Ripping by Index

[simbun]

Is there any way of having TrackNumber appear as 1, 2.1, 2.2, 3.1, 3.2, 4, etc?
I've tried the obvious (value.display= and .displayFormat=) but they don't seem to operate on TrackNumber, I assume this is a forced limitation?

It's for tracks that have multiple indexes such as the Buster soundtrack. I believe it's more common in Classical music, but I have a small number of CD's like it, and if I were to "rip by index" and number them separately I'd be able to access the songs directly, rather than "rip by track" and have to forward through the track to get to the next song.
If it were possible, I'd potentially split up some other tracks where a single track contains multiple songs.

I think ripping by index would probably cause automated tag scraping to fail, but it's easy enough to do it manually for the few that need it, and I can create a CUE to piece it all back together for verification purposes, so that's fine.

I know I could just change the title (using displayFormat) to include the '3.1' from another tag, but I'd really like to get it working "properly" if at all possible.

[simoncn]

The UPnP specification requires the track number to be an integer.

As you have discovered, MinimServer does not allow track numbers to be modified using value.display or displayFormat.

You could add track number information to the titles for tracks 3.1 and 3.2 (etc.) but I am not sure what you would use for tracknumber tag values to get the album tracks sorted in the correct order.

[simbun]

I didn't think the spec would have allowed for it, and it's only for 2 albums so it's not the end of the world.

The best I've come up with so far (with testing of one album) is to add a tag called TrackIndex that holds the intra Track index, turn off the track number display in BubbleUPnP, and:

Code:

tagValue: Title.value.sort={TrackIndex}
Title.displayFormat={$TrackNumber^^^$TrackIndex^.^^$Title^  - ^}

The 'Show Metadata' in BubbleUPnP shows the core TrackNumber, which I suppose is accurate so I can live with that, just got to make sure it doesn't cause any complications.

Thanks for your support.

[lyapounov]

(08-04-2021 18:54)simbun Wrote:  Is there any way of having TrackNumber appear as 1, 2.1, 2.2, 3.1, 3.2, 4, etc?
I've tried the obvious (value.display= and .displayFormat=) but they don't seem to operate on TrackNumber, I assume this is a forced limitation?

It's for tracks that have multiple indexes such as the Buster soundtrack. I believe it's more common in Classical music, but I have a small number of CD's like it, and if I were to "rip by index" and number them separately I'd be able to access the songs directly, rather than "rip by track" and have to forward through the track to get to the next song.
If it were possible, I'd potentially split up some other tracks where a single track contains multiple songs.

I think ripping by index would probably cause automated tag scraping to fail, but it's easy enough to do it manually for the few that need it, and I can create a CUE to piece it all back together for verification purposes, so that's fine.

I know I could just change the title (using displayFormat) to include the '3.1' from another tag, but I'd really like to get it working "properly" if at all possible.

The index is a feature which is part of the original CD specification, but which is rarely used nowadays.

Someone on Discogs found 6 CDs which have this
https://www.discogs.com/lists/CDs-with-u...nly/213189

I personally remember CDs using this feature but then giving it up (I started buying CDs in 1985...). As an example, Glenn Gould playing Bach Goldberg were originally one track and one index per variation; but Sony reverted to one track per variation.

[simbun]

(09-04-2021 15:24)lyapounov Wrote:  The index is a feature which is part of the original CD specification, but which is rarely used nowadays.

Someone on Discogs found 6 CDs which have this
https://www.discogs.com/lists/CDs-with-u...nly/213189

I personally remember CDs using this feature but then giving it up (I started buying CDs in 1985...). As an example, Glenn Gould playing Bach Goldberg were originally one track and one index per variation; but Sony reverted to one track per variation.

I started ripping some discs for my dad a few weeks ago and have come across 3 discs so far, 2 from the list you detailed (Buster and MCMXC a.D.) and Foxtrot by Genesis.
I knew the specification allowed for it, but I'd never seen it before, and I don't know why but I'd never thought of breaking tracks up before like that, especially with what we can do with MinimServer.

A good example (although not a great example as each track is a continuous piece of music) is with Close to the Edge by Yes. The CD I have doesn't have subindexes for each "song", so titles for the first two tracks are:
Track 1) Close To The Edge: I. The Solid Time Of Change, II. Total Mass Retain, III. I Get Up I Get Down, IV. Seasons Of Man
Track 2) And You and I: I. Cord Of Life, II. Eclipse, III. The Preacher The Teacher, IV. Apocalypse

Whereas if I split the track up into individual "songs", not only would I be able to use the Grouping tag within MinimServer, but I'd also be able to name the tracks individually, to achieve something like:

Close To The Edge
1.1. The Solid Time Of Change,
1.2. Total Mass Retain
1.3. I Get Up I Get Down
1.4. Seasons Of Man
And You and I
2.1. Cord Of Life
2.2. Eclipse
2.3. The Preacher The Teacher
2.4. Apocalypse

I guess it's no more wrong that splitting a CD into tracks, and I'll be able to create a CUE that pieces the files back together so that the album still verifies with CTDB/AccurateRip.

[lyapounov]

Having teached long time ago database structure, I use to give to my student the very difficult job to make a conceptual model of classical CD.

Your description is a quite easy case. Just imagine a CD which has 3 tracks Mahler number 1 3 tracks Mahler number 2 and three tracks Bruckner number 5.

In that case you would need a 3 level structure:

Mahler
1.1 Symphony 1
1.1.1 movement 1
...
1.2 Symphony 2
1.2.1 movement 1
...
Bruckner
2.1 Symphony
etc...

And then, imagine you want to structure by interpret...

And then, imagine all this is in a Box set...

Just my 2 cents

Cheers

[simbun]

(08-04-2021 22:35)simoncn Wrote:  You could add track number information to the titles for tracks 3.1 and 3.2 (etc.) but I am not sure what you would use for tracknumber tag values to get the album tracks sorted in the correct order.

Hi @simoncn,

I never did get beyond the testing stage with this, but I want to sort it now so I have one point to clarify.
I haven't summarised - again - what I'm trying to do, so please look at the first post for a refresher if you need it.

If I have 3 tracks from the same album that all have the same trackNumber, when viewing the album tracks they seem to be sorted first by TrackNumber and then by Title, is that by design?
If this is by design and I can rely on it then I can simply include the index number at the beginning of Title to ensure they appear in the correct order within TrackNumber.

If that's not by design, then maybe adding the index to Title and using the configuration option Title.value.sort={TrackIndex} would be a belt and braces way to achieve this?

Thanks in advance.

[simoncn]

Where in the MinimServer menus are you viewing the list of tracks for which this sorting is required? I have checked your previous post but I didn't see this information there.

[simbun]

It's after having selected the album.

[simoncn]

The list of tracks in an album is sorted first by tracknumber and then by the item title (as tagged) or the album title's sort value if it has one. You can rely on this.

This means that adding the index to the title tag value would work but this might cause an unexpected sort order when viewing a list of tracks in some other container. The same applies to using Title.value.sort={TrackIndex}.