Jaikoz Audio Tagger, what are your thoughts?

[superboyac]

Today on Bits Du Jour, I discovered a new audio tagger software called Jaikoz Audio Tagger.  Now this is a software category that I know pretty well, and I still insist that the best one I've ever tried is Tag & Rename, which I've been using very happily for years now.  When I first joined DC, there was an interesting discussion about this program called the Godfather, but despite its powerful featureset, it was too complicated to use.  After all, we're just talking about an audio tagger, not a freaking programming language.

Anyway, this Jaikoz seems very interesting.  It takes tagging to another level, where it can identify the files on your computer with some kind of musical fingerprint ID from a couple of websites I had no idea about.  I haven't tried it yet, but it seems cool.

After viewing the demo, I don't think it will rename Tag&Rename, but it may be a complementary software by using it to automatically tag a bunch of files (unattended) and then I can use Tag&Rename to put the final touches on the tags and organize the files in the right location (I'm very anal about my tagging, I've turned it into a sort of science).

If anyone has any thoughts on this program, please write about it here.  Thanks.

[superboyac]

SO I bought this yesterday on a rare impulse buy for me.  But it was cheap on BDJ.

Initial thoughts:  it made me install java before I could install the regular program.  I swear I've installed 10 versions of java on my computer whether it's java, jdk, jre, or something like that (what's the deal with java and all those installers).  Anyway, the program doesn't use standard windows components for the windows and dialogs, it's something else.  I'm guessing it's some kind of cross-platform system.  I only played with it for a couple of minutes, but it's a weird piece of software.  However, I was expecting that (except for the non standard interface).  If it can do some convenient things with tagging to complement my main tagging software (tag&rename) then it will be cool.

As far as it's claim that it uses these external databases to "fingerprint" songs and albums, I have a feeling I'll be disappointed with that.  By fingerprinting, the program is claiming that it can automatically figure out what song an unnamed and untagged file is.  However, I doubt these databases are large enough to cover all the jazz albums and obscure music I have.  It's probably only good for a very small percentage of music (probably very popular albums) that is out there.

I'll have more on this later.

[superboyac]

Still using this thing.  It's actually very powerful.  Super geeky interface, but once you use it, you will save a lot of time.

[skwire]

I haven't used anything but Mp3tag for many years now.  An absolutely bullshit-free interface just like I prefer and free (though I did donate years ago).   

[Curt]

I too use Mp3tag. I am however not impressed that after all these years, there is still no way to say "[Album Artist] same as [Artist]"
--------------

@superboyac
how did the audio fingerprinting / "Music Identification via Sound Card" turn out to be like? Can it recognize music from YouTube? My "competitor" is wrong a lot more often than right.

--------------
By the way, almost related link: http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=39478.msg377307#msg377307

[superboyac]

I too use Mp3tag. I am however not impressed that after all these years, there is still no way to say "[Album Artist] same as [Artist]"
--------------

@superboyac
how did the audio fingerprinting / "Music Identification via Sound Card" turn out to be like? Can it recognize music from YouTube? My "competitor" is wrong a lot more often than right.

--------------
By the way, almost related link: http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=39478.msg377307#msg377307

I've never attempted id'ing files like that, using the soundcard audio.  SO I can't really say.  From what I know, I'd be highly skeptical of it, so much so I don't even care to try it, lol!!

mp3tag has been around for so long, wow!  Yea, it's been the best of the best for quite a while, impressive.  I still use Tag&Rename for that sort of work because I have some very specific interface complaints.

Jaikoz does some pretty fancy things.  I wouldn't consider it my everyday use application for tagging, but the more I use it, the more I like it.  It is a relatively "advanced" software, however.
What's good about it is being able to select the tags and fields like an excel spreadsheet.  You can also make changes and preview them before applying them, in a very powerful way.  For me, it's best when I have to update or modify a very large collection of files, so only once in a while.

But what I'm saying is, let's say I run the auto-correct function.  Well, it offers thousands of changes...spelling corrections, artwork changes, added fields, etc.  I can preview all this on the big screen (color coded) and I can say for each individual field "No, leave that one alone" or select a group of random fields and also cancel those changes while leaving the rest intact.  Then, once everything is perfect, you apply all the changes at once.

It's like Oscar's Renamer for text files, but for mp3.  If that makes sense.