The application will be "standalone" (no client/server architecture), and will work on Mac OS, Windows, or Linux (I hope). perhaps casting to UPNP endpoints (have not looked into it). to the system sound cards), which is of limited use playback through LMS (Logitech Media Server) - this will be possible as long as the local files can be read from the LMS server (through a shared network folder, for example). In terms of "playback", I am considering several options: None of the tags of the files will be used - purely Discogs data. What needs to be customized can be managed through custom fields.
I do not intend on developping any mechanism to edit metadata within the application - that can all be done in Discogs. Custom fields can be used to identify the bitrare/sampling frequency in case one has several versions of the same album. I am already using one to store the original release date of albums, which I find useful. I plan on adding "alerts" if the number of tracks do not match, but do not plan on matching tracks more precisely (I do not see the need for it).Īll the releases in one's library will be collected in the application, with all the corresponding metadata: titles, artists, contributors, etc.which can be used for browsing one's collection.Ĭustom fields defined in Discogs will also be available. Once the folder is matched to a Discogs release, the appliation will assume that the order of the music files in the folder match the order of the tracks on the Discogs release. The album folder name will be seperate from the name of the "drive" on which the folders are stored (it will be a "relative" path). Otherwise, add individual releases in your Library in Discogs, and then assign, within the application, to a local/network folder containing the album tracks to initialize the data through an upload, use SongKong, or any other tool, to identify the Discogs releases corresponding to your album collection, prepare a file with the album folder name, the Discogs release, and upload it into Discogs. The album folder, relative to a root folder, will be stored in a Discogs custom field. I will be assuming that an album is contained within a dedicated folder on a local or network drive. The association between a Discogs release and the local music files will be based on matching folders. These can be used "offline" and the results can be uploaded into one's Discogs Libary (there is no upload function on the Discogs website, but I have developped one using the standard Discogs APIs). There are already applications available to do that (ex: SongKong). I do not intend on developping an automated solution to match one's music collection with Discogs releases. Libraries can serve different purposes, but one of them will be used to identify albums within one's "physical" collection. you can easily edit the data yourself - it is actually quite simple and "immediate"- you just have to follow some rules.įirst of all, it will require a sign-on on Discogs, and creating a "certificate" in order to interface with the application (takes a minute to do).ĭiscogs lets you manage your collection, and define "Libraries" in which you can store lists of releases (albums).
it manages some things fairly well which are not (yet) managed in Roon - labels on discs, series to identify box sets Though the completeness of the data varies between various versions of an album, you can generally find a version with at least composition credits, musicians, and notes indicating the recording dates the metadata "quality" is good - all data is referenced (artists, labels.), and it is widely used.
it contains more albums than any other database (both physical albums and albums offered through download only) It is far from perfect, but it does present a number of advantages:
It is not finished, but I would like to know whether this application could be of interest to others, in order to determine how much time and effort I should spend into it (to make it a "polished" product).Ī few preliminary words on Discogs.
Frustrated with Roon, and seing the limits of all other software (based on tags), I embarked on writing an application that links my music collection to Discogs releases, and lets me browse through it using all the corresponding Discogs metadata.