[Bug-gnupod] DESC field in iTunesDB

[Richard van den Berg]

When I first started ripping all my CDs I made the decision that the ID3 
genre field was too limiting, so I split my collection into different 
directories named after genres and/or source of the CDs 
(wife/brother/daughter). I have generated several m3u playlists using 
these directory names. Now that I switched to the iPod, this information 
is no longer available to me. So I started to look for a field in the 
iTunesDB that I could use for that purpose. The FDESC and DESC fields 
fit rather nicely. FDESC has a width of 15 characters which is enough 
for me today, but could be limiting in the future. So I patched 
FileMagic.pm to place the full pathname of the mp3 into the DESC field.

I realize that this is a patch for personal purposes, but looking at 
what the DESC field is used for now I wonder if it has a real purpose:

rh{desc}       = __merge_strings({joinby => " ", wspace => "norm", case 
=> "ignore"},($hs->{USLT} || $hs->{ULT}),($nonitunescomment || 
$h->{COMMENT}));

It joins the USLT or ULT field (which are used for lyrics) with the 
$nonitunescomment (which is the ID3v2 COMM field with the iTun* fields 
stripped) or ID3v1 comment. The comments are already stored in the 
iTunesDB in the COMMENT field. Storing lyrics doesn't seem to make much 
sense since the field is only 40 characters wide.

Maybe my patch is not so bad to be applied for everyone? (If so, the 
nonitunescomment code can also be discarded.)

Regards,

Richard

--- FileMagic.pm.org    2009-04-25 14:43:31.000000000 +0200
+++ FileMagic.pm        2009-04-29 16:49:38.000000000 +0200
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@
 use strict;
 use Unicode::String;
 use MP3::Info qw(:all);
+use File::Spec;
 use GNUpod::FooBar;
 use GNUpod::QTfile;
 
@@ -516,7 +517,7 @@
        $rh{artist}     = ($hs->{TPE1} || $hs->{TP1} || $hs->{TPE2}   || 
$hs->{TP2} || $h->{ARTIST}  || "Unknown Artist");
        $rh{genre}      = _get_genre($hs->{TCON} || $hs->{TCO} || $h->{GENRE}   
|| "");
        $rh{comment}    = ($hs->{COMM} || $hs->{COM} || $h->{COMMENT} || "");
-       $rh{desc}       = __merge_strings({joinby => " ", wspace => "norm", 
case => "ignore"},($hs->{USLT} || $hs->{ULT}),($nonitunescomment || 
$h->{COMMENT}));
+       $rh{desc}       = File::Spec->rel2abs($file);
        $rh{composer}   = ($hs->{TCOM} || $hs->{TCM} || "");
        $rh{playcount}  = int($hs->{PCNT} || $hs->{CNT}) || 0;
        if($hs->{REPLAYGAIN_TRACK_GAIN} ne "") {