I use amarok on Linux. I have ripped all my CDs to FLAC, complete with tags, and burned to DVD.

I have been given a Mac Mini+iPod, and want to convert the FLACs to AIFF, and import them into iTunes. I am running MacOSX on the Mac Mini. This is what I have been doing (on the command line)

- copy an album from a dvd
- decode the flac files back into wavs:
flac --decode --verify *.flac
- encode the wav files as aiff:
flac --output-name=02_Graceland.aiff --force-aiff-format --verify --compression-level-0 02_Graceland.wav
- add aiff tags:
metaflac --set-tag=genre="Folk" --set-tag=artist="Paul Simon" --set-tag=album="Graceland" --set-tag=date="1986" --set-tag=tracknumber=02 --set-tag=title="Graceland" 02_Graceland.aiff
- import the aiff file into iTunes.

iTunes recognises the file, but flatly refuses to import it.
Leaving out the "add aiff tags" stage makes no difference whatsoever.

What is going on? Why won't it import the aiff file?
I have tweaked every parameter in iTunes that I can think of.
I have searched the web for days, and tried every hint I could find, but nothing doing.

Can anyone out there help, as this is driving me insane.

You've been making plain FLAC files. --force-aiff-format is for decoding, not encoding. So if you want AIFF files, use flac -d --force-aiff-format

But I'd rather recommend http://www.xiph.org/quicktime/ XiphQT instead.

It doesn't support native FLAC at the moment, but judging from your post I'd say you can manage with Ogg FLAC.

Aha. So decoding straight from flac > aiff is the way to go, not flac > wav > aiff.
That works just peachily - iTunes imports the file just fine. Very many thanks.

BUT the tags get lost. Running metaflac --list on the .flac file:
... ...
METADATA block #2
type: 4 (VORBIS_COMMENT)
vendor string: reference libFLAC 1.1.2 20050205
comments: 6
comment[0]: genre=Folk
comment[1]: artist=Paul Simon
comment[2]: album=Graceland
comment[3]: date=1986
comment[4]: tracknumber=01
comment[5]: title=The Boy In The Bubble

When iTunes imports the file, it doesn't recognise any tags whatsoever - everything gets lumped under 'Unknown Artist' etc. Is there a solution to this? I assume the problem is that ID3 tags differ in some way from oggvorbis tags ...


Yes, I know about XiphQt - but the oggs won't play in the iPod, iTunes won't display the album art, and I have to go through adding all the tags from scratch. If it weren't for these shortcomings, I'd *much* prefer to stay with oggvorbis and friends.