Want to highlight a helpful answer? Upvote!
Did someone help you, or did an answer or User Tip resolve your issue? Upvote by selecting the upvote arrow. Your feedback helps others! Learn more about when to upvote >
Did someone help you, or did an answer or User Tip resolve your issue? Upvote by selecting the upvote arrow. Your feedback helps others! Learn more about when to upvote >
My music library goes back to when iTunes first started. Back than, when you imported a CD, it didn't give you the option to add the album cover or any other information.
I'm going back and editing each and every one of my songs and was wondering if there was an easier way to do it. Like export the information out than import it back when it's been edited.
Thanks for your help.
I don't know exactly what information you're trying to add, but here are two ways to deal with your library all at one time:
Also, consider using File > Library > Get Album Artwork from iTunes' menu.
I'm going back through my music and adding the album name, track numbers and the album cover. It's just a little tedious doing this in iTunes when I can do it faster in excel or pages, which is where the import/export would work.
I don't see how what you are doing even works, and if it does how it could possibly be faster than doing it in iTunes. If you want to give a series of tracks an album name select the range of tracks > Get Info and edit the album name field. It will apply to all those tracks. Do track count while you are there, and artist if it is all one; year too. Close Get Info and the tracks will all have the new information. You can also look into using scripts such as the Albumize Selection one from the Dougscripts web site.
I understand how to edit songs and groups of songs but since I have over 3000 songs in my library, it becomes a long task having to go through them all. There are many programs that have an import/export feature that would allow me to export information and certain fields, edit them in excel than import them back in, kind of like a bulk update. This is commonly used for retail websites that have to add multiple items at one time. All I was wondering was if iTunes had a feature that let me export my library so that I can edit all the song information than import it back in. If you've ever used excel you would know how much faster this would be rather than going into each song or songs manually.
Retail websites are selling music in a format that doesn't support embedded tags, and they are not including them??? Remind me to avoid those sites. They would have to be WAV files and why somebody would want to distribute that format given the cost of bandwidth is beyond me.
If you are having to do this on a regular basis look on the Dougscripts web site. There is one called "label tracks" which lets you assign a set of metadata from a text file to a list of tracks. It requires specific formatting and it is possible to customize the script to your own needs but it has to be done through AppleScript Editor. Still, if you are doing this routinely or for large quantities of files it may be worth a small learning curve. I have used it periodically and when set up properly it will assign 5 tags to 500 files in ten seconds.
Just to be clear, all of my music comes from Apple or the actual cd. When I mentioned retail I was only referring to the method of uploading multiple items to a site rather than manually adding them one by one.
I will look into your script idea. I don't see this being a huge issue once my current library has been updated since all new material would come with all the important information in it.
Thanks for your help.
If this is from commercial CD why not just avail yourself of one of the many track labeling services such as Gracenote in iTunes? Anything from Apple will already have tags embedded. If you're talking about adding a set of things to the comments field (and it would help to be more specific in your needs in asking questions) then the Dougscript may help if you really have to do this in bulk.
I thought I was specific when I said in my second post that I have been going back into my songs and entering information such as the album title, the year it was released, the track number and even the album cover. For whatever reason when I imported my CDs many years ago, this information didn't carry over. I'm just looking for an easier way to add this information into iTunes.
This article says you can re-identify CDs, but is doesn't provide details:
iTunes 12 for Mac: If you don’t see song information - https://support.apple.com/kb/PH19609
I don't have an iTunes Store account so I can't explore.
Third party utilities such as XLD and MediaBrainz Picard may offer features of interest to you. One files have been tagged outside of iTunes the tags should update i iTunes once you activate the track in a playlist.
Import/Export song information
