[vorbis] PROPOSAL: Sub-Tagging

[Craig Dickson]

Trick wrote:

> I mentioned sub-tagging in an earlier post. Here's a more in-depth mail on 
> what i thought of.
> 
> One of the debates going on here are whether ARTIST is worthy of life. 
> Another is whether the average user will bother filling in the detailed info 
> Jonathan wants. Of course, all tags are optional, but nevertheless we should 
> have a tagging-system that pleases _the_users_, that is, everybody:
> 
> 1. Make it simple.
> 2. Make it (optionally!) detailed.
> 
> Based on this i propose the following tagging and sub-tagging system, which 
> is easy, simple, flexible, detailed for those who want it.
> 
> Tags are for simple comments, and has the form:
> 	TITLE=Title
> 
> Subtags are for detailed comments, and has the form:
> 	ARTIST=COMPOSER=Xz
> 	ARTIST=PERFORMER=Yz

Instant reaction: Interesting idea. Keep it simple for those who want it
simple, but allow complexity for those that want it.

I don't like using = both for separating the names from the value, and
the tag name from the subtag name. Seems like it could be ambiguous,
especially in the case of an artist with an = in its name (I'm sure some
pop group has done it). Imagine a band called A=A. Here's the obvious
form of their simple ARTIST tag:

    ARTIST=A=A

Is that a subtag, or not?

So I suggest using a comma to separate tags from subtags:

    ARTIST,COMPOSER=Beethoven
    ARTIST,PERFOMER,PIANO=Daniel Barenboim

So the rule now is that everything to the left of the first = is tag
names, with commas separating levels of tags. Any subsequent commas or
=s are part of the tag's value.

Note that I have extended the subtagging to a third level here (why
not?).

I still don't think very many people will bother with all this arcane
stuff, so it really isn't worth the bother of implementing, but your
system at least allows the ordinary user to enter simple tags without
worrying about the details, or the difference between a PERFORMER and an
ENSEMBLE.

I also like a suggestion someone else made, that tag names should be
cased for normal printing so that the software displaying the tags doesn't
need to worry about it. So it really should be

   Artist,Composer=Beethoven
   Artist,Performer,Piano=Daniel Barenboim

This will tend to display better.

> Now, on to the proposed tags:
> 
> Supertag "ARTIST":
> 	Subtag "COMPOSER"
> 		The composer of the work.
> 	Subtag "LYRICIST"
> 		The one who wrote the lyrics.
> 	Subtag "PERFORMER"
> 		The one performing the work.
> 	Subtag "ENSEMBLE"
> 		The group performing.
> 	Subtag "CONDUCTOR"
> 		Conductor, if any.
> 	Subtag "AUTHOR"
> 		The original author.
> 
> Supertag "WORK":
> 	Subtag "TITLE"
> 		The title of the work.
> 	Subtag "VERSION"
> 		The version (eg live)
> 	Subtag "PART"
> 		Part of the work.
> 	Subtag "OPUS"
> 		Opus.
> 	Subtag "TYPE"
> 		Type.
> 	Subtag "GENRE"
> 		Genre.
> 	Subtag "COPYRIGHT"
> 		Copyright.
> 	..

Actually, there may be two copyrights involved. The one you're putting
under "WORK" would presumably be the composer's (or sheet music
publisher's) copyright. But there is also a copyright in the sound
recording, which is usually owned by the record company. So there
should be a COPYRIGHT subtag under ORIGIN as well.

> Supertag "ORIGIN":
> 	Subtag "ALBUM"
> 		Album this work came from, if any.
> 	Subtag "MEDIA"
> 		Media.
> 	Subtag "DATE"
> 		Date of recording.

Let's have a date of release, too; both original date and re-release
date. This will help to distinguish ugly 1980s CDs from nice remastered
1990s/2000s CDs. So, RECORDINGDATE, RELEASEDATE, MASTERINGDATE. These
names are rather long, unfortunately, but I don't think they will be
clear if they're much shorter.

The fact that you've placed MEDIA under ORIGIN helps to clarify its
intended usage.

> This is by no means the final version (i wouldn't have any say in that 
> anyway, since i'm just yet another list-subscriber =)

Funny, I thought Jonathan was just another subscriber, too, but he seems
to think he has some authority.

> but it IS a proposal. 
> So, please comment.

I think just about any attempt to go much beyond the tags of ID3 is
going to have a very small userbase; as a quick sampling of
Napster/Gnutella/etc. shows, most MP3 users don't even use ID3
effectively. So I have serious doubts about the value of any attempt to
define an elaborate standard for tagging. However, I like your system
better than I like Jonathan's, because you allow the average user to do
things simply while still allowing considerable flexibility for the more
sophisticated users.

Craig

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