options | Appearance
MediaMonkey user since 2006
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ReverendEntity
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by ReverendEntity »

I was looking for a good place to write this so it doesn't get away from me.

I think there should be some sort of method to specifically designate field data as a Proper Name (as in the exact name of the artist or act, for want of a better term) and therefore ineligible for automatic modification.

I have noticed that even though I have MM3 set to use the ; as a field separator instead of /, apparently certain functions will cause the software to rewrite artists' names that use / with the ;. So 'Noise/Girl' keeps ending up as 'Noise;Girl', for example. It would be nice if there were some method to designate 'Noise/Girl' as the Proper Name of the artist so the software would know not to modify the / in the middle.

Appy polly loggies if this is the wrong place to post this.
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Mizery_Made
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Mizery_Made »

This likely comes from the fact you're using mp3s. In the ID3 (v2.3) standard, tags with multiple values have said values separated by '/'. Thus when you write "Noise/Girl" to the tag, and then have the information read back to the tag (such as an Add/Rescan), MediaMonkey has no real other choice than to interpret that '/' as meaning "Noise" & "Girl" are two separate values within the Artist field. ID3 (v2.4) could solve this problem, as '/' is no longer used as the separator in that standard, instead a 'null byte' is used instead.
chrisjj
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by chrisjj »

deusdiabolus wrote:It would be nice if there were some method to designate 'Noise/Girl' as the Proper Name of the artist so the software would know not to modify the / in the middle.
I think it would be nicer to if the long-awaited option to disable multi-value interpretation was implemented. Users should not have to manually create an exception list.
Chris
moonglow
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by moonglow »

I like hintergrundrauschen's idea - xbmc has " / " as its default separator, but since MM3 has auto calculated a lot of my tracks to multiple artists seperated by ";" I could just add ; as an additional separator to the advancedsettings.xml

MM has seemed to always be all about customisation, seems strange to lock it to one setting on this....

In the mean time, since MM doesn't read " / ", and XBMC can be setup either way, does anyone know an easy way to search and replace all the " / " in my tags with ";"?

Thanks
moonglow
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by moonglow »

ahhh, apparently I just need this ...

You have this script from ZvezdanD:
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=28510
Lowlander
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Lowlander »

Tools > Options > Appearance : Split multiple-value fields with. It seems to accept custom values.
Solitaire001
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Solitaire001 »

This is an interesting thread. I agree with other posters that it is likely that there is no solution that will please everyone, but the following is my opinion.

As far as the character used to separate multiple artists, like at least one other poster I think the pipe symbol ( | ) is the best choice. One advantage of it is that it is rarely used in the name of an artist, unlike many other symbols (including &, ; \ / @ # $). Due to this, a list of necessary exceptions would be small.

Another possibility that might be better is to use the straight quotes ( " ) to enclose the names of each individual artist/group in a multiple artist/group list. Example: If the artists for a song are Queen and David Bowie they would be written as: "Queen" "David Bowie". If the entry doesn't contain straight quotes, then it is treated as a single artist. Within the straight quotes any symbol is allowed.
Enochrewt
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Enochrewt »

Solitaire001 wrote: Another possibility that might be better is to use the straight quotes ( " ) to enclose the names of each individual artist/group in a multiple artist/group list. Example: If the artists for a song are Queen and David Bowie they would be written as: "Queen" "David Bowie". If the entry doesn't contain straight quotes, then it is treated as a single artist. Within the straight quotes any symbol is allowed.
What happens to "Weird Al" Yankovic, Richard "Groove" Holmes, and Richard "Humpty" Vission then? It was a good thought though ;) (Maybe use { and } or something??)

I don't really want to get into this entire debate, but I will say that I'm one of the nameless people that's completely happy with the ; as the seperator. It's been a godsend and my music collection is much better because of it.

I was searching for a way to do alternate names, because I want them to all show under that artist's nodes. After reading all 11 pages of this thread, I've seen a lot of stuff that could/should be implemented that would solve these problems but very little that would solve my problem now. These should show up in the Louie Armstrong node:

Louie Armstrong
Louie Armstrong & His Hot Five
Louie Armstrong & Hist Hot Seven
Louie Armstrong and His Stompers
The All Stars

To compound this problem, ol' Satchmo allowed his name to be leant to bands that he was "involved" with but wasn't a strict member of for promotional purposes. Maybe these bands shouldn't be part of Louis Armstrong's node. And I'm sorry, having Louis Armstrong & His Hot Five; Louie Armstrong in the artist field is not a good solution. I have enough problems as it is keeping under the 255 character limit for a path on my external HDD.

So at this point I think that the involved people field is probably the best bet, but man, what a pain in the ass this all is.

And does anybody think it's ironic that there are this many people trying to standardize artist's expression in names so rigidly? I find it funny. :lol:
Solitaire001
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Solitaire001 »

Enochrewt wrote:
Solitaire001 wrote: Another possibility that might be better is to use the straight quotes ( " ) to enclose the names of each individual artist/group in a multiple artist/group list. Example: If the artists for a song are Queen and David Bowie they would be written as: "Queen" "David Bowie". If the entry doesn't contain straight quotes, then it is treated as a single artist. Within the straight quotes any symbol is allowed.
What happens to "Weird Al" Yankovic, Richard "Groove" Holmes, and Richard "Humpty" Vission then? It was a good thought though ;) (Maybe use { and } or something??)

I don't really want to get into this entire debate, but I will say that I'm one of the nameless people that's completely happy with the ; as the seperator. It's been a godsend and my music collection is much better because of it.

I was searching for a way to do alternate names, because I want them to all show under that artist's nodes. After reading all 11 pages of this thread, I've seen a lot of stuff that could/should be implemented that would solve these problems but very little that would solve my problem now. These should show up in the Louie Armstrong node:

Louie Armstrong
Louie Armstrong & His Hot Five
Louie Armstrong & Hist Hot Seven
Louie Armstrong and His Stompers
The All Stars

To compound this problem, ol' Satchmo allowed his name to be leant to bands that he was "involved" with but wasn't a strict member of for promotional purposes. Maybe these bands shouldn't be part of Louis Armstrong's node. And I'm sorry, having Louis Armstrong & His Hot Five; Louie Armstrong in the artist field is not a good solution. I have enough problems as it is keeping under the 255 character limit for a path on my external HDD.

So at this point I think that the involved people field is probably the best bet, but man, what a pain in the ass this all is.

And does anybody think it's ironic that there are this many people trying to standardize artist's expression in names so rigidly? I find it funny. :lol:
Thanks for recognizing my error. The problem with "Weird Al" Yankovic didn't come to mind when I made my post (and he is one of my favorite artists.). One way around the problem would be to use curly quotes when they are part of an artist's name as opposed to straight quotes, but I think that would overcomplicate things.

I haven't made much use of ";" symbol since it is not compatible with my player (it shows the artists separated by the ;). When it comes to artists I tend to just list them as they are. If I end up with an artist listed in many ways, so be it. As far as using ";" as a separator, I think it is a good solution that is both simple and optional (as would using the pipe "|").
Burrito

Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by Burrito »

I have been trying to become a MediaMonkey user for years, but this "/" problem is the single thing keeping me back. I have a pretty decent number of bands that use "/" in their name, and for MediaMonkey to separate them with no setting to disable it is just a shame. I use last.fm and it is a mess. I wonder how many plays I've attributed to "Akron" and "Family" rather than Akron/Family?

There is ample space next to the "Split multiple-value fields with" option in the preferences for a checkbox. Put a checkbox there, let me disable this STUPID 'feature'!
chrisjj
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Re: Multiple Artists, ';' separator, etc. - discussion

Post by chrisjj »

> I have a pretty decent number of bands that use "/" in their name, and
> for MediaMonkey to separate them with no setting to disable it is just a shame.

> let me disable this STUPID 'feature'!

MM has made recent progress on this, with the addition of the 'Split multiple-value fields with:' option. When the bug http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewto ... =7&t=41905 is fixed, this option will let us disable the feature.
Chris
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