I was just curious.
Tagging Formats
For me, as an example, I absolutely DESPISE
APE tags. I will rage to myself about how stupid people are, wondering why they'd use an inferior tag format (to
ID3v2), much less use a tag format that isn't NEARLY as widely used or recognised. Apparently there is an
APEv2 now, but I've yet to come across it. Either way, the standard
APE appends the tag data at the end of the file? How does that make sense? Just in my head alone I am thinking the program playing the files must read the entire file if it is played from the disk, or must pre-buffer every time to find that thing at the end but it also has to specifically know to look for that. Just stupid.
My preference is for
ID3v2 UTF-16; I can encode everything I want in any language and it is recognised by practically everything.
What Tags to Encode
Album and Track Title
How specific do yous get here? Do you go with what it should have been titled or do you go with what the actual track is listed as? Example, in German, even with song titles, you use normal capitalisation rules meaning only nouns (regardless of being proper or improper) are capitalised (but not pronouns). However if a band is from Germany but uses an English song title, do you use English capitalisation conventions (all words capitalised or all words except articles, etc) or German capitalisation conventions? Say this track of mine as an example, „Ich bin den ewigen Tränenreichen‟ or "I Am the Eternal Lacrimosa". The first word is always capitalised in German but the only other noun in the title is "Tränenreichen", but let's just say my band was based in Germany and I decided to use the English title. Would you tag it "I Am the Eternal Lacrimosa" or "I am the eternal Lacrimosa"?
Personally, I typically go with the conventions of the language that the title is in. There are exceptions where the capitalisation of the title is relevant (say "hIV+", the album title for an album by Havoc Unit).
Also, do you include in the track field any sort of extra information like "(featuring So-and-So)" for guest appearances, especially when listed as such on the album; or "(Such-and-Such-Band Cover)" for cover songs?
Artist and Album Artist
Do you guys use both of these fields? Do you use each one differently? In most cases, both fields are identical to me but I still use both even when they're identical, but I always put the proper band/artist name in the artist field and if there are multiple bands with the same name, in the album artist field, I will put the 3 letter country code as well. Example: Quo Vadis (Can) and Quo Vadis (Pol) both have the same name in the artist field but the country code added in the Album Artist field.
What about artists by name, do you put the last name first or the first name first? Me, I always put the first name first, Example: Richard Wagner and not Wagner, Richard. Part of this reason for me is I like both Clara Schumann and Robert Schumann. So if I want to listen to Clara Schumann and not Robert, I'm thinking Clara Schumann so instantly, type in "cla" and get there without having to worry with accidentally clicking the wrong one. Or what about a band with a name that begins with an article such as "the" or something? The Embraced for example I put as "The Embraced" as opposed to "Embraced, The".
Track and Disknumber
How do you list the track numbers? For me, it has to be 1, 2, 3 etc. I cannot stand 01, 02, 03... and I absolutely loathe either format listed as 1/10, 2/10... or 01/10... 02/10... and so on. It is just really bleh to me and irrelevant as when I load an album into a media player, I will load alphabetically by track and I have the tracks saved as '01 - Song Title'.
I am the same way with disk numbers, must be 1, 2, 3 not 1/1 or 1/2, 2/2. I also always put a disk number even if there is only one disk.
Composer
Do you ever fill this field in? I do for each individual track if I can find the information.
Publisher
I also use this field. However, do you put the original publisher or do you put the publisher for the version you have? I put the publisher for the version I have, unless the version I have is no different than the original in which case I put the original.
Album Art
Use it? I do too, and I always have to have the original album cover with at least 500x500 px.
Other Tags
Do you use these too? Like lyric tags or anything like that? I don't use any others other than what I mentioned, but I am still curious as to others that other people use.
File Naming and Organisation
How do you name/organise your files?
Personally, I use Music Folder > Artist (Country Code if Necessary) > (Year) Album Title > music files.
For the actual music file name, I use the format string
$num(%track%,2) - $replace(%title%,:, -,/,_) which may differ on Mp3 tagging programs or mp3 reading programs, but that's just what I use in
Mp3Tag for converting the tag to file name. The actual name comes out as:
01 - Song Title.mp3.
So my overall organisation looks like:
Music Folder\Quo Vadis (Pol)\(1997) Uran\
01 - Intro.mp3
02 - Uran.mp3
[...]
06 - Nie każdy
[...]
14 - Człowiek swoim wrogiem.mp3