Skip to main content

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Can't get ARTISTSORT to work (Read 7523 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Hi all,

I'm trying to get my artist to sort properly. Of course, I want that to happen across my various players, so I'm trying to figure tags that work across the board.

MusicBrainz claim that ARTISTSORT and ALBUMARTISTSORT are what I should use, see very bottom of last post :
http://forums.musicbrainz.org/viewtopic.php?pid=12090#p12090

My tagger, Mp3tag, also support ARTISTSORT and ALBUMARTISTSORT :
http://help.mp3tag.de/main_tags.html

My SqueezeBox also support ARTISTSORT and ALBUMARTISTSORT :
http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/Slim...erSupportedTags
http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.p...bum-Artist-Sort

And finally, Foobar2000 also support ARTISTSORT and ALBUMARTISTSORT in recent versions :
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....showtopic=88002

So, I take a few files from my FLAC collection, add the ARTISTSORT to the files as such :
Code: [Select]
ARTISTSORT = "Rossini, Gioacchino"

I'm using Foobar2000 v1.1.11, default setting, default skin. I've checked that the FLAC/Vorbis metadata mode is set to "More compatible with various software".

I exit Foobar, I restart, and my artist don't want to sort according to the new tag in the "Album List" window. I tried by artist or by genre, does not work, artist are always listed by the ARTIST field, not the ARTISTSORT field.

When I open the property for the artist, I can see in the list of tags :
Code: [Select]
+--------------+-----------------------------+
| <ARTISTSORT> | Rossini, Gioacchino         |
+--------------+-----------------------------+


So, the tag was read by Foobar in the file, but completely ignored for sorting. I'm quite puzzled as I don't understand why it does not work as advertised. I would expect such problem with ID3, but not with VorbisComment !

Thanks in advance,

Jean


Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #1
You can add your own patterns (or change the existing ones) in Preferences -> Media Library -> Album List.

Is that what you are looking for?

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #2
You can add your own patterns (or change the existing ones) in Preferences -> Media Library -> Album List.

Is that what you are looking for?


I'm looking for Foobar2000 to support the ARTISTSORT and ALBUMARTISTSORT tags as specified by the standard. Nothing more, nothing less.
I included a few links to describe the function in my original e-mail, maybe that was not enough :
http://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewtopic...f=4&t=45736
http://forums.mp3tag.de/index.php?showtopic=10624
http://www.blisshq.com/music-library-manag...e-than-one-way/

I don't know if changing the pattern would work, because those tags work in interesting way. If using ARTISTSORT, the field that should display the content ARTIST, however it should be sorted according to ARTISTSORT. When looking at the patter reference, it does not seem that it can differentiate between displaying and sorting, therefore it does not look like it can support this function.

Regards,

Jean

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #3
It depends upon whether the specific UI element that you are using supports the behaviour of displaying one field while sorting by another.

This is not something that is strictly specific to foobar2000’s core itself, and neither is it a bug therein; so, I’ve moved this out of Support.

I don’t believe the Default UI or the bundled Album List support this. Columns UI should, and by extension I imagine NG Playlist will. Perhaps there are others that can; have a look.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #4
It depends upon whether the specific UI element that you are using supports the behaviour of displaying one field while sorting by another.

This is not something that is strictly specific to foobar2000’s core itself, and neither is it a bug therein; so, I’ve moved this out of Support


Fair enough, I thought I was doing something wrong as I saw people saying that it was supported.

I don’t believe the Default UI or the bundled Album List support this.


Ok, no problem.

Columns UI should, and by extension I imagine NG Playlist will. Perhaps there are others that can; have a look.


I tried switching UI, and I don't see how it help. The Album List look exactly the same, and still does not take those tag into account while sorting the lists. Yes, I know that you can sort playlist, but that's not something I would ever use. Maybe I missed how Columns UI could provide an enhanced Album List, please tell me.

Thanks a lot for the useful information.

Jean

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #5
foobar2000 supports completely arbitrarily named fields, so you don't need support for some specific fields like in other software. What you need to do is to define your own sorting strings using the fields you want to use. So you need to specify your own sorting string for the Album List using the ARTISTSORT/ALBUMARTISTSORT fields. Technically you need to create a new view in Preferences->Media Library->Album List. You can take one of the predefined ones, for example "by artist/album":
Code: [Select]
[%album artist% - ]['['%date%']' ]%album%|[[%discnumber%.]%tracknumber%. ][%track artist% - ]%title%

You now need to make sure this view actually uses your metadata field ARTISTSORT/ALBUMARTISTSORT. So hit the "Add New" button on the Album List preferences page, and enter a nice descriptive name like "by artistsort" or something. Now alter the example above accordingly, like this:
Code: [Select]
[$if3(%albumartistsort,%artistsort%,%album artist%) - ]['['%date%']' ]%album%|[[%discnumber%.]%tracknumber%. ][%track artist% - ]%title%

This means when using the "artistsort" view, the Album List will sort based on ALBUMARTISTSORT, ARTISTSORT and ALBUM ARTIST with decreasing precedence. Generally you likely want to replace any occurrence of %album artist% (and maybe %artist%) with $if3(%albumartistsort,%artistsort%,%album artist%).

You can of course define your own views in any fashion you like. Please refer to the Title Formatting Reference for more information.
It's only audiophile if it's inconvenient.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #6
You now need to make sure this view actually uses your metadata field ARTISTSORT/ALBUMARTISTSORT. So hit the "Add New" button on the Album List preferences page, and enter a nice descriptive name like "by artistsort" or something. Now alter the example above accordingly, like this:
Code: [Select]
[$if3(%albumartistsort,%artistsort%,%album artist%) - ]['['%date%']' ]%album%|[[%discnumber%.]%tracknumber%. ][%track artist% - ]%title%

This means when using the "artistsort" view, the Album List will sort based on ALBUMARTISTSORT, ARTISTSORT and ALBUM ARTIST with decreasing precedence. Generally you likely want to replace any occurrence of %album artist% (and maybe %artist%) with $if3(%albumartistsort,%artistsort%,%album artist%).


Nice try, but it does not work according to the spec. I tried it, and what is shown in the Album List is the ARTISTSORT instead of the ARTIST. The ARTISTSORT should never be visible (otherwise, you would just put the content directly into the ARTIST tag).

Thanks a lot !

Jean

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #7
Yes, because, as I said, you need to use a UI element that supports distinct strings for both display and sort.

It’s up to you whether you want to wait for someone who knows more than me to suggest such a thing, or browse the wiki and other resources for information.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #8
If you would follow the advice presented above for the second time you would be done. I use neither NG Playlist [cui only] or ESPlaylist [dui and cui]. However, a quick viewing of their preferences shows what, to these eyes, are clear indications that both decouple presentation columns from sorting and both should do exactly as you want.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #9
I think he's looking for a Media Library viewer with that functionality, not a Playlist viewer.
It's only audiophile if it's inconvenient.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #10
I highly doubt you can do that visually using the Album List Viewer (since you cannot define a custom sorting pattern there by default - at least not something which is invisible). But the generated playlist itself will be sorted properly (if force-sorting is enabled, and the syntax which Kohlrabi gave you is used) regardless.

The only workaround I found so far for some really basic (but invisible) sorting is putting the tab character in front of the string, which puts it to the top of the list. The more tabs you have, the higher the priority is. But since you probably don't want to replace each of your artists' names manually, I doubt this would work.

But maybe someone else can come up with something based on this.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #11
uhm, what about facets?

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #12
Jean, do you still have any problem with sorting? Facets are surely capable of sorting by any field you'd like to, recently I didn't have much time for foobar/music but I remember its simple to set up and I could help you if there was any problem. Facets is popular media library viewer anyway so you won't miss with that.

Btw correct fields to be used with foobar are ARTISTSORTORDER, TITLESORTORDER, ALBUMARTISTSORTORDER, ALBUMSORTORDER. Those write into proper frame of ID3v2.3 / 2.4 tags. If you tag only Vorbis and APE, it doesnt matter much. More proper field names you can find at table for my project and ID3 tag mapping reference.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #13
Jean, do you still have any problem with sorting?


I was planning to give up, I did not realise that almost nobody understand and use those tags.

Facets are surely capable of sorting by any field you'd like to, recently I didn't have much time for foobar/music but I remember its simple to set up and I could help you if there was any problem. Facets is popular media library viewer anyway so you won't miss with that.


Thanks a lot for the suggestion, I'll try that. From a quick read of the documentation, it's not obvious how to do sorting, as it seem the documentation more concerned with stripping the "The" than anything else (which most likely works only in english).

Btw correct fields to be used with foobar are ARTISTSORTORDER, TITLESORTORDER, ALBUMARTISTSORTORDER, ALBUMSORTORDER. Those write into proper frame of ID3v2.3 / 2.4 tags.


Mp3tag, SqueezeBox and MusicBrainz seem to disagree with you on that ;-) I'm not pedantic, I'll use whatever works at the end of the day.

If you tag only Vorbis and APE, it doesnt matter much. More proper field names you can find at table for my project and ID3 tag mapping reference.


I'm using FLAC and Vorbis, staying as far away of the ID3 as possible, life is too short. I'm in general following the Vorbis recommendation, adding whatever seems to work across the software and devices I use :
http://xiph.org/vorbis/doc/v-comment.html

Thanks again,

Jean


Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #14
Here

Install facets. Go to settings and create or modify Album and Album sort columns.

Don't use what I have there, instead of that fill Album with pattern %album% and Album Sort with pattern %albumsort%. Green box only. Ok.

Go to GUI. Set facets to display multiple columns (Right click on column name...) and check Album and Album Sort. You shall see only those two. Click on Album Sort column name to sort list by Album Sort. Move Album Sort to the left and with slider between them over-cover whole Album Sort album with Album. Voila! Sounds complicated but its easy, believe me.


fig.2


I skipped blue box. This is the sort string which works for sorting items in your playlist. So far we sorted only files in facets, not in playlist. So fill blue box with pattern by Kohlrabi - the sorting one. Everything should work now.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #15
Install facets.


Thanks for your detailed and great help, there was a few details that had eluded me. The multi-colum trick took me a while to set in. The interface is very powerful, but with great power comes great learning curve...

Don't use what I have there, instead of that fill Album with pattern %album% and Album Sort with pattern %albumsort%.


Actually, the patterns that seem to work are the following :

Code: [Select]
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Artist sort       | [$if2(%artistsort%,%artist%)]                                       |
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Album Artist sort | [$if3(%albumartistsort%,$meta(ALBUM ARTIST),%artistsort%,%artist%)] |
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+


Unfortunately, the last pattern will work only with the way I tagged my FLAC files. If you use another tag name or if you use ID3, all bets are off. It would be convenient if %albumartistsort% would be automatically remapped cleverly the same way %album artist% remap to %artist%.

Lastly, if you want to alternate between the genre view and the artist view (as I do often), you have to reset the columns which is suboptimal.

Thanks a lot for your expert help, I would not have been able to do it without you. I'll play more when I'll get time.

Jean

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #16
It was brief, glad you made it and created better patterns for Album sort and A.A. sort!

Lastly, if you want to alternate between the genre view and the artist view (as I do often), you have to reset the columns which is suboptimal.


You don't have to! Can you see in second picture of my post three tabs above facets? They are called Audiotheca, Incoming, To be tagged. Under each of tab is different facet. You can do the same: In layout editing mode, add Tabs to the place where you have facets. One tab you can name "Album" the other one "Artist" - under Album add facets with Album columns, under Artist add facets with Artists columns. Then you can just switch tab and have different sorting. Hope that helps too.

Can't get ARTISTSORT to work

Reply #17
Actually, the patterns that seem to work are the following :

Code: [Select]
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Artist sort       | [$if2(%artistsort%,%artist%)]                                       |
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Album Artist sort | [$if3(%albumartistsort%,$meta(ALBUM ARTIST),%artistsort%,%artist%)] |
+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+

Generally you likely want to replace any occurrence of %album artist% (and maybe %artist%) with $if3(%albumartistsort,%artistsort%,%album artist%).

Glad you used my suggestion after all.
Though I don't really see why ALBUM ARTIST should take precedence over ARTISTSORT. From my understanding ALBUMARTISTSORT and ARTISTSORT are intended to do essentially the same thing, and you just decide which one to use.
It's only audiophile if it's inconvenient.