Vorbis dev - Jun 2000 - The Oft Maligned comment field, initial thoughts.

Hey all.
Ok, so I'll stand up and be counted a newbie in this list too (just did the 
same for the General discussion list).  I (once again) read through the 
archives, especially the ones concerning the comment field.

First, I'm not a developer, per se.  I'm merely an anal-retentive power 
user of such things, who likes to have my music archived, and sorted.

In reading through the comment tags discussion, I noticed that, once you 
allow one thing, everyone else jumps in with what's important to them, and 
you start to duplicate the proposed XML MetaData stream 
unnecessarily.  Having a short field for identification purposes is a lofty 
goal, but one, I think, that is harder to reach than would seem 
apparent.  One person noted that he has 8 copies of an Orbital song (pls. 
correct me if I'm wrong, I can't seem to find the reference again), and
so
merely having ARTIST/SONG TITLE in the comment field would not be enough 
for unique identification, but to go any further leads down the slippery 
slope of "Genre's critical for me", and "What about Track
Number".

I would like to propose that all identification is left to the XML 
stream.  As Patrik Rådman posted (Re: [vorbis-dev] comment field proposal, 
Fri 12 May 2000 - 20:27:22 PDT), you can identify the basics of a song with 
the filename, as he does.  Now, I'm not trying to force anyone to do it MY 
(I guess in this case HIS) way, but the line must be drawn somewhere, and 
that will inevitably piss other people off.

I notice, in re-reading the archive, that I'm pretty much seconding what 
Mark Elrod said (Re: [vorbis-dev] comment field proposal, Fri 12 May 2000 - 
14:36:17 PDT).

As Monty pointed out, the Comment field is currently being used to identify 
the vendor.  Why not keep this comment field for technical information 
only, and use the XML field for information and MetaData?

I don't know how viable this is, and I guess it's up to Monty to draw
the line.

Just my thoughts, I'll go back to reading now.
Adam

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On Sat 17 Jun 2000 Adam Scriven opined:
> Hey all. 
     Ok, so I'll stand up and be counted a newbie in this list too (just
did the 
     same for the General discussion list). I (once again) read through
the 
     archives, especially the ones concerning the comment field. 

     First, I'm not a developer, per se. I'm merely an anal-retentive
power 
     user of such things, who likes to have my music archived, and sorted. 
> In reading through the comment tags discussion, I noticed that, once
> you allow one thing, everyone else jumps in with what's important to
> them, and you start to duplicate the proposed XML MetaData stream
> unnecessarily. Having a short field for identification purposes is a
> lofty goal, but one, I think, that is harder to reach than would seem 
> apparent. One person noted that he has 8 copies of an Orbital song (pls. 
> correct me if I'm wrong, I can't seem to find the reference again),
> and so merely having ARTIST/SONG TITLE in the comment field would not
> be enough for unique identification, but to go any further leads down
> the slippery slope of "Genre's critical for me", and
"What about Track
> Number". 
I'm a newbie too, but fwiw, I think Monty's decision is a good
compromise.
The rest can be left to practice. And note that there is a recommended
"VERSION" field for just the situation you describe.

I suppose "DESCRIPTION" can be used for issues like the composer and
so on
in classical recordings? The "ARTIST" field is a little confusing for
that
context. Should the conductor be credited as an artist?

If I'm encoding from CD, I do want CDDBID and TRACKNUMBER fields, but
perhaps they're insufficiently general to deserve mention in the formal
documentation. Maybe wait and see what extensions become commonly
accepted?

another $0.02,
 -ralph


--
now subscribed to the list. aiigh! I'm being sucked in! :-)

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Dan Conti wrote :
>    Just a quick comment on this.
>      
>    ARTIST should refer to the person or persons who played the piece in
>    question. A seperate field, such as ORIGINALARTIST or COMPOSER or
something
>    similar would be better fit than using a generic DESCRIPTION field for a
>    specific purpose. Note that the scenario described also applies to
covers.
>    On a seperate note, I would recommend at least two or three GENRE
fields,
>    with some sort of order placed on them.
I you are going into any details , then forget ARTIST and add PERFORMER,
COMPOSER, etc...
The term ARTIST is too vague ( which artist ? the singer, drummer or
guitar
player ? maybe the one who wrote the music ? or the lyrics ? what about
the
guy who drawed the CD cover ... )

But then it might be too complex for people who just want one field to
enter "Metallica" :-)

david balazic

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