Tips for a Personal Music Archive

[Nicholas Leippe]

On Friday 07 March 2008, Jordan Gunderson wrote:
> Hi Nick et al,
>
> Would you mind sharing your script?  I'd like a way to detect (and mark)
> files that have skips, etc.  I need this (sadly) help me determine which
> CDs I need to purchase again.

Not at all, but I'll have to polish it up a bit. I'll put a short page up and 
post a link to it soon.

> Also, is your approach duplicable with one drive by just ripping twice,
> or does that defeat the point?

That kind of defeats the purpose--getting two opinions. If (as Derek 
mentioned), the accuraterip CRC database is easily accessible, you could 
improve the script to use that mechanism, then you'd only have to rip it once 
(assuming it matches).

> Does anyone have any advice relating to cleaning (and prepping) the
> discs before they are ripped (or reripped)?  Does that stuff you smear
> around on the surface work, and if so, where might I find it?

There have been threads about this before on the list. Regular toothpaste can 
work well as a polish for cds. It is also possible to repair scratches to the 
reflective layer by affixing some Al foil to the label side.

> Also, does anyone have any tips for associating "metadata" with the
> files?  I'd be interested in being able to associate user ratings,
> tagging, etc. to the files --like marking a track as damaged, 4-star,
> Brazilian, child-safe, etc.

The script I have collects the cddb data and uses that to name the files.
Other than that, I use the command line mp3info package 
(http://ibiblio.org/mp3info/) for editing metadata. I don't know what is 
available for ogg/vorbis, but I assume there is something similar.


One approach you might take, is get a nice gui app like k3b, and play with it 
until you can rip a cd exactly the way you like it. Then, figure out exactly 
how it is calling all the helper tools that actually do the work, and work 
that into your own custom script to make it a faster process. (Assuming your 
plan is to rip 100s and not a half-dozen.)


Nick