New to MinimServer: where to begin?

[DavidHB]

Well, the good news is that your title is already overtaken by events. You have already begun, I think quite successfully.

We don't need to tell you how to get MinimServer working, because you've done that already, and the catalogue of messages you have in your log is clear evidence that MinimServer is working as designed. Simon, the author of MinimServer, is very clear that he wants the software to be fully standards compliant, so MinimServer is often intolerant of errors that other programs just accept. In my opinion, this intolerance is a good thing; when you have a clear log, you also know that you have files that conform to the relevant specifications and which should be acceptable to any standards compliant program.

Unfortunately, I don't use Macs, so cannot review the range of software applications available. The CD ripper and file converter I use on Windows - dBpoweramp - is now available on the Mac, though I think it may still be in beta. My favourite tag editor - MP3Tag - is for Windows only, though I think I have read that it runs in the emulators. If you have access to a Windows machine, it might be using it with these applications for the file correction work you need to do; both programs are very widely used and very capable. MP3Tag is free (but seeks a donation, like MinimServer); dbPoweramp has a free version, but you will need the full version, which is paid for software. The price is, I guess, much less than you have already invested in your music and playing equipment, and in my opinion is very well worth paying.

As far as I can see, all the log errors you describe relate to faults of some sort in your music files. In general, the faults are of two kinds. Those that relate to the file as a whole (with messages like 'format error' or 'unexpected end of file') indicate that the file is in some way corrupt or wrongly constructed. Usually, if these files will play in other software, the best way to deal with them is to use a program such as dBpoweramp to 'convert' the format. Actually, you can usually 'convert' to the same format as the original (obviously, the new file needs to be in a different folder from the old one); what happens is that the converter re-writes the file in the correct form, and the error goes away.

Errors that refer to specific tags (such as the one referring to the Date tag, which expects a year value only) may need to be fixed with a tag editor. The value of an editor that works in a grid (such as MP3Tag) is that it will often allow you to change the problem tag value(s) for, say, all the tracks in an album at one go. This makes the editing process much quicker. I have used MP3Tag to make a particular change in every file in my collection (which is of a similar size to yours) and completed the job in a couple of hours.

One of the errors that merits particular mention is the problem of multiple ALBUMARTIST tags. MinimServer expects all the tracks in an album to have the same, single ALBUMARTIST tag. Multiple ARTIST tags (which can vary between tracks) are allowed. I regard this approach as logical; others disagree. In this instance, all you need to do is set the ALBUMARTIST tag to the same value for each track, and make sure you don't have more than one such tag. This in turn means that you need to know how your tagging program creates multiple tags, so you don't do it accidentally.

I'll leave it to others to unlock the mysteries of ID3 tags for you; all my files are FLAC, which does not use this tagging scheme. This kind of problem can be caused by incorrect use of the different versions of ID3 tags, and I think that it can sometimes be fixed by format 'conversion' as described above.

I hope that this initial response is of some help.

David