I think it should be possible, I am thinking in something similar to the "bonus track" field, although I need to revisit that part as I don't remember how it was implemented back in the day (heh, lol).
About the reported issues:
Regarding the date issues, I need to check that part, as when it implemented it really gave me some headaches as it had some, er, "quirks" to be addressed to function as expected - maybe I missed something while trying to fix something else.
As for the "METAL ARCHIVES BONUS" field, I haven't take a look at code (yet) but as far as I can remember that one relies on the "*" added on tracks that are detected/identified as bonus: it'll add a value on that field if that symbol is present, otherwise it'll be empty. One thing to keep in mind, is that as this script depends on page's HTML definition, in case that something has changed on that regard script requires to be adapted to new markup definition.
In any case, could you please share the few cases (albums/bands) where you detected this issues? This to be able to replicate your scenarios.
Nonetheless, I'll take a look at these issues, although I still need to setup a dev environment as I have moved from Windows to Linux and I'm still trying to get used to use some very specific applications (MP3Tag, for example) under Wine.
Also, there's this Cloudflare issue that can be a hassle than anything while trying to fix these issues - although I'm checking some potential additional, eh, things, that could be used to deal with that (but I fear that it won't be for the average user). But nonetheless it's a factor that could become an unwanted roadblock.
Just a FYI: it seems that MA has relaxed their CF rules, and it's kinda usable for the time being.
Also it's worth to mention that this thread has been mentioned in a thread on MA's forums about CF, so I think that helps (hopefully) to bring some visibility about that issue.
Nice, this is like Christmas for me lol - I really love when examples with multiple cases.
Just to confirm: Did you used the URL script to get data for this one?
I did a quick test a few minutes ago, and it looks like at this moment (2025-04-02 07:10:15+0000 - UTC) MA seems to be working as expected, however, I'll check this tomorrow/later today as is past midnight for me right now.
Yeah, i tried with the URL script but the query always retrieves (with cases like this, it's been awhile using this script for tagging) a correlative tracklist and a static value as a discnumber. I suppose that a good result for the query it should be something like "discnumber.tracknumber" and after that, the track name and the length of the track (these two elements are working fine).
Btw, cases like this when it's a reissue, in other words, it's not the first result if you look the album by the title, the only way to get info is with the URL script. Not a complain, just an observation.
I've pushed a new version of scripts that seems to be getting both Release Date and "Bonus Track" flag as expected.
Long story short: white spaces... white spaces everywhere!
Jokes aside, as far as I can tell, it was an issue of how HTML is formatted, specially due to big white spaces here and there that were messing with how script parsed the information.
In any case, those two items should be working now, but nonetheless I will be grateful if you could take a look at those and see if you can find anything out of place. You can get them from Github repository.
Regarding "Disc Number" and potential "Instrumental" tags...
Long story short: I need to do more research on those, specially Disc #, to get it working as expected.
No so short version:
Having to parse/scrap an HTML file is not as fun as it seems, and scripting is not as flexible as I would like (compared against C# or other programming language - even JS), so there are a bunch of things to take into account to have script work as expected like white spaces, if certain line/tag exists, empty lines, etc. As far as I can see, this is specially true on these two specific details (Disc #, Instrumental tag).
For the time being I'll just focus on Disc # thing, and once that works again as expected and if you or someone else can confirm that recently fixed issues are no longer present, I'll push a new version for those changes.
First of all, a massive shoutout to you! You pulled this out really quick.
Now, (writing this while i'm testing the scripts) at first glance, everything seems to work fine, all scripts return data.
Using the script to search by album, the issues with the date are gone (full date is retrieved, if day is missing, returns the date with a "01", and if only the year is present, "-01-01" is added to the result.
Using the script to search by band, data retrieves normally.
Using the script to search Band + Album, the issues with the date are solved as well.
Using the script to search by URL, the issues with the date are solved. I used theses examples to check every scenario:
The new function of calling the discnumber (if exists) it works properly. I tried with the examples given in the previous reply. The track list still is a correlative one, but it doesn't matter, if the user don't like it the auto-numbering wizard can be used to give them the preferred format (in my case, i like a track list depending on disc number, e.g. 1.1 1.2 1.3 ... 2.1 2.2 2.3... and so on, so on).
Issues found:
When an album doesn't have album cover, no data is returned.
I used these examples for my test:
Glad to know that, album cover issues aside, previous issues have been solved.
Contrary with previous fixes, I'll take a look at album cover on next week as I usually have weekends kinda busy and I am no longer having so much free time as before lol.
Nonetheless, I've already have taken a quick look at current code, and I think that I already know how to fix that. Thanks again for the provided examples.
Hi! Don't worry mate, no excuses needed, all in here have lifes outside the internet (I suppose, hahaha).
I tested the new version, the issue is fixed in all the scripts. At the moment, no new issues detected. I'll keep test 'em and if I find anything else, i'll post it in here.
Cheers, and best regards!
PS: it seems to be I am the only one interested in the community to enhance/improve this useful script lol
That's awesome! Hopefully there won't be any further issues/changes, but nonetheless I'll keep an eye on any future posts.
Haha, actually I blame CloudFlare issues for that... I mean, honestly even I stopped using the script(s) as that issue was a big/huge factor to not (actively) using them.
Nonetheless, I'm happy to see/know that you still find them useful
To be honest, the "CloudFlare vs scripts/bots feud", yeah, I can understand why MA became so aggressive blocking suspicious activity. Thank god i use a VPN, so when I get blocked/timed out, refreshing the conection makes the trick, but ngl, is kinda annoying to do it every 10 querys approx. Anyway, as I wrote previously, I'll keep my testing after rebuild my action groups, my computer crashed and I lost all my custom-made ones with no backup
Do you have in mind any features to add to the script? Just as a anecdote: I tried to tweak by myself the scripts to add a line with the "version description" (useful to indicate if an album is in digipak format, reissue, limited edition, etc., if some user need to hoarde more info) and I tried a little approach of the "instrumental" track column, but I failed big time, I only got a lot of bugs and I dropped the idea hahaha
Well, that's all for today, I'll keep reporting myself. Regards!
That's actually a good idea... I didn't thought about doing that LOL (have other stuff running over my LAN). I'll give it a shot if needed.
Well, being honest, I had/have some ideas in mind/somewhat planned(-ish), most notable the use of Advanced Search (as @MilesMetal suggested a while ago), but for X or Y reasons I never did any progress on those lol - even more true when CF issues appeared (and yeah, as you, I can understand why MA did it - they even briefly discussed it on a thread in their forums).
In any case, I'll give them a shot in the near future.
I've found an example for that field ("Version desc.: Limited edition, Box set, EU") on this album, Paradise Lost - Obsidian, is this the correct field that you're referring to?
When fixing the "bonus track" field I took a quick glance at that one, and seems to be doable, but need some tinkering here and there due to how HTML is served - I remember (more or less) that is not as straight forward as we would like.
In both cases, I have a rough idea what needs to be done, just need to do write it down lol.
In any case, I'll try to come up with something soon. Nonetheless, please let me know if you found something.
Yeah, exactly that one, and I discovered that is not a field present in every query, so it's more like an "bonus" info if is present on a query, so its addition it will be useful for "completionism" more than somewhat else.
Yeah, that's right, and after a lot of research and try & error, I came with a draft, but I lost it even to share it to you. Anyway, the draft with that I came, only retrieved all the odd tracks and i couldn't figure it out what was wrong.
Don't worry, I'll keep in contact with you over here. Have a great day! And thanks again.
Had some plans cancelled/not confirmed, and suddenly had some spare time...
I have now a functional demo about the mentioned enhancements (attached to this comment), and before implementing those change into all scripts (as well doing some refactor(-ish) on scripts) I would like to know if changes are what you were expecting/had in mind.
Please keep in mind the following:
For this demo I used the "URL" script, as it's the most straightforward for testing.
As usual, for both cases, new tags were created for this effect as I didn't found equivalent tags on ID3 specification:
METAL ARCHIVES VERSION for Version desc.: field.
METAL ARCHIVES INSTRUMENTAL for instrumental "flag".
In both cases, if no data is found for any of them, no tags will be created.
For METAL ARCHIVES INSTRUMENTAL potential values are 1 and null/empty, similar to how "Bonus" works.
Tag names can be changed to something more appropriate (if needed).
For those changes I've used the following albums, but feel free to used your own options/cases.
Track number 3 is marked as an "instrumental" but this is one of those rare exceptions where the track has liner notes over lyrics instead, so it moves "HTML speaking" in a gray zone, where we have an instrumental track with "lyrics" inside, so naturally, the script it doesn't mark it as an instrumental track because the HTML code has another syntax.
Unfortunately I am not able to check at the moment the edge case that you mentioned, but I'll check it on upcoming days (I'll be going off / on the grid randomly, so I can't say for sure when I'll be able to check this issue).
Nonetheless, thank you for the help, and for confirm that script works... Mostly
Don't worry about it, take your time, I think we're in the phase where the debuggin' is more refined and the finer details appear, but the script works smoothly for the job, as globally as with new features. And well, I could reply quickly 'cause i'm in "forced vacation" a.k.a. my work car is at the mechanic hahaha
