Observations using Sonas reading B2 NAS (filenames, metadata tags)

[Jon Degenhardt]

New B2 user. Been setting up Sonas to use the B2 NAS as a music library. Overall works fine, but a few glitches here and there. Have a few observations that might be helpful to others. (Note: I'm new to using NAS music libraries.) In no particular order:

• Sonos appears to occasionally have trouble with track files ending with a right parenthesis. That is, ending in ").flac". Not always, but in a number of cases on my system. Renaming the track fixed the cases I saw.
• Sonos uses the metadata tags included by the B2 in flac files when constructing its  index.
• Renaming a track on the B2 often updates the "TITLE" metadata tag, but not always. (Haven't figured out when.)

Here's an example of metadata tags in a B2 flac file (shown using the linux 'metaflac' command line tool):

# metaflac --export-tags-to=- '01 Back in the U.S.S.R.flac'

ARTIST=The Beatles
ALBUMARTIST=The Beatles
ALBUM=The Beatles CD1
TITLE=01 Back in the U.S.S.R
YEAR=1984

Here's an example where the TITLE tag was not updated after renaming the track:

# metaflac --export-tags-to=- '01 Searching for a Heart -- Don Henley.flac'
ARTIST=Warren Zevon Tribute Artists
ALBUMARTIST=Warren Zevon Tribute Artists
ALBUM=Enjoy Every Sandwich- The Songs of Warren Zevon
TITLE=01 Searching for a Heart (Don Henley)
YEAR=1984

This track file was previously named ending with "(Don Henley).flac", which gave Sonos trouble. Sonos was able to index it after renaming the track file to end in "-- Don Henley.flac".  However, Sonos still shows the song name with the parenthesis form, picked up apparently from the TITLE tag. The TITLE tag was not modified by the rename operation, which was done via the web UI. However, the TITLE tag had been updated as part of an earlier rename, as the "(Don Henley)" postfix was added via rename post ripping & DB lookup. (It's a compilation album, so the intent was to list the artist for each track.)

--Jon

[JFBUK]

Hi Jon,

when the B2 rips a CD it does populate some of the metadata tags,  - Artist, Title, Album, Year, Album Artist .

However when you rename a track, artist or album the changes are not reflected in the tags only in the file and folder names on the B2 HDD.

Its a different part of the Brennan software that handles renames of tracks already ripped and it does not update the tags.

The B2 does not give you any control over file naming when it rips.

This is one of the reasons I prefer to rip on my PC and then upload the tracks to my B2.

I can populate more tags and configure track names based on the tag values. Particularly useful for compilation albums

I favour dBPoweramp to do this but there is other software that can do the job, e.g. EAC

My preferred naming scheme is to use [ ] around the artist name

You can use software like MP3Tag to edit tags for existing tags and rename based on those tags, including editing tags  and names across multiple selected tracks at once.

Again there is other software that will do this as well.

Why Sonos does not like a name ending in ) but I suspect its because a name ending in ) has a special significance to the Sonos software.

John

[Jon Degenhardt]

Hi John,

Thanks for the suggestions and tips about software like MP3Tag. I'll look into them.

I think now I was incorrect about Sonos having trouble with right parens in file names. More likely a different effect that I happened to notice after using parens in a compilation album. Sorry for the confusion.

What was likely happening is that Sonos indexed the music library after the files were ripped, but before they were compressed. The uncompressed .wav files do not have metadata tags, so Sonos cannot find the artist and album info for those tracks. (Best I can tell, Sonos constructs its index entirely from the metadata in the track files, not from the directory hierarchy.)

Why I saw some but not all renames reflected in B2 generated tags is likely related. I'm guessing that the B2 generates the tags as part of compression, not as part of renaming. So, renames done immediately after ripping, but before compression are reflected in the tag names, but renames after compression are not.

The lessons: Try to do basic renaming immediately after ripping, before compression. And wait until compression is done before having Sonos index the library.

It would be nice if the B2 renaming algorithms updated the tags, perhaps as a background/standby mode task.

--Jon

[Daniel Taylor]

Hi Jon,

Great observations about the WAVs not being tagged, so the tags must be added at compression time, and the ramifications.

I'd not ever read about anybody noticing that before.  And it totally makes sense.  Thanks!