Itunes Databases......*&#@$*%&#@@!

[Ollie 859]

I thought we had a thread on iTunes databases, like Gracenote, but I didn't find anything with the search function.

The culprits who put the FSM Rozsa box set into iTunes should be kicked in the butt.

And that's being nice.

What a @*&$@*#*$!! mess.

Which opens a whole new can of worms, There needs to be someone, or a group, who are responsible to make sure the entries are all the same or that there is a standard protocol for entering CD titles and tracklistings.

[Wojo 2,442]

You're having a very slow day at work, aren't you?

[Ollie 859]

It's a Monday.

Actually I'm working as I'm posting. However I run the risk of posting mistakes, so if you see sales figures and customer orders start popping up in my posts, you will know why.

[Jay 27,216]

The search engine for this forum is currently broken. Most searches will only return 1 result. I don't know if Andreas is working on fixing it or if he's even aware of the problem

[Ollie 859]

Actually I did get more than one result, just not the one I was looking for.

Although the thread I'm thinking of could be over at FSM.

[Jay 27,216]

No it was definitely here, its just hard to find anything right now until the search engine is fixed

[Wojo 2,442]

I don't use iTunes, and I don't rely on auto-tagging from any ripper or tagger that I might happen to use. I either type it all out, or import tag info from a text file. The text file approach is what I used to tag The Blue Box, so the Rozsa box would be twice as much to handle. Especially since I tag my FLAC and MP3 files at the same time.

[fommes 126]

The search engine for this forum is currently broken. Most searches will only return 1 result. I don't know if Andreas is working on fixing it or if he's even aware of the problem

Yeah, if you search titles only and ask to display as topics, it will give you one result while saying it's got more results.

Try 'display as posts'; then it'll give you the proper results.

[John Crichton 4]

Actually I'm working as I'm posting. However I run the risk of posting mistakes, so if you see sales figures and customer orders start popping up in my posts, you will know why.

Just don't post their account numbers.

[Trent B 317]

I too don't use iTunes to rip CD's. I use Audiograbber, however even that sometimes can be a pain in the ass. That's why I just do my own track titles looking at the back cover of the CD.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,476]

How the hell does this work, anyway? First ripped, first tagged kind of thing? I hate when track titles feature the composer in the title. Such as, "Newman: Fox Fanfare", "Williams: Main Title". What in the hell? Isn't that what the artist/composer tag is for? Also, it's a personal little nitpick, but I don't care for the gaps between the forward slash in track titles. It's just redundant. So I've fixed a lot of those.

[Jacob 0]

I hate it when there aren't gaps between the forward slashes.

I always add them.

[Jay 27,216]

Ditto

[Koray Savas 2,095]

I always remove the spaces around the slashes. I only keep them if it's in an album title.

[Charlie Brigden 5]

I am pro-gap.

[indy4 152]

I like spaces between dashes, but not between dashes.

[Ollie 859]

This is how the Rozsa box ended up before I fixed it.

I had 3 discs with the titles "FSM BOX"

I had 4 discs that actually had the disc number in the title "MIKLOS ROZSA Treasury (1948-1969) Disc .."

I had 2 discs that actually had the film score title listed.

The rest were listed as "Miklos Rozsa Treasury" and all ran together because I was cooking diner while loading the discs and not really paying attention. So I had to separate them once they were loaded.

And that doesn't count the multiple errors and stupidity within the track titles.

[Jacob 0]

I like spaces between dashes, but not between dashes.

Um, yeah.

[davros72 1]

I actually did vote for the spaces between dashes, before I voted against it.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,476]

I consider it superfluous. The "/" is basically the "space" as far as I'm concerned. When you've got huge track titles like on Lost in Space, adding blank spaces is just going to make an overlong mess of a track title worse off. It'll take me 20 minutes to read what the hell I'm listening to on my iPod, as opposed to 10.

[Marian Schedenig 5,520]

I hate it when there aren't gaps between the forward slashes.

I always add them.

I used to add them. Until I realised they're wrong. Now I remove them.

[Wojo 2,442]

I used to not put any spaces on either side of the "/" symbols, so tracks would look like "Destiny/Burgos." Now I do put a space after the front slash, to put a bit of separation like "Destiny/ Burgos." I'm not sure it looks any better, but I don't mind.

I'm more concerned about capitalization, specifically of certain prepositions like for, from, with, into, and out. I know about a, and, and the, but some of my song titles look pretty silly with only one word not capitalized. Album covers that either capitalize every word or every single letter don't help.

[Jacob 0]

I hate it when there aren't gaps between the forward slashes.

I always add them.

I used to add them. Until I realised they're wrong. Now I remove them.

Is it? I just think it looks better when spaced.

Anyone else go as far as using em-dashes or am I the lone typography freak in that?

[Wojo 2,442]

I only use the normal dashes that are interchangeable with those in file names.

[Jacob 0]

I haven't had any problems using em-dashes in file names on Windows 7 (yet).

Mac or Linux systems might have a problem with it.

[Koray Savas 2,095]

I'm more concerned about capitalization, specifically of certain prepositions like for, from, with, into, and out. I know about a, and, and the, but some of my song titles look pretty silly with only one word not capitalized. Album covers that either capitalize every word or every single letter don't help.

I capitalize the first letter of every word.

[Jay 27,216]

Me too!

[Wojo 2,442]

That would make it easier.

Good thing I don't have very many track names in Arabic or Klingon, which capitalize letters in the middle of words.

[Marian Schedenig 5,520]

I hate it when there aren't gaps between the forward slashes.

I always add them.

I used to add them. Until I realised they're wrong. Now I remove them.

Is it? I just think it looks better when spaced.

As far as I know, it's wrong typography. Like putting spaces before question marks (and then wondering why they wrap to a new line).

Uppercase letters bother me. Most CD track listings fetched from CDDB have all words starting in uppercase. I correct them where I can, but I don't really know the capitalisation rules for English in enough detail to always be sure. Plus it seems that writing everything with an uppercase first letter seems to be correct for "song" titles.

Anyone else go as far as using em-dashes or am I the lone typography freak in that?

Interesting, how do you type them (in a non text processing application)? I can never remember the difference between em- and en-dashes, German having only two types of dashes (hyphens and... the other ones).

[Trent B 317]

I too capitalize every first letter of a word for a track. If there is a back slash and it has more than two cues, then I put a space in between the slash.

[Luke Skywalker 1,284]

many tracklists on offical covers have capitalised first letters of the importan words (nouns, verbs, adjectives)

But connection-preposition words (and, the, at....) usually arent.

Example: 'The Arrival at Naboo', 'Panaka and the Queen's Protectors'

FSM and Intrada write like this.

LLL capitalises every 1st letter.

[Marian Schedenig 5,520]

many tracklists on offical covers have capitalised first letters of the importan words (nouns, verbs, adjectives)

But connection-preposition words (and, the, at....) usually arent.

Example: 'The Arrival at Naboo', 'Panaka and the Queen's Protectors'

FSM and Intrada write like this.

And it's the correct way of writing titles.

[Kendal_Ozzel 32]

Yeah, title case is the way to go. Can't stand the every letter thing.

[Koray Savas 2,095]

I used to lower case "and" and "the" and words like that, but not anymore. I think it looks better with everything capitalized.

[indy4 152]

Capitalizing every word looks strange to me. I much prefer "Duel of the Fates" to "Duel Of The Fates."

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,476]

Yes. "The Return of the Jedi"; "Suite from Close Encounters of the Third Kind"; "Leia Breaks the News (alternate)/Funeral Pyre for a Jedi (film version)". On compilation albums (say Williams on Williams) where there are multiple "Theme" tracks, I will title them for instance, "Theme from Jurassic Park". I know some people label them as "Jurassic Park: Theme" or something. For tracks where I know what film they're from, I don't label them as "from" anything. Like "The Battle for Hollywood". Nice.

[Jacob 0]

As far as I know, it's wrong typography. Like putting spaces before question marks (and then wondering why they wrap to a new line).

Ah, makes sense. I'm probably still going to use spaces though.

Anyone else go as far as using em-dashes or am I the lone typography freak in that?

Interesting, how do you type them (in a non text processing application)? I can never remember the difference between em- and en-dashes, German having only two types of dashes (hyphens and... the other ones).

I just copy the character from a page like this and paste it into the file name: http://www.nationalfinder.com/html/char-asc.htm

Crude, but it works. Can't say how grammatically appropriate it is exactly, but I like the way it looks.

I started using them in place of certain hyphens not too long ago, after reading this: http://csswizardry.com/type-tips/#tip-13

[Jay 27,216]

I used to lower case "and" and "the" and words like that, but not anymore. I think it looks better with everything capitalized.

Ditto!

[Wojo 2,442]

For all my countless tracks titled "Main Title," I used to put the album/movie name in parentheses afterward. Now with an iPod and the album name right below and the cover art to the left, it's become a bit of overkill. Though I don't know the difference between "Main Title" and "Main Titles."

I think the reason I now put a space after a "/" in long track names is so that moving through them via Ctrl + arrow keys is quicker. I picked it up from Trent, along with naming files "03- The Battle of Hoth" instead of "03 - The Battle of Hoth" to save characters in a filename.

For tracks that contain "Phrase/ Phrase/ Phrase/ Phrase" etc., I usually truncate filenames to be either the first or most essential of those title phrases, to keep the filenames from becoming overly long. There are few things worse than burning a file structure to CD, only to be told that the folders go too many deep, or that the filenames are too long and you can't actually move or open the file anymore.

[Marian Schedenig 5,520]

Ah, Windows with it's fun "this path is too long" stuff. We actually get that at work. We HAVE to have our project directory on the root level, because otherwise, the number of directories we have combined with the files automatically created by the versioning tool will be too much for the system.

[Jay 27,216]

naming files "03- The Battle of Hoth" instead of "03 - The Battle of Hoth" to save characters in a filename.

I always name them like "03 The Battle Of Hoth". What is the point of putting a dash there?

[Ollie 859]

I don't put track numbers before a title.

And I capitalize the first letter of every word. I also put a space between each side of a / if there are multiple listings for a track.

[Wojo 2,442]

I always name them like "03 The Battle Of Hoth". What is the point of putting a dash there?

Truthfully, because that's how I saw somebody else tag his files in 1999 when my MP3 craze started, and I haven't changed much since then. You are right, the dash just takes up space. For soundtrack albums, I won't put the artist in the filename unless it's a compilation, when the file names can get crazy long. American Graffiti comes to mind.

I don't use iTunes to listen to music and still rely heavily on actually looking in the folders themselves to explore my music collection. I absolutely despise seeing complete albums -- soundtracks, rock, or otherwise -- in pure alphabetical order. For folders of miscellaneous songs or classical music that I haven't sorted into albums, it's ok.

I realize that Windows can view track numbers in the Details view just like photo dimensions, size, file type, and modified date, but Windows XP is so stupid when it comes to remembering these settings -- or volunteering settings that don't make sense, like photo settings for music and music settings for photos.

My collection is so helter skelter anyways, across three internal HDD partitions and two externals, that I'm eying up a 1 TB+ internal drive to create a workspace to sort everything in one logical place, and use my externals as backups instead of more workspace. Just not sure if I want two different mirrored RAID arrays.

[Jay 27,216]

I don't put track numbers before a title.

And I capitalize the first letter of every word. I also put a space between each side of a / if there are multiple listings for a track.

I was talking about the file name, not the tag inside the file

[Wojo 2,442]

Once my MP3s and FLACs get track numbers and titles, I create filenames from them as "%track%- %title%" in MP3tag. What's good for the goose is good for the cloned goose.

If they are miscellaneous tracks not belonging to any album, they have historically been "%artist%- %title%", which I now have to mobilize as albums to put onto an iPod, even if it's as mundane as "Artist's Greatest Hits" or "Artist's Misc Songs."

[Jacob 0]

naming files "03- The Battle of Hoth" instead of "03 - The Battle of Hoth" to save characters in a filename.

I always name them like "03 The Battle Of Hoth". What is the point of putting a dash there?

I use a period in the file name after the track number: "03. The Battle of Hoth"

[Wojo 2,442]

See, I don't like putting an extra period into the filename. The one to separate the filename from its extension is enough for me.

"R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A. (A Salute To 60's Rock)" is a good example of a song whose filename I would truncate to "ROCK in the USA."

[indy4 152]

I just sort my iTunes music by Album when I want to listen to a score in proper order.

[gkgyver 1,638]

How fascinating ... the space between spaces.

I listen to CDs on my stereo, so there

[Wojo 2,442]

And you plan what you're going to listen to during the commute and at work, and pack accordingly that morning? How novel of you!