MediaMonkey forum

Apologies for reporting this, but I couldn't find any reference.

In MM 3.0.2.1134 on Win2k3, when I update any of the year tags it creates the entires twice. I am navigating straight to the files in the browser and am not using the library.

I am using Mp3tag to look at the id3v2.3 frames.
If I clear out YEAR and ORIGYEAR frame, refresh MM I see that my Date and Orig Date are blanked. I then set both Date and Orig Date, and when I look at the extended tags in Mp3tag I will see doubling like so:

ALBUM = American Polka
ARTIST = Elliot Sharp
BAND = Elliot Sharp
GENRE = Album Rock
ORIGYEAR = 1905
ORIGYEAR = 1905
POPULARIMETER=no@email|26|0
TITLE = Happy Chappie Polks
TRACK = 24
YEAR = 1900
YEAR = 1900



If I only set the Date and not Original Date, then only the YEAR fields are dupped.

I have added these lines to MediaMonkey.ini but I still have the problem reported in post 1

[MP3Tagging]
DisableFrames=TDAT;TDRC
EnableFrames=TYER

After you put that setting into your INI, MM has to rewrite the tags. So if you use the "Synchornize Tags... (CTRL+S)" feature on track, it should rewrite the tag and remove the disabled frames. Check that file in the other program and it should then correctly show only one year. If that works correctly, then you'll have to do the rest of your files like this.

Still don't work, very strange, I will give you an example

Step 1.
New clean library
Properties in MM and columns
Date=2008-05-30
Original date=2007

Metadata (Alt-T) in Mp3tAG 2.43
Date=2008-05-30
Original date=2007

Step 2.
Just open properties in MM and click OK => new timestamp
Properties in MM and columns
Date=2008-05-30
Original date=2007

Metadata (Alt-T) in Mp3tAG 2.43 (date is converted to Year and original date is duplicated)
Date=2008
Original date=2007
Original date=2007

Step 3. Rescan or Synchronize => No change
Step 4. Delete album
Step 5. Rescan (add the album again)
Properties in MM and columns
Date=2008
Original date=2007

Yes, I see now - for some reason it seems the original year tag is written twice (MM help indicates it should only be written once).

http://www.ventismedia.com/mantis/view.php?id=5822

nohitter151 wrote:Yes, I see now - for some reason it seems the original year tag is written twice (MM help indicates it should only be written once).

http://www.ventismedia.com/mantis/view.php?id=5822

k, thx

So if I want to keep my date in YYYY-MM-DD format it's better to remove the lines in above post and live with the extra field until this BUG is fixed. It's easy to delete the extra field in Mp3tag but it is not so fun to replace YYYY with a proper YYYY-MM-DD date.

We're talking ID3v2.3 here, so "YEAR: YYYY" & "DATE: DDMM" is proper.

Mizery_Made wrote:We're talking ID3v2.3 here, so "YEAR: YYYY" & "DATE: DDMM" is proper.

I must be very stupid
I tried to understand About Track Properties in the Help file. Is it so that the field Date in columns (view options) and in properties actually is a Year field and Date (DDMM) is not used in MM? And therefore are Date converted to Year (YYYY). My date inf. comes from MusicBrainz.

MediaMonkey's writing of releases dates is a mess, in my opinion. It's written into a TDRC frame, which is a ID3v2.4 frame when MM is writing a ID3v2.3 frame. I believe it also writes to one of the ID3v2.3 frames as well, which is why some programs show a duplicate Year field. I believe it was said this behavior was for "compatibility." I still don't understand that one.

TDRC is for the Recording Time of a track, which is still being used improperly by MM. TDRL is the 2.4 frame for "Release Time" which I feel better fits the Year/Date field. There's also TDOR which is "Original Release Time," which would work for Original Year I feel.

However, I think MM should really write 2.3 specified frames by default, not this non-standard use of a 2.4 frame alongside 2.3 frames. However, that help article is a little off and really needs to be changed, because it has you disabling the 2.3 frame needed to save full dates to the tags.
That's what should be used. It disables the writing of the 2.4 frame (TDRC) while forcing the writing of the two standard 2.3 tags. Entering a date of "06/29/2009" in the Date field in MediaMonkey should (by default in my opinion) write that information to TYER (Year) 2009 & TDAT (Date) 2906. That's the correct way to store this information in 2.3 tags. Instead we get the non-standard use of TDRC, and even in the article telling you how to fix that, they improperly have you disabling the 2.3 frame that would save Day and Month into your tags.

An excellent summary of the problem as I too see it. Devs, there have been calls for some times for this mess to be sorted. It would be nice to hear there is some intent to do so.

To also solve the problem of Original Year being saved twice, the MP3Tagging section in MediaMonkey.ini should look like this:

[MP3Tagging]
DisableFrames=TDRC;TDOR;
EnableFrames=TYER;TDAT;TORY;

This disables the ID3v2.4 TDOR which MM is using for Original Year, and enables use of the ID3v2.3 TORY, intended for original release year.

Reproduced here on 1256 with the install-default [MP3Tagging] .ini section.