TagFormat is not working properly

[bubbleguuum]

I made a detailed reply to Simon to explain this issue which has to do with BubbleUPnP inferring if a generic folder contains a music album (to improve the experience for basic media servers that need it). I will make a few changes in the next app update so this issue does not happen.

[ischowam]

Also big thanks to you for picking up this topic (immediately)

So I am waiting curiously.

[ischowam]

@bubbleguuum
Thank you for the very quick update of BubbleUPnP.
I just had time to have a closer look at it.

Basically there is always a year displayed now.

There is only one minor issue left.
If there are several items with the same albumname but different year-tags in one folder, the year-figures are chained up.

That is e.g. the case in folders with a mix of single files and if for these files the album-tag is not filled.
Example: " -None- [20032002] "

It could also be, that two artists published an album with the same name in different years. But I guess that will not happen quite often anyway and that I own these additionally. ;-)

[simoncn]

Your are seeing this strange-looking display because of your tagFormat setting. Multiple years would normally be displayed with a comma separator between them but your tagFormat setting has changed the separator to the null string.

This setting has a null separator:

{$Date^ [^]^}

This setting has the default comma separator:

{$Date^ [^]}

[ischowam]

Yes, OK understood.

But the issue is not, that I dislike to see "20032002" without a separator, but that the years are chained at all.

01: Artist-1 - Empty (Album) - Title-01 - 2003
02: Artist-2 - Empty (Album) - Title-02 - 2004

For both files the albumtag now looks like: " -None- [20032004)"

But it should be:
01: "-None- [2003]"
02: "-None- [2004]"

[simbun]

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  There is only one minor issue left.
If there are several items with the same albumname but different year-tags in one folder, the year-figures are chained up.

I answered this previously:

(07-01-2023 13:50)simbun Wrote:  

(07-01-2023 13:32)ischowam Wrote:  I also see for Test-6 (two years) > "Album-1 [20032004]"

MinimServer identifies albums by AlbumArtist (or Artist if AlbumArtist is empty) and Album, and if that album has been tagged with multiple Dates they get concatenated, which is what you're seeing.

I've never looked, and I don't browse by folder but I'm not aware of an option to disable album grouping.

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  That is e.g. the case in folders with a mix of single files and if for these files the album-tag is not filled.
Example: " -None- [20032002] "

I've tried to replicate this but if my files don't have an album tag then I don't see the album.displayformat at all, only the title.displayformat and the artist tag.
Might be worth uploading an example again, and clarifying your MinimServer settings.

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  It could also be, that two artists published an album with the same name in different years. But I guess that will not happen quite often anyway and that I own these additionally. ;-)

Why would you put these two albums in the same folder anyway, assuming we're still talking about folder view?

[ischowam]

I have to appologise causing irritations and mentioning wrong facts.
There were copies of these files on the harddisc really containing "-None-" as the album name. I did not get that. Everything works as described by you. Sorry again.

(21-01-2023 20:59)simbun Wrote:  I've never looked, and I don't browse by folder but I'm not aware of an option to disable album grouping.

Too bad.
I guess that could solve all my issues: if only available tags within the individual file is being used solely for the displayFormat.

(21-01-2023 20:59)simbun Wrote:  

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  That is e.g. the case in folders with a mix of single files and if for these files the album-tag is not filled.
Example: " -None- [20032002] "

I've tried to replicate this but if my files don't have an album tag then I don't see the album.displayformat at all, only the title.displayformat and the artist tag.

Is there a chance to force Minimserver to display the year anyway even if there is no album-tag, but a year-tag?

(21-01-2023 20:59)simbun Wrote:  

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  It could also be, that two artists published an album with the same name in different years. But I guess that will not happen quite often anyway and that I own these additionally. ;-)

Why would you put these two albums in the same folder anyway, assuming we're still talking about folder view?

As said: Won't happen often, if at all. (Maybe compiled tracks from different "Greatest Hits") from ONE Artits.
In my case (a former "Party-Mix" folder with copies in) I would use a playlist instead today.
Please see this as cleared.

BTW: Thank you for your patience going through all these details and for still replying!

[simbun]

(22-01-2023 14:46)ischowam Wrote:  

(21-01-2023 20:59)simbun Wrote:  

(21-01-2023 16:28)ischowam Wrote:  That is e.g. the case in folders with a mix of single files and if for these files the album-tag is not filled.
Example: " -None- [20032002] "

I've tried to replicate this but if my files don't have an album tag then I don't see the album.displayformat at all, only the title.displayformat and the artist tag.

Is there a chance to force Minimserver to display the year anyway even if there is no album-tag, but a year-tag?

You could apply a default value to the album tag if it's empty that would force the displayFormat to work, but it won't fix the scenario where you have multiple dates within the same folder.
If you wanted to apply a default value to album you could use the zero-width unicode space (if you didn't want any label to be offset) or any other text you may want to choose:

Code:

tagValue:album.default={'​'}

A more correct way to do this (which would prevent the 20032004) would be to put the Date into the title.displayFormat (because that's the level the date applies to in this instance), but it would then also show for normal albums as well. If you had a tag that identified the non-album files then we could probably write a tagUpdate script so that it's only shown for non-album files, although it would be a little messy.

[ischowam]

Hi

That could y a nice workaround.
For the time being I do not have a tag, which would distinguish betwenn Album-Tracks and Non-Album-Tracks, but that would be manageble.

I read a bit about scripting in the user-guide, but I did not fully understand it.

Could you explain to me, what steps are necessary?
- What would the script look like? Code?
- How (file?) and where do I do I need to save it (Minimserver runs on a Synology-NAS)
- What do I need to do, to start it? (Continiously or once like a scan?)
- Something else to take care of?

[simbun]

So the absolute easiest way is just to put the date onto the title.displayFormat and remove it from the album.displayFormat as that's just a configuration change. It means you'll have the date attributed to every track regardless if it's an album track or not.

The alternative, if we have some way of identiying albums and non-album tracks would be to - internally to MinimServer - build two new date tags, one for album tracks and one for non-album tracks, which you'd then use in the relevant displayFormat settings e.g. album.displayFormat={$album^^ $AlbumDate^[^]^}, title.displayFormat={$title^^$NonAlbumDate^[^]^}$#AudioDuration^ ^^$#AudioFormat^ | ^^}

The code required would look something like:

Code:

@ALBUM=0
&DATE=2003
+NONALBUMDATE=2003
&DATE=2004
+NONALBUMDATE=2004

@ALBUM=1
&DATE=2003
+ALBUMDATE=2003
&DATE=2004
+ALBUMDATE=2004

Obviously the identifying tag can be called anything, I've just used ALBUM=0/1 as an example.

Which translates into:
If the Album tag has a value of 0 (@ALBUM=0) and the Date tag is 2003 (&DATE=2003) create a new tag (within MinimServer) called NonAlbumDate and set it to 2003 (+NONALBUMDATE=2003), else if the Date tag is 2004 (&DATE=2004) then create the tag NonAlbumDate and set it to 2004 (+NONALBUMDATE=2004) e.t.c.

NOTE: I think we can get away with just one tag that identifies the non-album tracks, but I'd have to test that.

This will have a performance impact on scanning, but I don't think it will make much difference unless you have a huge library as I have a lot of tagUpdate processing and I don't notice a difference.

I should be able to create an export script in Mp3Tag to create the code - assuming you can load all your music into it at once - or just copy and paste for each year.
The text file with the rules would need to be placed on the Synology, so it's probably easiest just to put it in the root of your music folder, and the MinimServer configuration will need to be changed to point to it.

If you want to go down the tagUpdate route let me know and I'll try and experiment later.