Dj Software interface question

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omsuperhoops
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Dj Software interface question

#1 Post by omsuperhoops » Mon May 06, 2013 4:14 pm

Ok, so today is the last straw. I have had it with editing the metadata via right clicking and clicking all sorts of options. I lost ALL my metadata recently and doing it again this way, is something I do not want to do anymore!!!

SO,

Is there music software that has the capacity to edit metadata right on the interface itself? so I dont have to right-click anymore....

maybe a big open-field box or a comment box or something? There has to be a more efficient way of doing this...

any help would be much appreciated.

O

SoundInMotionDJ
Posts: 154
Joined: Wed May 30, 2007 8:27 pm

#2 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Mon May 06, 2013 9:16 pm

Depends on what you mean by "metadata." (Almost) all my data is stored in ID3 tags. That is "safe" and travels with the mp3, or FLAC.

I use Traktor software. Cue points, the bpm grid, and the waveform strip are all stored in a Traktor database. This can be copied (carefully) from one computer to another...but that takes some degree of care. The Traktor interface offers an option to allow editing in the "browser" window.

What software are you using?
What metadata are you looking to store?

omsuperhoops
Posts: 197
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Location: Seoul, Korea

#3 Post by omsuperhoops » Tue May 07, 2013 12:08 am

I went from Windows to Itunes to Winamp To Mediamonkey, somewhere between, Itunes --->mediamonkey, everything got warped.

I was storing everything from, personal comments on songs, transition suggestions to myself, bpm, year, my own rating system, notes on edits, if song is a hit at a specific venue, venue specific songs, genre, sub-genre, how i came across, the names of djs that gave me such a song(i always let people know if a song I play comes from someone else, if asked), mood, energy, goto's, etc, instrumentation, notes on vocalists,

it was pretty extensive...I was a pretty meticulous note taker when it came to songs...I was slowly doing over time...but its all gone...i dont have the zeal to redo it all, i just want to simplify the process, lessen the clicks and start over...slowly, probably after I play each song at a dance...I want something I can mess with. I will look into traktor...

SoundInMotionDJ
Posts: 154
Joined: Wed May 30, 2007 8:27 pm

#4 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Tue May 07, 2013 7:37 am

Traktor is more of a DJ'ing program, not a "music collection management" program. Both iTunes and Media Monkey are more about "collection management" than DJ'ing.

iTunes does not support ID3 tags in a "standard" (or perhaps "portable") way. This is unfortunate, but the reality of what is going on.

What do you mean by "everything got warped"???

The odds are good that you can export everything you have tagged in iTunes and get that in to MediaMonkey. The issue is in the precise details of what you have stored in each ID3 field, and what has been stored outside the tag fields.

Overall, the kind of notes you are taking do not fit well into the standard ID3 tag fields. Well, "Year", "BPM" and so on are actual field names. "Comments" can be used to hold quite a bit of free form text...but the value goes down rapidly as it becomes a general purpose "catch all." The "Custom" tags might be something to look at...but support for them is not "universal" so that might get you some lock in on a particular program.

omsuperhoops
Posts: 197
Joined: Wed Aug 25, 2010 10:45 pm
Location: Seoul, Korea

#5 Post by omsuperhoops » Tue May 07, 2013 11:52 am

lets say I have song that says,
Gypsy, manouche, JesseMiner, 160bpm, balboa beginner, lindy hop, end of night, etc.

it ended up looking like this during one of the transfers

@&#^(#* @&*##@(

or

it will just be blank

I will continue my search, i just got the trial version of traktor so I am playing with that now...something with a free-form text is ideal though.

SoundInMotionDJ
Posts: 154
Joined: Wed May 30, 2007 8:27 pm

#6 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Tue May 07, 2013 8:31 pm

The most likely reason for the "symbols" in the tag is character set.

iTunes has a well known issue with the Comments field. iTunes does it "wrong" (according to the ID3 standard), but they are common enough for their way to be another kind of "standard."

As a test....in iTunes, right click on a song that shows as garbage in MM, and pick "Convert ID3 tags". Select the "Reverse Unicode" option. The view that file in MM. If that resolves the problem, you can select all the songs in your iTunes library and do that same operation on all of them.


MediaMonkey is normally pretty forgiving about character sets. I have MM 4.0.7.1511.

For tag character set options, go to: Tools->Options->Tags&Playlists. Check the following settings:

"Store MP# file properties using" is set to "IV3v1 and v2 tags".
"IV3v2 text encoding" is set to "ASCII + UTF-16 (when needed)"

That will give you the maximum flexibility when dealing with character set issues.

omsuperhoops
Posts: 197
Joined: Wed Aug 25, 2010 10:45 pm
Location: Seoul, Korea

#7 Post by omsuperhoops » Wed May 08, 2013 1:32 pm

it kinda of worked on some didnt on others...some of the files have the data incomplete, some end up being blank and some turned out just fine...

I got traktor but I cant figure out where the comment box is on the "browser" window? any help?

penguin
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#8 Post by penguin » Thu May 09, 2013 6:35 am

J River is a good library management software. It does it all in ID3 tags, plus you can back up your library so all your playlists and smartlists (and other settings) are preserved if the program goes bork on you.

The fields can be edited either in the playlist window or in an "Action Window" sidebar. Both of these can be set (differently) to display exactly the fields you want to see or edit.

omsuperhoops
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#9 Post by omsuperhoops » Tue May 14, 2013 12:18 am

J.river...does not want to work on my computer...i keep getting needs to shut down message...i think the jazz gods just want me to do this all click by click....thanks you for all the help guys!!

Surreal
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#10 Post by Surreal » Fri May 17, 2013 2:19 pm

You can try standalone ID3 editors as well.

SoundInMotionDJ
Posts: 154
Joined: Wed May 30, 2007 8:27 pm

#11 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Tue May 21, 2013 11:29 am

One other editor to try is this:

http://www.mp3tag.de/en/

Before I switched to Media Monkey, this was my tag editor of choice. It was really fast, and had a nice "batch" editing function. The editor understood regular expressions for tag matching. The new version supports full unicode character sets...so with some experimentation it is likely that you can recover everything. Oh, and it's free.

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