Tracks import from CUE file

[bawdrip]

Hi
I'm trialing Acoustica CD Label Maker and was hoping to find a reliable way of generating the Tracks info from the same info I use for creating the CD itself - a CUE file. But it seems the Import Tracks function in Label Maker always interprets the input file as a m3u playlist, expecting the file to contain a list of filenames that consist of title & artist seperated by a hyphen, with no support for picking up other fields such as composer or album. It certainly doesn't seem to understand CUE files properly, it just used the filenames after each FILE keyword and ignored the CUE lines with the actual TITLE and PERFORMER.

I have tried importing from iTunes, which works to an extent, but the problem there is that the CD is cut from tagless .wav files (as listed in CUE file), whereas iTunes tags are on mp3 files, so to use that method I have to prepare a playlist in iTunes that has a set of mp3 files (with manually created tags) that were generated from the same wav files. This is more work than using the 'edit tracks' function within Label Maker. Also, BTW, it would be better if that edit tracks could be expanded or made 'full screen' so more or all of each field shows without scrolling (and possibly edit could be activated by double clicking the field rather than having to click the 'edit' button each time).

(Actually, my wav filenames ARE structured, but not in the simple artist-title format this program seems to assume. I use a program to turn my very long filenames into tags for mp3 [and insert them]).

Another method I tried was to write the CD with CD-TEXT info, then import the track title & artist using 'Read CD' - but then I found CD-TEXT seems unreliable, each title & artist was truncated after about 30 characters. I'm not sure if the truncation happens when the cd is written or read, since different programs seem to read different amounts of CD-TEXT (I also tried reading CD-TEXT using CDex & Realplayer). Also BTW, in the Track Listing dialog, if I 'Clear All' (having started by opening a pre-existing x.lbl layout) then 'Read CD' I find the 1st track is offset to the right by about 2mm (1 digit) in the Back and Inside labels - I have to manually do 'Add Row' to insert an extra track 2 with same details as track 1 then delete the version of track 1 that was created automatically, to get the alignment corrected. (Now I've found that going into 'Adjust Size/Position' and just 'Cancel' back out, for both pages, seems to realign ok (with no blank before the track numbers) - perhaps they're not being redrawn correctly after the EditTracks ClearAll & ReadCD refresh cycle.)

In short, I would find it MUCH more convenient to import Tracks info from the CUE file's keywords, ie TITLE, PERFORMER, COMPOSER, etc, so I only had to prepare ONE input file (the CUE) which could create the CD-TEXT on the CD itself & the Tracks info for the label.

If I've missed something and there IS a trick that can be used to avoid lots of cutnpaste then i'd be grateful for pointers, otherwise thanks for reading this & possibly considering it for future addition.


p.s. I've only got one day of trial left it seems, unless it's just 'starting' that disabled - I won't shut it down, to see if can get a couple more days of experimenting, might buy but not quite decided yet.
Alternatively, exactly how are the filenames in Import parsed into the various fields of Track List (or is it just title-artist.*) since knowing that I could programmatically turn my CUE file info into a suitable 'playlist' just for the Import function.

[Acoustica Greg]

Hi,

Yes, you'd probably be having a better experience if the source files had tag information. You might try experimenting with different playlist formats. I'm not sure what else to suggest. You may just end up cutting and pasting.

Greg