Wot no tags?

[dinkypumpkin]

On 01/09/2011 09:51, Arthur Dent wrote:
> It seems a shame that such useful (crucial?) functionality is provided
> only by a (relatively) obscure tool that is not widely available in the
> repos of the mainstream Linux distributions. I would not have found the

It has been kicking around in Debian/Ubuntu for a while. I can't say why 
it hasn't gained more of a foothold in the Fedora/RPM universe - it 
doesn't have many dependencies and is relatively easy to build.   I 
suppose command-line tagging is not something that many people need. 
Besides, a number of Linux apps that do tagging (like puddletag) are 
built with or support Python, which means they can easily use Mutagen.

> forked version but for your help - I was struggling to build the Mac
> version which, as you say, is long dormant (last updated in 2006), but
> comes top of the google searches. I now see that the "wez" version is
> next in the list, but I'm not sure I would have trusted that unless you
> had told me about it.

The other thing I probably should have mentioned is that you'll also get 
an autoconf-based build by checking out the last revision in the 
AtomicParsley Sourceforge SVN repo.  That's what the Debian/Ubuntu 
packages are based on.  I figured if you're going to DIY you might as 
well get the latest and greatest.

> I know this is not a get_iplayer issue, but is there anything that can
> be done?

I don't really see it.  It is fortunate that somebody stepped up with a 
new AtomicParsley build that could be incorporated in the Windows 
installer, but Windows users could still get the old version from 
Sourceforge without too much trouble.   Your travails notwithstanding, 
on other platforms it's probably best to leave it up to their respective 
package management systems.  That's what we have to do for the essential 
dependencies like rtmpdump, but since tagging can't truly be considered 
an essential part of get_iplayer, I don't think special measures are 
called for.

When I rewrote the tagging code a few months ago, I tried to incorporate 
existing Perl MP4 tagging modules into get_iplayer, but they weren't up 
to the task, and I didn't really want to own hacked versions just for 
get_player.  To be fair, those modules were never intended for chores 
like tagging large video files.  If get_iplayer were written in Python, 
we could just use Mutagen.  I did that for a long time via a 
command-line wrapper, but it was no better than AtomicParsley.  I did it 
mostly to get better MP3 tagging, but when the BBC shifted away from 
flashaudio streams on national stations, it was much less useful.

So, it seemed best to stick with AtomicParsley.  There are a few other 
options for MP4 tagging, but AP is more complete, and none of the others 
would be any easier for users to acquire.  Plus, get_iplayer had already 
employed AP for a while.  And who can say how many users really care one 
way or another?  I like to have my downloads automatically show up in 
iTunes nicely tagged and organised, but I expect a lot of users aren't 
really bothered, particularly if they don't use iTunes.  I know at least 
some people just download with --raw and pop open the flash video files 
without bothering with conversion and tagging.