Noob help: Can i achieve my goals with SongKong and if so how?

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

Ok i get what you mean and the options but not sure i understand enough to know the correct decisions according to what i’d like so if i gave you the example you used in the format i’d like could you advise what settings/masking, etc i’d need to achieve this please?:

David Guetta/Guetta Blaster/9 - Higher (feat. Chris Willis).mp3
obviously this isn’t my exact naming format but only used to highlight how i’d like the featured artists to be dealt with.

Okay so basics are we have album artist and artist, album artist must always be the same for every track on release or you run into big problems, artist shows the artists for individual track.

For both these fields the default options will store not only the main artist(s) but featured artists and other artists credited at album level in album artist field and track level in artist field

You can change the options to throw away the featured artists or move the featured artists into the title.

Now in your example you want the songs in an album artist folder, and you want to show just the featured artists as part of the filename, so you could do this as you suggest by those options.

Hoever, I want to point some things that you may have not considered:

Nowhere in your rename mask are you storing the main track artists(s) so if this is different to the album artist then that is not captured in the filename. For example the option is to only move featured artists not collaborations so this second artist would not be displayed

In your compilation rename mask you asked to display the (track) artist so with the option in your tags to move featured artists to title this will mean the featured artists wtll display before the artist (as part of the title)

My suggestion

Set When tracks contains featured artists back to - Add all contributing artists back to artist field, then for this example you will get

David Guetta/Guetta Blaster/09 - Higher David Guetta (feat. Chris Willis).mp3

and if it it was a track on a compilation you would get

Compilations by Various Artists/AlbumName by Various Artists/09 Higher [David Guetta (feat. Chris Willis)].mp3

My point being in both cases you get all Album Artist/Track Artist/Featured Artists.

[steveyg777]

Thanks for helping me with the masks Paul. It’s very much appreciated!

@paultaylor

So you mean release type (media type is CD/Vinyl etectera), Im lost because I thought you wanted soundtracks in their own folder?

Sorry yes i mean release type. There’s an option to include release type in the preferences. When I’ve renamed media it’s clear it puts it in the folder. (Me) Thinking that sk couldn’t be programmed to only include specific release types in this function i thought "well if it’s going to put them on for all release types then if prefer them put at the beginning of the names (to help with organisation more) than being put further along.
So hopefully that helps to explain my thinking. However “Im lost because I thought you wanted soundtracks in their own folder?” - yes i do want release types within their own sub folder like in me examples i posted.

[steveyg777]

@paultaylor

I cant see without support files, but AcoustIds can match to mutiple totally different songs, so maybe this was the only information available and Fix Songs picked the wrong one

I’ll send support files later

[steveyg777]

Yes i actually spotted that explanation later on but too late to adjust my previous post.

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

yes i do want release types within their own sub folder like in me examples i posted.

Hi, here is updated rename mask with support for Soundtracks and Audobooks added

function ignoreThe(name)
{
   if(name.startsWith('The ')) return name.substring(4);
   return name;
}

function brackets(name)
{
   if(name.length>0) return '(' + name + ')';
   return '';
}

function squareBrackets(name)
{
   if(name.length>0) return '[' + name + ']';
   return '';
}

function yearOnly(year)
{
   if(year.length>4) return year.substring(0,4);
   return year;
}

function r(value)
{
   return value.replaceAll("\\?","");
}

function formatSubtitle(subtitle)
{
    if(subtitle.length>0) return ' - ' + subtitle;
    return "";
}

function writeBody(type)
{
   return r(type
    + "/"
    + ifnotempty2(ignoreThe(albumartist).substring(0,1),ignoreThe(artist).substring(0,1),'/')
    + ifnotempty2(albumartist,artist,'/')
    + ifnotempty(album + ' ' + brackets(yearOnly(year)),'/')
    + ifmultidisc(squareBrackets('CD' + pad(discno,2) +  formatSubtitle(subtitle)) + ' ')
    + ifnotempty(pad(trackno,2),' - ')
    + title)
}

if(mbreleasetype.contains("Soundtrack"))
{
    writeBody("Soundtracks");
}
else if(mbreleasetype.contains("Audiobook"))
{
    writeBody("Audiobooks");
}
else
{
    writeBody("Artists");
}

There is an issue with your concept of Playlists

If you have a folder of essentially random songs already matched by Picard then SongKong probably wont modify it. If it has not been matched to MusicBrainz by Picard but has existing metadata then SongKong may group into these sub groups and try and match into albums, which is what you wanted to with some of your test data but means tracknos will update to match, or it it wont match and therefore Rename Files will not rename the files anyway if set to Matched to Release.

The underlying issue is these are not playlists, playlist are a separate layer on top via a m3u file or similar.

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

I’ll send support files later

Hi, I have looked at the logs but cannot reach a firm conclusion on why it picked a version by the incorrect artist. Could you please email support@jthink.net the file, I want to try and replicate the issue locally as it looks like there is an issue with single song matching. It is single song matching because you only have one song in this folder so there are inherantly less checks and balances then when album matching but in this case SongKong should have managed to match to the correct song.

[steveyg777]

@paultaylor

function formatSubtitle(subtitle) { if(subtitle.length>0) return ’ - ’ + subtitle; return “”; }

Regarding this bit of coding, could this cause a problem if i have the “song in to put disc number in subtitles if they’re isn’t a subtitle” setting on? Because couldn’t it potentially cause SK to write “cd01 - cd01”?

[paultaylor]

Yes, the obvious solution would be not to use that option and use Add Disc Subtitle if Disc has Title instead.

[steveyg777]

I mean Playlists in the format of services like Spotify where people create them or they are generated.

Is it possible to run these through a different mask so that if I segregate then in a separate folder i can process them from there? One problem that would arise is that track numbers would have to be created synthetically to maintain song play order. However, unless the filenames had track numbers then, sk wouldn’t know the order already. I could certainly add numbers before hand or, if it’s not important for a specific playlist, then sk could just create track numbers in a random order. What are your thoughts?

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

I mean Playlists in the dithery of services like Spotify where people create them or they are generated.

But when they become a list of files in a folder they are not a playlist, tools such as SongKong or Picard cannot match these songs whilst preserving the playlist integrity

But what you could do is create an actual playlist (m3u) from these files, then this playlist would preserve the order, and the underlying files could be identified and their actual album data added. The problem with this approach is that if you then rename the files the plyalist will now refer to nonexistent files. I dont know if there is a tool that would automatically track filename chnages and update the playlist accordingly.

[steveyg777]

Yes i see your point and it’s a good one . I don’t know if you were trying to emulate my desired masks verbatim though (i suspect not) because, and correct me if I’m wrong as i don’t profess to know everything about this stuff, id prefer the output slightly different:

Firstly, when the album is an artists album and the artists songs, i don’t see the reason to need the artist wrote in the filename because it will be displayed along with song title and album on my music player anyway and it’s organised into the artists named folder anyway.

Secondly the compilations need to be amended to

Compilations/album (yearonly) by albumartist/[cdnumber-ifabove1 - subtitle] tracknumber - title [trackartist feat. Featuredartists]

These are descriptive tags as opposed legal tags with the only purpose of describing my ideal format.

You mentioned earlier about colaboration artists, how do people deal with these?

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

Firstly, when the album is an artists album and the artists songs, i don’t see the reason to need the artist wrote in the filename because it will be displayed along with song title and album on my music player anyway

That applies to any metadata, your song player will display song title and album because you have title and album metadata so with this reasoning there is no need to store them in the filename either !

@steveyg777

and it’s organised into the artists named folder anyway

But you are making the incorrect assumption that the track artist is always the same as album artist which is by no means true, see

https://musicbrainz.org/release/0521a4b0-69bc-470b-ad2c-d44d0ccbbf8c

@steveyg777

Secondly the compilations need to be amended to

Compilations/album (yearonly) by albumartist/[cdnumber-ifabove1 - subtitle] tracknumber - title [trackartist feat. Featuredartists]

As I said earlier the mask is going to depend on what you are storing in your artist tag, and it seems you want to display differently for compilations/non compilation which is going to be difficult to do that in a reliable way.

@steveyg777

You mentioned earlier about colaboration artists, how do people deal with these?

People usually use the default option for artist so it will contains track artist(s) and featured artists and use this artist field in the filename, simple and causes no issue.

[steveyg777]

An improvement idea:
I’ve noticed that if i change settings for the fix songs or rename, etc, unless i press start the settings don’t get saved. sometimes, especially when working through things with you for example I need to adjust settings so they will work better for my use case. however i don’t always need to (or arent’ ready to) process any files at that time but could do with changing the settings before i forget that i need to.

therefore i could see a “Save Settings Only” button would be really useful instead of having to press start.

another idea:
when trying (experimenting) to create correct code for filename masks and scripts allow an undo feature - simply with command + z - i’ve noticed i can’t do that with sk. when doing the same with filebot i can do it and found it really helpful.

[steveyg777]

ok. so i’ve so far concluded my decisions based on how i’ve seen certain formatting messing up folder organisation, such as when folders are organised with several simliar artist folders but it splits up an album like:
method man
method man & redman
etc

i’d ideally want the album to be filed under method man as it’s his album but i’d like to acknowledge featured/collaborated artists within the filenames too. and obviously want to keep compilations and mixtapes (usuallly made or comprised by several artists) organised. i didn’t know artists albums could be made by other artists like in your example, not sure i’ve come across it myself but fair enough.

my formatting decisions have been dictated by both a desire to keep media organised sensibly and to provide as much information as possible without duplicating information where possible (for example; having an artist folder but not repeatedly including artist within the song title - although you have pointed out potential problems with certain attempts to prevent repetition), in the best way i know how - obvioulsy I’m not an expert.

it’s interesting what you are saying about some things i didn’t know about or haven’t thought about before. I’m feeling a little lost on what decisions to make now. Given what I’m attempting to achieve and the kind of formatting i prefer what would you recommend going forward (I’m all ears and open to your suggestions).

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

therefore i could see a “Save Settings Only” button would be really useful instead of having to press start.

I dont love this idea, I cant understand the logic in deciding to change an option and then trying it or at least testing it does what you expect it to.

@steveyg777

when trying (experimenting) to create correct code for filename masks and scripts allow an undo feature - simply with command + z - i’ve noticed i can’t do that with sk

Yes, good idea I have raised an issue for that.

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

ok. so i’ve so far concluded my decisions based on how i’ve seen certain formatting messing up folder organisation, such as when folders are organised with several simliar artist folders but it splits up an album like:
method man
method man & redman
etc

i’d ideally want the album to be filed under method man

That isn’t an issue (at least with albums matched to MusicBrainz because all albums have the same value for Album Artist for every track.

@steveyg777

i didn’t know artists albums could be made by other artists like in your example, not sure i’ve come across it myself but fair enough.

Here is a more regular example https://musicbrainz.org/release/4c610c45-1bb1-4069-a92c-e1bd893061c5

Given what I’m attempting to achieve and the kind of formatting i prefer what would you recommend going forward (I’m all ears and open to your suggestions).

So with the example above and your suggestion you wouldn’t see any of those second artists because they are not featured they have joint billling at track level, although album as a whole (and hence album artist) is credited to Elton John only

So now you have the facts you need to decide if you want to continue with your original idea of only showing featured artists at album level or not, and then I can give you an updated example mask.

[paultaylor]

Hi. okay interesting investigation into the incorrectly identified song, I found a few issues that conspired against a good match, now fixed and detail in this issue and wil be in next release. Quite technical so not going to try and fully explain it in the forum but for those interested there are details in the ticket.

[steveyg777]

Okay, well for the sake of sanity and organisational purpose i’d want an album to always only be organised under the one main artist, so in your example it was Elton John‘s album so I’d want it filed under Elton John. But then could I just place equally billed artists, contributing artists and featured artists and whatever other artists in whatever kind of calibre they are contributing towards the song, et cetera in brackets at the end of the file name? I’m not sure I know a better way than that to be honest. I also don’t want to be super pedantic about terminology within my file naming to the point where it causes a massive headache.

[steveyg777]

hi Paul, I’m glad I could contribute and help you improve Song Kong. it’s good that these fixes will be released in the next version release. However, this implies that this is still obviously a problem in the current release so I’m wondering when you release the next version and if it’s not really soon are there settings I can change to combat this problem for now as I am trying to get song Kong set up as perfect as possible so that I can run my entire audio library through it, finally?

[paultaylor]

@steveyg777

However, this implies that this is still obviously a problem in the current release

It is an obscure set of issues that mean this song maybe the only song affected, but I will probably do a minor release next week.

@steveyg777

are there settings I can change to combat this problem for now

So for this particular song you could run through Match to One Album and sepecify the album to fix this song.

Also note, that in Fix Songs you currently have the For songs already fully matched option set to Rematch. This is useful for the first time to force a rematch of songs incorrectly matched by Picard but once you have run it once it makes more sense to set it to Update Metadata Only so this means will not be rematched each time, so you have consistency and also it will run much quicker.