would mp3 tagging corrupt mp3 bitrate/quality if done improperly?
It could corrupt the first or last part of an mp3 file (fractions of a second), but the majority of the file it could not change the quality of.
Tags shouldn't affect the audio data at all, if they are written properly. The situation spoon describes would be only if something goes wrong during the tagging process.
Depending on where the tag is (beginning or end of the file) and how big it is, the file might have to be totally rewritten in order to add or change tag data. In this case, a new temporary file is created with the modified tags, the old file is deleted, and the new file is renamed. If something goes wrong, like when you're out of disk space, then you could end up with a corrupted file. It's rare, but it happens.
Tags at the beginning of a file, like ID3v2 tags, APEv2 tags, and Vorbis comments often have some extra room built into them so they can be changed without having to create a temp file.
Why do you ask?
Tags shouldn't affect the audio data at all, if they are written properly. The situation spoon describes would be only if something goes wrong during the tagging process.
Depending on where the tag is (beginning or end of the file) and how big it is, the file might have to be totally rewritten in order to add or change tag data. In this case, a new temporary file is created with the modified tags, the old file is deleted, and the new file is renamed. If something goes wrong, like when you're out of disk space, then you could end up with a corrupted file. It's rare, but it happens.
Tags at the beginning of a file, like ID3v2 tags, APEv2 tags, and Vorbis comments often have some extra room built into them so they can be changed without having to create a temp file.
Why do you ask?
Thanks, I understand now. My computer started hanging for a few seconds, while the mp3 tag program was in the process of changing the mp3 tag of the whole album.