Plugin adds several commands to MusicBee main menu for extended tag editing, exporting them to external applications, gathering library statistics, making (auto)backups of tags, etc.
Be careful to not ACCIDENTALLY tick some "Advanced Search & Replace" or "Library Reports" presets for AUTOMATIC EXECUTION! THIS CAN SILENTLY CHANGE TAGS OF TRACKS! See details in plugin description.
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If you are familiar with plugin quick update process, you can always download latest plugin version here. Copy the file "mb_TagTools.dll" from the archive "mb_TagTools_latest.zip" to MusicBee "Plugins" folder, and overwrite the existing file.
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Pay attention to tool tips over buttons/fields in plugin windows.
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Add-on description is limited to 15000 characters. Read full description, or read shortened description here and follow the links to description supplements in the text below.
Plugin adding/updating/removing
Extract the content of the downloaded archive to a temporary folder of your choice. See the "README FIRST!" file inside this folder for instructions on adding/updating/removing the plugin.
TAGGING & REPORTING TOOLS
Copy Tag
Allows you to copy one tag to another for selected files. Its possible to append one tag to the end of another tag or add one tag to the beginning of another tag placing custom text between them. Also its possible to use <Null> pseudo tag as the source to append static text to the destination tag.
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Swap Tags
Swaps any two tags for selected files.
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Change Case
Changes letter case of a tag according to rather sophisticated rules for selected tracks.
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Library Reports
Allows to export some library statistics for currently displayed tracks to external file: HTML document (as a table), M3U playlist (its only possible to export file paths to playlists, but considering filtering capability of command this option may be useful), CSV file. This may be used for reimporting table in spreadsheet editor (including HTML table - its the easiest way to import track list to MS Excel) for printing statistics or just content of your library, filtered content of library or your playlists.
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Also, "Library Reports" allows to calculate one or more presets and save results to (custom) tags at startup/after a given number of tag changes/or manually. Useful for autosaving or manual saving such values as "Summary play counts of albums" or "Number of tracks for each artist", etc. to (custom) tags, i.e. it's some analog of virtual tags with the ability to operate not only on tags of current track, but on tags of all tracks.
"Library Reports" supports multiple item splitters for grouping tags. For example, you can define splitter ; for "artist" or "'genre" tags to split multiple artists or genres. If several tags are split (i.e., several tags for one track may have several values) then all possible combinations of split values for every tag will be included in LR report.
"Library Reports" supports virtual tag expressions (any expressions valid for virtual tags).
Read more about "Library Reports" virtual tag expressions
"Library Reports" command adds new virtual tag function:
$LR(<URL>,function_id)
To use this function open library reports window, create one or several presets, each with one or several aggregate functions and assign a function id (any string containing a-z chars, numbers and symbols . : - _ ) to functions. Probably you will want to write all aggregate functions to <Null> tag (i.e. do not write them to any tags at all if you use these functions only for virtual tags).
"Library Reports" virtual tag functions allow to gather and display in the main panel some library statistics for currently displayed tracks.
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Example 1
If you want to get the number of albums of artist of displayed track, i.e. the number of albums (function "Count" of (parameter) tag "Album") per artist (tag "Album Artist"), you should add grouping tag "Album Artist" in the table and required function "Count(Album)".
Example 2
If you want to get the number of releases of artist (of displayed track) per year, i.e. the number of albums (function "Count" of (parameter) tag "Album") per year (tag "Year") per artist (tag "Album Artist"), you should add grouping tags (in order) "Album Artist" and "Year" in the table and required function "Count(Album)".
Example 3
If you want to get the total duration of all tracks of artist of displayed track, i.e. the sum of track durations (function "Sum" of tag "Time") per artist (tag "Album Artist"), you should add grouping tag "Album Artist" and function "Sum(Time)".
See two predefined presets "LIBRARY TOTALS" and "LIBRARY AVERAGES" of "Library Reports" command for more examples.
LR virtual tag functions may be even more useful if they are used in grouping header in "Albums and Tracks" view.
Make sure that you haven't accidentally checked some "Library Reports" presets for auto-execution. You will see warning message at the top of "Library Reports" window if any presets are marked as auto-executed.
Auto-executed preset view example
Auto Rate
Calculates auto rating on the basis of the number of plays per day for selected tracks. Also its possible to auto rate all tracks of your library on MusicBee startup or update auto rating if currently played track is changed.
Another option is to calculate auto ratings defining the percentage of tracks of your library that should be assigned certain rating level (e.g. 1 star, 2 starts, etc.)
Reencode Tag
Even ID3V2 tags are usually stored not in UTF encoding (which is independent of language), but sometimes they are stored using national code pages. In this case reading ID3 tags is correct only if tags use the same encoding (in general - language) as your windows default encoding (code page). This command allows you to convert any incorrectly interpreted not UTF tags to UTF tags. In this command "initial encoding" is the suggested actual encoding of tag and the "used encoding" is incorrectly interpreted encoding of tag (Usually it's your default windows encoding. The only sense to change "used encoding" is if you get music file from another computer with different regional settings).
Reencode Tags
Command to re-encode all tags of selected tracks at ones. Cuesheets are supported.
Advanced Search & Replace
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"Advanced Search & Replace" command adds new virtual tag function:
$ASR(<URL>,preset_id)
To use this function go to main ASR window, select preset and define preset id (any string containing a-z chars, numbers and symbols . : - _ ). Then use function in virtual tags, file organization templates, etc., where preset_id is the id entered in ASR window. ASR preset function will return last written in preset tag. To see last written tag click "Edit/Rename" button in ASR window or (if "Edit/Rename" is disabled) click "Copy" button and view the content of preset copy. Most preset functions will return exactly what you expect.
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Make sure that you haven't accidentally checked some "Advanced Search & Replace" presets for auto-execution. You will see warning message at the top of "Advanced Search & Replace" window if any presets are marked as auto-executed.
Auto-executed preset view example
Multiple Search & Replace
Multi-step search and replace. You can make unlimited number of replacements in the same source tag and write result to a given destination tag. MSR presets can be saved as special ASR presets and can be checked in ASR for auto-execution if any tags are changed or if new tracks are added to the library.
Calculate Average Album Ratings
Command averages all the ratings of the individual tracks on the album writing result in an Album rating. Any tags can be used as album and track ratings. This may be useful for calculating average album rating for auto rating stored in custom tag.
Compare Tracks
Command provides easy way to compare tags of 2 (or more) tracks.
Copy Tags to Clipboard
Copies specified tags from selected files to clipboard.
Paste Tags from Clipboard
Pastes copied to clipboard tags to selected files from clipboard.
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Last Skipped Date/Time
Plugin has the option to store "last skipped date/time" in any writable tag (e.g. some custom tag). Go to MusicBee menu> Edit> Preferences> Plugins> Additional Tagging Tools> Configure. Click the button "Save last skipped date..." at the bottom of plugin settings window.
Plugin strictly follows MusicBee convention of what is "skipped track".
To define date type of custom tag, open MusicBee menu> Edit> Preferences> Tags (1)> Define New Tags> Configure Fields. Find "Custom1" tag (or some other custom tag), change type to "Date".
See here screenshot of this setting.
BACKUP & RESTORE
These commands allow to (auto)backup tags of all tracks in your library and restore them. First create full backup manually. You can do manual or auto incremental backups after this.
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VIRTUAL TAG FUNCTIONS
This plugin introduces several new virtual tag functions (they also can be used in various filename templates, e.g. in the file organizer) like
$Char(hexadecimal code), which returns Unicode character with given hexadecimal code, e.g. $Char(a7) returns Unicode character "§" (U+00A7).
Read more about virtual tag functions here.
ASR SPECIAL FUNCTIONS
You can use special functions in substitution fields of "Advanced Search & Replace" and "Multiple Search & Replace" commands.
Read about ASR special functions here.
APPENDIX
License
Do all you want with plugin binary and source code at your own risk.
Source code
MS VS 2022 project, C#. Most people don't need this.
Backup download
Name | Additional Tagging & Reporting Tools |
Author | boroda |
Version | 7.0 |
Category | Plugins |
Published on | September 3, 2016 |
Updated on | August 27, 2023, 5:17 am |
Supports Minimum | MusicBee 3 |
Unless mentioned by the Author, all add-ons and screenshots are licensed under cc by-sa 3.0