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Topic: Question about embedding art in WavPack (Read 8181 times) previous topic - next topic
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Question about embedding art in WavPack

I just sucessfully added 1.5MB images on WavPack files using foobar2000 sub-menu tagger, thinking that the files would refuse to accept it.
Knowing the limitation that you can't add images over1MB over the wavpack command line, what is exactly the issue?
Is an EXIF data different from the Binary tag? Are this kind of tagging in foobar2000 different from the command line tagging using binary tag?

Thanks for answers.

Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #1
The 1MB limitation is discussed at some length in this thread..

Foobar2000 handles APEv2 tags itself (without the WavPack library) and obviously it does not implement the arbitrary 1MB limit that I decided on for the WavPack library (although I guess that there is probably some other, higher, limit). This means that any tags over 1MB will be ignored by the WavPack library and will not show up when using the WavPack command-line tools or any program that uses the WavPack library for reading tags (Winamp comes to mind). Of course, they will continue to work fine in Foobar2000.

Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #2
Hey Bryant,

Thanks for your quick reply.
Indeed, I noticed that that wasn't being read by the WavPack library.

Are you considering in implementing a native tag format?

I've seen that there are some people who are not adopting wavpack because of three things:

- the presence of a lossy mode
(could wavpack be split in two "editions" instead of having its entire features in one codec?)

- lack of native tags
(you will agree that its easier to manipulate tags with metaflac in flac files, and it's a bit tricky in wavpack not using an external app)

- hardware support
(I've noticed that the hardware support list in the wavpack site hasn't got any addition since a long time ago, could the implementation of wavpack on hardware find some kind of hinderance because of the whole hybrid mode thing, or is it just because hardware dealers don't care, as they don't care with anybody else... what could it be done to wavpack get more attention as flac has got)

PS: I like both codecs, but it's just frustrating neither of them going really mainstream in hardware.

Thanks again for your fast answer and willing to help/explain everything.

Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #3
Hi Krafty,

- the presence of a lossy mode
(could wavpack be split in two "editions" instead of having its entire features in one codec?)

I know that people have been saying this for a long time, but I don’t really buy the arguments. It is trivial to determine whether a WavPack file is lossy or lossless (every player I know of will show it, and of course the bitrate is pretty indicative). And just because a file is FLAC does not mean it is a lossless copy of the original either (it could have been a decoded MP3, or it could have been processed by LossyWAV, or it could have been converted to an 8-bit file first). I usually hear this from the pirate community implying that WavPack is actually designed to facilitate people passing off lossy files as lossless and propose the fact that even auCDtect is fooled as the proof. Yeah, that was my goal! 

Even if I wanted to create separate codecs, there’s really no way to put the genie back in the bottle here without making old files unplayable on old hardware or software. And of course the whole point of the hybrid mode is to allow a file to be both lossy and lossless (depending on the accompanying correction file).

Quote
- lack of native tags
(you will agree that its easier to manipulate tags with metaflac in flac files, and it's a bit tricky in wavpack not using an external app)

I can see that metaflac would make some tag editing tasks easier, but I can’t see how that relates to whether the tag format is native or not. I could add the same capability to WvGain (and have thought of doing so). As far as I know, there is no functional difference between the two tag formats except that FLAC has its tags at the beginning of the file and WavPack has the APEv2 tags at the end.

Quote
- hardware support
(I've noticed that the hardware support list in the wavpack site hasn't got any addition since a long time ago, could the implementation of wavpack on hardware find some kind of hinderance because of the whole hybrid mode thing, or is it just because hardware dealers don't care, as they don't care with anybody else... what could it be done to wavpack get more attention as flac has got)

PS: I like both codecs, but it's just frustrating neither of them going really mainstream in hardware.

I don’t believe that adding hardware support for WavPack is any more difficult than FLAC, except for the lossless hybrid mode because handling two files at once in hardware is tricky (the lossy part is a trivial addition). I imagine that FLAC is more prevalent simply because it’s the more popular codec and so would be most device maker’s first logical choice. Companies respond to the requests of users and the cases where WavPack has made it into hardware devices may just be situations where someone close to the development happened to be a WavPack fan or where the goal of the device was to be able to decode every possible format (Rockbox and Cowon come to mind).

One remote possibility is that the more complete sample format handling of WavPack (32-bit float and integer, specifically) is actually a disadvantage because it makes implementation and verification more difficult (or at least creates that impression).

Interestingly, WavPack encoding is actually much easier to implement in hardware than FLAC because it doesn’t use floating point, which is why Rockbox supports it as the only lossless compression option for recording.

I share your frustration with the lack of hardware support, but nobody is going to respond to requests from me... 

Thanks for you support!

Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #4
Recently I tested PowerAMP on my Sumsung android phone and it plays wavpack lossy -hh mode flawless + gapless. CPU @ %25 vs 18% for mp3.

http://powerampapp.com/

Also :

http://neutronmp.com/


Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #5
Hi Bryant,

Thanks for your answer it really clarifies a bit more about the "issues" people talk about.

Nice find shadowking.

Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #6
Recently I tested PowerAMP on my Sumsung android phone and it plays wavpack lossy -hh mode flawless + gapless. CPU @ %25 vs 18% for mp3.

http://powerampapp.com/

Also :

http://neutronmp.com/

Hi Shadowking! Thanks for reminding me about those...I really need to add the whole Android thing to the WavPack website with these players and DeaDBeeF which I have been using.

Interesting to see your CPU usage with -hh compared to MP3. The other day I noticed my old recommendation to not use that mode for portable devices and thought of removing it (the warning), but I think I'll leave it... 

David


Question about embedding art in WavPack

Reply #7
The 1MB limitation is discussed at some length in this thread..

Foobar2000 handles APEv2 tags itself (without the WavPack library) and obviously it does not implement the arbitrary 1MB limit that I decided on for the WavPack library (although I guess that there is probably some other, higher, limit). This means that any tags over 1MB will be ignored by the WavPack library and will not show up when using the WavPack command-line tools or any program that uses the WavPack library for reading tags (Winamp comes to mind). Of course, they will continue to work fine in Foobar2000.

Do you have any plans to improve it?

The limit is painful... with most formats I could have a true single-file rip containig high-res scans of all covers and with wavpack I have to keep them separated.