I'm editing the Chapters/Menus of several .m4b files.
Here is my Problem: No matter what Program I use to add/delete Chapters, mp3tag will upon opening the file add the old chapters that were in the file to begin with.
I tried stripping the file completely of all chapter information, Nero and Quicktime. I use mpeg4ip for this and confirmed it strips the chapter information with MediaInfo. In case MediaInfo was having a fluke I confirmed that they really are stripped with a bunch of players, none of them show any chapter information.
The only way I got it working somehow, was like this:
Edit the chapters in Drax, which uses Quicktime, and then exporting the chapters in Drax into a plain text file.
Use mpeg4ip to strip both Nero and Quicktime chapters.
Use mp3tag to strip remaining old Nero chapters, where ever these are coming from.
Import the exported Quicktime chapters with Drax.
Use mpeg4ip to convert Quicktime to Nero chapters.
My questions here is, where does mp3tag get the Nero chapters from after they have been stripped with mpeg4ip and all programs can't find any chapters anymore? Are there several places in the m4b file where Nero chapter information is stored?
No, it's only one place. Can you provide an example file with has no chapters (Nero and Quicktime) where Mp3tag re-adds the chapters upon opening the file?
I had to re-encode the file to a smaller size and it's uploading right now. I kindly ask for your patience as my internet is slow as a snail... I will send you a link to info@mp3tag.de, with the download link.
After re-encoding the problem seems to be slightly different, but in the same spirit I guess.
The Nero chapters of the file are removed via mpeg4ip and do not show up with MediaInfo. Upon opening the file with mp3tag it creates the Nero chapters, but as you can see in MediaInfo with different names compared to the Quicktime chapters. I did not delete any of the Quicktime chapters, so the number of chapters are the same. If I had deleted some of the Quicktime chapters, this deletion would have not propagated to the Nero chapters, so I believe mp3tag is not simply converting Quicktime to Nero, which is also evident from the different chapter names.
On the original file, which I unfortunately can't upload as it would take me days, stripping the chapters via mpeg4ip (Both Nero and Quicktime), will result in mp3tag recreating the Nero chapters.
I suggest you open the file with something else than mp3tag first, to confirm that there are indeed no Nero chapters present.
There is of course the possibility that mp3tag is doing everything right here and mpeg4ip, as well as MediaInfo just don't show the correct info on the Nero chapters and they are indeed not stripped correctly from the file.
Thanks for the example file. As far as I can see, the file has a tags atom (offset 312911843) which indicates a Nero tag. Besides usual metadata, this tag also contains cover art and several tseg atoms which contain the Test 1 to Test 22 title and track fields.
Using Utils → Strip MP4 chapters from the Mp3tag context menu removes the chapters.
There is of course the possibility that mp3tag is doing everything right here and mpeg4ip, as well as MediaInfo just don't show the correct info on the Nero chapters and they are indeed not stripped correctly from the file.
It is such a shame that this chapterization is not all standardized in the Format and the other programs are misbehaving, but of course mp3tag is not at fault here.
Thanks for clearing this up and your tremendous work on the project. I have been using it since forever it seems.