[flac-dev] FLAC and external file attributes

[Phil Karn]

Has any consideration been given to support for external file
attributes, at least on file systems that implement them?

At the very least I'd find it VERY useful if the FLAC command simply
copied any extended file attributes between source and destination files.

My application is a program that records and plays raw I/Q sample
streams in a software defined radio system. I/Q signal streams closely
resemble integer PCM stereo audio, so FLAC tends to compress them fairly
well. But I tag my raw I/Q recordings with attributes like radio center
frequency, hardware gain, etc, that aren't relevant to audio.

Yes, I could write a script to preserve them, but it sure would be
convenient if FLAC were to simply preserve them. (Yes, this wouldn't
work on pipes, but that's OK.)

I would also find it very handy if when FLAC compresses a headerless raw
PCM file, it could (optionally) take sample rate, format, endianness,
etc, from the extended file attributes instead of requiring them to be
specified on the command line. It should also put them in extended file
attributes when decompressing (at least to raw format).

And while we're at it, it would probably also be nice if FLAC could
export/import its own internal meta tags (AUTHOR, TITLE, etc) to and
from extended file attributes. But that's down the list from the two
features just mentioned.

I'm willing to do the work myself if there's a reasonable chance of it
being adopted back into the upstream versions.

Thanks!

Phil
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: 0xF14E4354ED463446.asc
Type: application/pgp-keys
Size: 3301 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/flac-dev/attachments/20180414/239b9332/attachment.key>