[vorbis] TAG-mess

[Moritz Grimm]

Jonathan Walther wrote:
> >- OGG tags shall be human readable, writeable (!), descriptive and
> >*small*. They're the first thing you get in a stream or an .OGG file,
> >e.g. the tags let you decide whether you want to download the whole file
> >or not. "It is meant for short, text comments, not arbitrary metadata;
> >arbitrary metadata belongs in a metadata stream (usually an XML stream
> >type)." -- http://www.xiph.org/ogg/vorbis/doc/v-comment.html
> 
> I'm not the only one saying no to using XML for this.  In his only post
> to this thread 2 months ago, Monty flatly said `no way' to the idea of
> using XML metadata for the sort of simple things covered by this
> tagging standard.  I get the feeling that there is hammer-and-nail
> syndrome here, with all you guys piping up that we should "use XML!".

DISCID
        since the EIN, ISBN, etc numbers aren't to be reliably found
        on the CD, nor is the catalog number reliable, the FREEDB
        index hash should go here

That's metadata and definitely NOT human readable. This should not go
into the tags. We had this topic 87234 times already, IIRC. This tags
also helps you in no way with your goals, as this hash is useless
without freedb and internet access.

I believe that there's a difference in whether to have descriptive tags
or a huge load of meta-data. 

ARTIST
        role fulfilled by COMPOSER, LYRICIST, PERFORMER, ENSEMBLE,
        CONDUCTOR, AUTHOR, PRODUCER, and ARRANGER tags.

You need this data neither in your playlist nor prior to downloading a
tune. If you buy an OGG file, you should get this information by the
vendor ... I don't say it's not useful, I say it's not needed. In my
very own case, it'd even be highly annoying. Look at this, an average
tune made by be and a friend:

COMPOSER=salt & maxx
PERFORMER=salt & maxx
PRODUCER=salt & maxx
PUBLISHER=salt & maxx
ARRANGER=salt & maxx
ENSEMBLE=KOLABORE (salt & maxx)
TITLE=Tachyon Part #12
ALBUM=Tachyon
GENRE=Ambient
COPYRIGHT=(C) 2001 by KOLABORE. All Rights Reserved.
URL=http://www.kolabore.com/
ISRC=DE-R46-01-00119

All six artist-related tags are perfectly valid, and none of them can
take another tag's meaning. But instead of these six tags, a single
ARTIST tag would perfectly do the job. I mean, I could still add tags to
it myself! How about MIXING=salt & maxx, MASTERING=salt & maxx and so
on? - This - is - too - much! -

Btw, point 2) in your mail about your goals is already fulfilled by the
ISRC tag. Every recording has a different, unique ISRC, so it should be
trivial to get the correct CD once you got that number.

> >- Every average user would need software support to handle all the tags
> >and to prevent wrong tagging. I, for example, tag all my OGGs on-the-fly
> >with one big oggenc command line. This would become impossible with this
> >huge, complex load of standard tags.
> 
> Standardize first, then the tools will follow.  Unless a standard
> exists, obviously none of the tools will support it.

The strengths of OGG tags is that you can define them yourself.
Everybody has different needs, and with a customizeable database, you
get exactly what you want.

I really don't want these tags to become standard. The standards should
not go beyond simple tags that are required for proper "playback", if
one may say it that way. The whole rest needs to adapt to too many
different possible scenarios to become a standard.

> ><highly_subjective>
> >Your theoretical ogg123 output is really scary, too. I mean, in the end
> >it's about music, right? I don't listen to music with my eyes.
> ></highly_subjective>
> 
> When someone sends you a file with a gibbled filename, how do you find
> out what the heck it is?  What if you really liked it and wanted to run
> out and buy 10 copies of it on CD for your friends you liked it so much?
> The output should give you enough information that you can do that.

I usually know the artist and the title, propably also the name of the
album. If this isn't enough, and there's an ISRC, I'm all set.

<p>Moritz


-- 
_______________________________________________________________________
"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security,
deserve   neither   liberty   or   security"  -  Benjamin   Franklin

--- >8 ----
List archives:  http://www.xiph.org/archives/
Ogg project homepage: http://www.xiph.org/ogg/
To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'vorbis-request at xiph.org'
containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body.  No subject is needed.
Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.