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What operations change the original on-disk files?

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paul.hargreaves

Feb 08, 2014 @ 03:48 PM

My envionment:

I have my original mp3/m4a/flac/oog files stored on my home server (Mac Mini). I transform them on that machine to be just mp3/m4a as appropriate, then rsync the transformed versions down to my laptop (Pro) where iTunes is installed. So the version on my laptop is just a copy of a transformed file, not the original.

I've just done a refresh from the Mac Mini and it's re-transferring lots of files. This indicates, though isn't proof, that the files on local disk are being edited by BeaTunes when I do operations.

For operations e.g. Import Lyrics, Detect Silence, perform actions using the Inspection (such as miscapitalized filenames) etc.

Is there a list anywhere of:
* What operations will change metadata in iTunes's database but not edit the files
* What operations will change the files themselves?

Once I know what is just an iTunes change, and what is a real file change, I can then decide if I should go back and edit the original file via some native tool (depending on format), stop doing whatever it is that's causing it, or just accept that every time I refresh I'll have to go run a large analysis & correct.

Thanks :-)

1. Support Staff 1 Posted by hendrik on Feb 10, 2014 @ 10:32 AM

   

   Hi Paul,

   some of your questions are answered in http://blog.beatunes.com/2013/10/so-where-exactly-does-beatunes-sto...
   But the first question I have to ask, is whether you use a folder-based or iTunes-based library? See http://help.beatunes.com/kb/troubleshooting/how-to-tell-an-itunes-b... to find out.

   Regardless of the answer to this:

   • folder based libraries always modify the files
   • iTunes based libraries always modify the files for fields also visible in iTunes (because iTunes modifies them!!)
   • to modify the files for things like key, language, color, etc. for an iTunes based library, you have to check the embed non-iTunes fields box in beaTunes general prefs.

   Hope this helps,

   -hendrik

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2. 2 Posted by paul.hargreaves on Feb 12, 2014 @ 08:24 AM

   

   Thank you. I should have noticed that blog.

   I’m using iTunes based, so it’s interesting that iTunes hacks at the original files. Maybe I’ll make them immutable next time and see how it handles them ;-)

   I haven’t embedded colour etc. Not much point since I know that the file will get overwritten; maybe I’ll spend some time extracting metadata from local disk, compare it with the original file, and apply any changes back.

   Regards

   Paul

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