[UNDER DEVELOPMENT] A Replacement for Gracenote CDDB support

[dro]

Just re-checking, Sonic uses ~5.3MB when installed & ~1.3MB of the installer size. That isn't too bad considering what the likes of Nero ended up being but I fully get the point as all of it can be done directly for what's needed in a few 100KB at most

Keeping ripping support make sense (since it's just normal playback being sent to an encoder instead of speakers) but dropping burning support leaves me in a bit of a quandary. As just based on the odd comments in the Enthusiasts group page, some are still trying to use Winamp for burning CDs & removing something that was available to the old pro users doesn't quite sit right (even if there's better options for doing burning anyway), hence my quandary.

But dropping burning support would make it so much easier for me to make a replacement ml_disc which is just focused on viewing / ripping audio CDs (never liked the data CD view as it wasn't nice to use & seemed at odds with Winamp not being able to create data CDs).

-dro

[edit]
fixed last sentence, oops

[Juanus]

Just re-checking, Sonic uses ~5.3MB when installed & ~1.3MB of the installer size. That isn't too bad considering what the likes of Nero ended up being but I fully get the point as all of it can be done directly for what's needed in a few 100KB at most

TOTALLY! Plus, DAE is a bit more stable if you ask me.

Keeping ripping support make sense (since it's just normal playback being sent to an encoder instead of speakers) but dropping burning support leaves me in a bit of a quandary. As just based on the odd comments in the Enthusiasts group page, some are still trying to use Winamp for burning CDs & removing something that was available to the old pro users doesn't quite sit right (even if there's better options for doing burning anyway), hence my quandary.

I understand the quandry as you never want to "REMOVE" features that were there. I am usually not for that, but when you have something as antiquated as burning an MP3 CD AND it was an incomplete feature anyway. I say move on. But that is just me and other people are free to voice their opinions also.

But dropping ripping support would make it so much easier for me to make a replacement ml_disc which is just focused on viewing / ripping audio CDs (never liked the data CD view as it wasn't nice to use & seemed at odds with Winamp not being able to create data CDs).

-dro

You said dropping ripping support, did you mean to say burning support?  Now with all this said, I am usually a fan of "dropping" antiquated things that only serve a few people. (XP support?) Sometimes that puts ME in that minority of people, but sometimes it is time to move on.

[dro]

TOTALLY! Plus, DAE is a bit more stable if you ask me.

Just from my initial re-tests of things, I get decent playback with my basic DAE version compared to the native one with out Sonic being used so I've got to agree on my limited data set

I understand the quandry as you never want to "REMOVE" features that were there. I am usually not for that, but when you have something as antiquated as burning an MP3 CD AND it was an incomplete feature anyway. I say move on. But that is just me and other people are free to voice their opinions also.

Aye, am just aware of some of the past feedback when I had an official hat about how irate people get with things that aren't working or get removed & removing burning support would be a biggy.

You said dropping ripping support, did you mean to say burning support?

I did and I've fixed my above post, thanks

Now with all this said, I am usually a fan of "dropping" antiquated things that only serve a few people. (XP support?) Sometimes that puts ME in that minority of people, but sometimes it is time to move on.

Could say that audio CDs (and Winamp, heh) are well within that but I know people who still use CDs e.g. I've got access to a load of audio CDs due to my gf liking to listen to them at night.

Though just having decent playback / ripping is the main thing I've seen talked about so hopefully you're right that dropping burning support is probably not that big of an issue for most. Have put up a blog post (https://getwacup.com/blog/index.php/2016/12/06/is-maintaining-audio-cd-burning-support-a-good-idea/) & related social media posts to see what others may think.

-dro

[Pawel]

In my opinion it is necessary that Winamp still play/rip Audio CDs. It is must have (however, it seems that soon no one will have DVD drive - at least I don't have, just using external Samsung drive).
Using Windows DAE is a very good idea.


About burning support. For me this is unnecessary feature (to be honest, every CD I burned was just for testing in Winamp translation ). So, it is not a big problem for me. Just remove it!


The most important extra feature of the program for me was auto-taging feature and cover art auto download feature... That was great!
If you implement it and it will work as good as it was in old AOL builds I will be more than happy


-Pawel

[Juanus]

I'm keeping a close eye on this.
Playing/ripping audio CDs is important and useful. I don't see burning CDs to be a thing anymore. And if it will help to reduce the overhead of the program as a whole, that's a win win.

[MarkRH]

For me, playback and ripping would need to stay, and a new auto tagging ability.

I have Burned Audio CDs for my folks but can use Window Media Player for that or something else.

[dro]

Thanks for the comments so far.

From what I've seen so far there seems to be roughly a 50/50 split between views on here vs those from the blog / facebook page on whether burning support should be kept or not.

I'll be keeping an eye on further comments here and elsewhere and will also do a bit more research to see if there's anything free & viable that can be used to if needed provide burning support in any replacements I make. Though everything so far has either been old &/or costly to get a license to be able to use it.

-dro

[Juanus]

You are right, it is about 50/50.
tbh I am surprised at the amount of people who burn AND the amount of people that are using Winamp to do it. Burning is one thing, but the way the functionality worked in Winamp, I think I would have found something different.
You might be the deciding vote in this one.

[dro]

I can see why people do use it as it's generally easier if you've got your library in the program already an can then just send that to a disc as needed.

Due to the general split, I'm going to have to do some proper research into burning options (although not immediately) as there is some demand.

The more important thing is that those who have replied generally want playback / ripping support maintained so at least that's consistent. Though that could be biased based on the habits of those responding but it makes sense to me to maintain at least parity compared to existing playback support

-dro

[dro]

Any progress for a replacement for Gracenotes in the near future?

I spent last night properly looking into this and I've started writing the code needed to make use of the freedb service from freedb.org as well as the equivalent from MusicBrainz via the MusicBrainz to FreeDB gateway

With the few CDs i've tried I've only gotten results from the normal freedb service but I'm going to leverage both of these services (and anything else that comes up from further research / viable suggestions) to try to ensure that if there is applicable information that it can be used in the ripping / playback handling

I'd expect to have a beta version working and included in the WACUP beta builds within the next few weeks... (maybe a bit sooner, maybe a bit later but the coding has started which is the main thing!).

-dro

[Juanus]

Three Cheers for DrO!
AutoTagging is on it's way back! Might be cool (If it is possible) to be able to choose which service you get results from. For example, I only want Musicbrainz tags, but some people might only want freedb tags. And some people might want both.

Re: burning support
I was totally wrong and I apologize to all burning fans. I didn't think that anyone still used that. I wonder if there is a way to implement burning through the windows API so that you don't have to use a depreciated 3rd party plugin.

I feel like I am asking a lot and making a lot of suggestions. I am sorry to put so many random ideas on your plate.

[dro]

AutoTagging is on it's way back! Might be cool (If it is possible) to be able to choose which service you get results from. For example, I only want Musicbrainz tags, but some people might only want freedb tags. And some people might want both.

It's not auto-tagging like I think you're thinking (that would involve other things needing to be done) and this just relates to getting CD info. As there can be variations in the information that either of those two services can provide (which is why I've never liked CD lookup as the data can be really bad at times), it'd have to be exposed as some sort of selectable list to get what's actually wanted as the 'best' solution.

Re: burning support
I was totally wrong and I apologize to all burning fans. I didn't think that anyone still used that. I wonder if there is a way to implement burning through the windows API so that you don't have to use a depreciated 3rd party plugin.

Using IMAPI2 is one of the things I've been considering but it's the hassle in making the new code to do it. Is why I'd prefer to make use of a pre-existing solution which is known to work. As http://cdrtools.sourceforge.net is one of the things that has come up as potentially being viable as there's a few odd Windows gui wrappers around them - so that's one possible option that I've found so far. Until I do more research (or any other suggestions come in) I'm still somewhat uncertain about what to do regarding burning support.

I feel like I am asking a lot and making a lot of suggestions. I am sorry to put so many random ideas on your plate.

I'd rather have that than no feedback at all

-dro

[Juanus]

AutoTagging is on it's way back! Might be cool (If it is possible) to be able to choose which service you get results from. For example, I only want Musicbrainz tags, but some people might only want freedb tags. And some people might want both.

It's not auto-tagging like I think you're thinking (that would involve other things needing to be done) and this just relates to getting CD info. As there can be variations in the information that either of those two services can provide (which is why I've never liked CD lookup as the data can be really bad at times), it'd have to be exposed as some sort of selectable list to get what's actually wanted as the 'best' solution.

Your link to the feedb to musicbrainz gateway had me stumble upon this (Which I am sure you have seen)
https://musicbrainz.org/doc/Development/XML_Web_Service/Version_2
But is it easier to use a gateway instead of using the current APIs?

[EDIT] And could this be a solution to already ripped files for lookups?

[dro]

For CD tagging, the freedb methods is the most common option that I've seen come up so by going with that and the emulated musicbrainz option, I can get something working with both of them (and potentially any alternative solutions that are freedb compatible) with a common code base (i.e. it makes things easier to get started with as the data format coming back should be the same).

For the other method, that is what be used for anything non-CD related (in addition to getting the mbid to start with). I see that it can also be used to do the CD info lookup but I'd then be running with two different implementations to get the equivalent information but in a different format (at least that's how it seems from a brief look - I've probably looked at that page back in 2014 but I don't remember it off-hand).

So for CDs I don't think it's too helpful but for non-CD / file tagging then it would be what would need to be used in part to get an auto-tagging option working.


In simple summary, for CDs it's use a freedb / cddb system and for already ripped files it's use musicbrainz.

-dro

[Dr.Flay]

Being able to find the track info is important even if there is no rip or burn ability.
Playing CDs from CD is still a thing.


The CDDB is always my preferred method because I can use a local copy, and there are many geographic mirrors for the fastest speed.
Exact Audio Copy comes with 2 lookup plugins that use CDDB. Both have different options and are worth comparing for ideas.
EAC also offloads the CD writing to cdrdao.exe as an optional part of the install.
If Winamp or a plugin can pipe the WAVs to an EXE, then you may have a similar optional....er option.