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metaflac command line tool |
metaflac - program to list, add, remove, or edit metadata in one or more FLAC files.
metaflac [ options ] [ operations ] FLACfile ...
Use metaflac to list, add, remove, or edit metadata in one or more FLAC files. You may perform one major operation, or many shorthand operations at a time.
metaflac is the command-line .flac file metadata editor. You can use it to list the contents of metadata blocks, edit, delete or insert blocks, and manage padding.
metaflac takes a set of "options" (though some are not optional) and a set of FLAC files to operate on. There are three kinds of "options":
-
Major operations, which specify a mode of operation like listing blocks, removing blocks, etc. These will have sub-operations describing exactly what is to be done.
-
Shorthand operations, which are convenient synonyms for major operations. For example, there is a shorthand operation --show-sample-rate that shows just the sample rate field from the STREAMINFO metadata block.
-
Global options, which affect all the operations.
All of these are described in the tables below. At least one shorthand or major operation must be supplied. You can use multiple shorthand operations to do more than one thing to a file or set of files. Most of the common things to do to metadata have shorthand operations. As an example, here is how to show the MD5 signatures for a set of three FLAC files:
metaflac --show-md5sum file1.flac file2.flac file3.flac
Another example; this removes all DESCRIPTION and COMMENT tags in a set of FLAC files, and uses the --preserve-modtime global option to keep the FLAC file modification times the same (usually when files are edited the modification time is set to the current time):
metaflac --preserve-modtime --remove-tag=DESCRIPTION --remove-tag=COMMENT file1.flac file2.flac file3.flac
--preserve-modtime
: Preserve the original modification time in spite of edits.
--with-filename
: Prefix each output line with the FLAC file name (the default if more
than one FLAC file is specified).
--no-filename
: Do not prefix each output line with the FLAC file name (the default
if only one FLAC file is specified).
--no-utf8-convert
: Do not convert tags from UTF-8 to local charset, or vice versa. This
is useful for scripts, and setting tags in situations where the
locale is wrong.
--dont-use-padding
: By default metaflac tries to use padding where possible to avoid
rewriting the entire file if the metadata size changes. Use this
option to tell metaflac to not take advantage of padding this way.
--show-md5sum
: Show the MD5 signature from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-min-blocksize
: Show the minimum block size from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-max-blocksize
: Show the maximum block size from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-min-framesize
: Show the minimum frame size from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-max-framesize
: Show the maximum frame size from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-sample-rate
: Show the sample rate from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-channels
: Show the number of channels from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-bps
: Show the # of bits per sample from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-total-samples
: Show the total # of samples from the STREAMINFO block.
--show-vendor-tag
: Show the vendor string from the VORBIS_COMMENT block.
--show-tag=name
: Show all tags where the field name matches 'name'.
--remove-tag=name
: Remove all tags whose field name is 'name'.
--remove-first-tag=name
: Remove first tag whose field name is 'name'.
--remove-all-tags
: Remove all tags, leaving only the vendor string.
--set-tag=field
: Add a tag. The field must comply with the Vorbis comment spec, of the
form "NAME=VALUE". If there is currently no tag block, one will be
created.
--set-tag-from-file=field
: Like --set-tag, except the VALUE is a filename whose contents will
be read verbatim to set the tag value. Unless --no-utf8-convert is
specified, the contents will be converted to UTF-8 from the local
charset. This can be used to store a cuesheet in a tag (e.g.
--set-tag-from-file="CUESHEET=image.cue"). Do not try to store
binary data in tag fields! Use APPLICATION blocks for that.
--import-tags-from=file
: Import tags from a file. Use '-' for stdin. Each line should be of
the form NAME=VALUE. Multi-line comments are currently not supported.
Specify --remove-all-tags and/or --no-utf8-convert before
--import-tags-from if necessary. If FILE is '-' (stdin), only one
FLAC file may be specified.
--export-tags-to=file
: Export tags to a file. Use '-' for stdout. Each line will be of the
form NAME=VALUE. Specify --no-utf8-convert if necessary.
--import-cuesheet-from=file
: Import a cuesheet from a file. Use '-' for stdin. Only one FLAC file
may be specified. A seekpoint will be added for each index point in
the cuesheet to the SEEKTABLE unless --no-cued-seekpoints is
specified.
--export-cuesheet-to=file
: Export CUESHEET block to a cuesheet file, suitable for use by CD
authoring software. Use '-' for stdout. Only one FLAC file may be
specified on the command line.
--import-picture-from={FILENAME|SPECIFICATION}
: Import a picture and store it in a PICTURE metadata block. More than
one --import-picture-from command can be specified. Either a filename
for the picture file or a more complete specification form can be
used. The SPECIFICATION is a string whose parts are separated by |
(pipe) characters. Some parts may be left empty to invoke default
values. FILENAME is just shorthand for "||||FILENAME". For
details on the specification, see the section Picture
specification in the flac(1) man page.
--export-picture-to=file
: Export PICTURE block to a file. Use '-' for stdout. Only one FLAC
file may be specified on the command line. The first PICTURE block
will be exported unless --export-picture-to is preceded by a
--block-number=# option to specify the exact metadata block to
extract. Note that the block number is the one shown by --list.
--add-replay-gain
: Calculates the title and album gains/peaks of the given FLAC files as
if all the files were part of one album, then stores them as FLAC
tags. The tags are the same as those used by vorbisgain. Existing
ReplayGain tags will be replaced. If only one FLAC file is given,
the album and title gains will be the same. Since this operation
requires two passes, it is always executed last, after all other
operations have been completed and written to disk. All FLAC files
specified must have the same resolution, sample rate, and number of
channels. The sample rate must be one of 8, 11.025, 12, 16, 18.9,
22.05, 24, 28, 32, 37.8, 44.1, 48, 56, 64, 88.2, 96, 112, 128, 144,
176.4, or 192kHz.
--scan-replay-gain
: Like --add-replay-gain, but only analyzes the files rather than
writing them to the tags.
--remove-replay-gain
: Removes the ReplayGain tags.
--add-seekpoint={#|X|#x**|#s}**
: Add seek points to a SEEKTABLE block. Using #, a seek point at that
sample number is added. Using X, a placeholder point is added at the
end of a the table. Using #x, # evenly spaced seek points will be
added, the first being at sample 0. Using #s, a seekpoint will be
added every # seconds (# does not have to be a whole number; it can
be, for example, 9.5, meaning a seekpoint every 9.5 seconds). If no
SEEKTABLE block exists, one will be created. If one already exists,
points will be added to the existing table, and any duplicates will
be turned into placeholder points. You may use many --add-seekpoint
options; the resulting SEEKTABLE will be the unique-ified union of
all such values. Example: --add-seekpoint=100x --add-seekpoint=3.5s
will add 100 evenly spaced seekpoints and a seekpoint every 3.5
seconds.
--add-padding=length
: Add a padding block of the given length (in bytes). The overall
length of the new block will be 4 + length; the extra 4 bytes is for
the metadata block header.
--list
: List the contents of one or more metadata blocks to stdout. By
default, all metadata blocks are listed in text format. Use the
options --block-number, --block-type or
--except-block-type to change this behavior.
--remove
: Remove one or more metadata blocks from the metadata. Use the options
--block-number, --block-type or --except-block-type
to specify which blocks should be removed. Note that if both
--block-number and --[except-]block-type are specified, the result
is the logical AND of both arguments. Unless --dont-use-padding
is specified, the blocks will be replaced with padding. You may not
remove the STREAMINFO block.
--block-number=#[,#[...]]
: An optional comma-separated list of block numbers to display. The
first block, the STREAMINFO block, is block 0.
--block-type=type[,type[...]]
--except-block-type=type[,type[...]] : An optional comma-separated list of block types to be included or ignored with this option. Use only one of --block-type or --except-block-type. The valid block types are: STREAMINFO, PADDING, APPLICATION, SEEKTABLE, VORBIS_COMMENT, PICTURE. You may narrow down the types of APPLICATION blocks selected by appending APPLICATION with a colon and the ID of the APPLICATION block in either ASCII or hexadecimal representation. E.g. APPLICATION:abcd for the APPLICATION block(s) whose textual representation of the 4-byte ID is "abcd" or APPLICATION:0xXXXXXXXX for the APPLICATION block(s) whose hexadecimal big- endian representation of the 4-byte ID is "0xXXXXXXXX". For the example "abcd" above the hexadecimal equivalalent is 0x61626364
--application-data-format=hexdump|text
: If the application block you are displaying contains binary data but
your --data-format=text, you can display a hex dump of the
application data contents instead using
--application-data-format=hexdump.
--remove-all
: Remove all metadata blocks (except the STREAMINFO block) from the
metadata. Unless --dont-use-padding is specified, the blocks will be
replaced with padding.
--merge-padding
: Merge adjacent PADDING blocks into single blocks.
--sort-padding
: Move all PADDING blocks to the end of the metadata and merge them
into a single block.
flac(1)