README

   1 ABCDE
   2 =====
   3
   4 abcde is a frontend command-line utility (actually, a shell script) that
   5 grabs tracks off a CD, encodes them to Ogg/Vorbis, MP3, FLAC, Ogg/Speex and/or
   6 MPP/MP+(Musepack) format, and tags them, all in one go.
   7
   8 Your finished Ogg/MP3/FLAC/Speex/MPP's are, by default, stored in a subdirectory
   9 of the current directory (named after the artist) with a filename based on the
  10 track title. Spaces are replaced by underscores, and apostrophes and
  11 control codes are filtered out. Colons are replaced with an underscore and a
  12 hyphen. The end result usually looks like: Our_Lady_Peace/01.Supermans_Dead.ogg
  13 This filename munging is customizable - edit the mungefilename function in
  14 your abcde.conf to change it.
  15
  16 Need to go through an HTTP proxy for CDDB access? No problem, just export
  17 your http_proxy variable first so wget/fetch/curl can see it.
  18
  19 You already store CDDB entries for your CD collection on your hard disk? Piece
  20 of cake. Just edit CDDBLOCALDIR to point to the repository and give abcde the
  21 "-L" flag to make use of it.
  22
  23 Low on disk space? abcde has different algorithms to schedule ripping and
  24 encoding - to optimize for disk conservation, use -l.
  25
  26 abcde can also take advantage of SMP systems, just like make. Try
  27 'abcde -j 2' - it'll run two encoder jobs while it rips the next track.
  28
  29 abcde now uses FreeDB by default. To use a different FreeDB mirror or
  30 another CDDB service, change the CDDBURL option in your abcde.conf.
  31
  32 Frustrated that you can't use the CPU power on Machine A sitting right
  33 next to Machine B with the fast cdrom drive? Now you don't have to be -
  34 Run distmp3host (included in distmp3) on Machine A, and then run
  35 abcde -r MachineA from Machine B (where "MachineA" is a dns name or IP
  36 address). Use this in combination with '-j 0' to shift all encoding off the
  37 local machine.
  38
  39 You do not have internet connection, or just feel with free time to write
  40 down all the song names and artists instead of using CDDB? Use -n and edit
  41 the template.
  42
  43 To make abcde 2.x work more like 1.x, put these options in your abcde.conf:
  44
  45 INTERACTIVE=n
  46 OUTPUTTYPE=mp3
  47 ID3TAGV=1
  48
  49 NOTICE: abcde needs cd-discid. Grab it from:
  50 http://www.hispalinux.es/~data/files/cd-discid/
  51
  52 MAJOR CHANGES
  53 =============
  54 Changes in 2.2-pre2:
  55
  56 * Support for MPP/MP+(Musepack) format. It can be downloaded from
  57   corecodecs.org. It is supposed to be Free (not only free), and released
  58   under the GPL...
  59 * New "-s <number>" option for starting the numbering of the output files at
  60   a given starting number. Ideal for albums with more than one CD.
  61 * Support for keeping an existing playlist (and not add new entries to it),
  62   erase the existing one (overwrite) or append new entries to the existing
  63   one.
  64
  65 Changes in 2.2-pre1:
  66
  67 * cdparanoia permits performing a query to the CD drive and obtain a list of
  68   valid audio tracks. So, now we perform such query and process the results.
  69 * Support for "None of the above" has been added with the "0" selection. A
  70   template is created, and the selection to edit it is defaulted to "y".
  71
  72 New options in 2.1.19:
  73
  74 * ONETRACK mode has been introduced. Setting the flag "-1" will create a
  75   single file with all the tracks from the CD.
  76
  77 Changes in 2.1.18:
  78
  79 * CDSPEED option defaults to eject. However, since cdparanoia has a built-in
  80   option to set the speed, we use it. There is not way (right now) to force
  81   the use of eject, but it will be introduced in a future release. Also one
  82   can use the pre_read function to set the speed with other program.
  83
  84 New options in 2.1.16:
  85
  86 * -S, CDSPEED and CDSPEEDOPTS for setting the speed of the CDROM. One can
  87   set the options in abcde.conf and pass the value on the command line.
  88   This option can be used with "eject -x <speed>", "setcd -x <speed>" or the
  89   built-in cdparanoia option "-S <speed>", if the CD reader supports it.
  90 * Added a pre-read function. Modify it at your pleasure in abcde.conf
  91   One can use it to close the CD drive.
  92 * -m option, to modify the playlist to include CRLF in every line. Some
  93   players insist on having those to work properly with playlists.
  94
  95 New options in 2.1.15:
  96
  97 * -V can be used to obtain some more information about the CDDB queries.
  98 * -v shows the version, basic help, and exits.
  99
 100 New options from 2.1.10 to 2.1.13:
 101
 102 * CDROMID has been introduced for cdda2wav use with SCSI devices.
 103 * Use -L to retrieve the CDDB entries from a local repository (also one can
 104   set CDDBUSELOCAL in the config file).
 105 * If CDDBCOPYLOCAL is set to "y" we store copies of the CDDB entries, under
 106   CDDBLOCALDIR (defaults to "~/.cddb).
 107
 108 Modifications from 2.1.9 to 2.1.10:
 109
 110 * Initial (still incomplete) MacOSX support is on the works.
 111 * A new tool (curl) has been added for MacOSX compatibility, as HTTPGET
 112   option.
 113
 114 Options modified from 2.1.8 to 2.1.9:
 115
 116 * KEEPWAVS option now sets the clean to "no".
 117
 118 Options added/modified from 2.1.3 to 2.1.5:
 119
 120 * Ogg/Speex added. Use "-o spx" to rip your audiobooks, for instance.
 121
 122 Options added/modified from 2.1.1 to 2.1.3:
 123
 124 * WGET has been substituted by HTTPGET. Now we support fetch as retrieval
 125   program.
 126 * KEEPWAVS has been introduced. Set it to "y" and the wav tracks will be
 127   kept.
 128 * CDDBPROTO is used to specify the protocol level in the CDDB retrieval.
 129 * DAGRAB has been introduced as a cd ripper.
 130
 131 Options added/modified from 2.0.3 to 2.1.x:
 132
 133 * -b use batch processing. It uses normalize to adjust the volume of the
 134   songs, and a -g gapless option from lame to remove gaps. Only available
 135   for mp3+lame combination.
 136 * a new "normalize" option has been added to -a, to normalize the volume.
 137 * -o works now with a combination of the different outputs: ogg, mp3, flac.
 138   Combine them separated by ",". Example: "-o ogg,flac".
 139 * OUTPUTTYPE is no longer used for the output file type. From version 2.1
 140   abcde implements multiple-output and the file type is always appended at
 141   the end of the file. The OUTPUT variable can be used in the
 142   PLAYLISTFORMAT and OUTPUTFORMAT to create different directory structures
 143   and playlist names for each of the output formats selected.
 144 * DYEAR can be used as DiskYear value in CDDB data. If the data is not
 145   supplied by the CDDB server, it can be added.
 146
 147 Other options that changed from 1.x to 2.x:
 148
 149 * -e doesn't exist anymore, abcde now presents you with all of the cddb data
 150   and asks you if you want to edit it. If you don't want to be asked,
 151   use -N or INTERACTIVE=n
 152 * The output type defaults to Ogg/Vorbis. Specify -o mp3 or OUTPUTTYPE=mp3
 153   if you still want to output mp3's.
 154 * -l 2 is now just -l, LOWDISK=2 should now be LOWDISK=y
 155 * -V and -v are gone, abcde will now prompt you if you'd like to use Various
 156   Artists handling, after showing you the cddb data.
 157 * -P is now '-a playlist,clean', PLAYLISTONLY=y is now
 158   ACTIONS=playlist,clean
 159 * -p is now '-a playlist,move,clean', PLAYLIST=y is now
 160   ACTIONS=playlist,move,clean
 161 * cddb-tool has been cleaned up a little bit. 'get' is now 'query' and
 162   'read', and the tempfile handling has been removed.
 163 * ID3COMMENT is now COMMENT.
 164 * FreeDB is now the default CDDB database.
 165
 166
 167 REQUIREMENTS
 168 ============
 169
 170 abcde requires the following backend tools to work:
 171
 172 * An Ogg/Vorbis encoder (oggenc, the default, or vorbize) or:
 173 * An MP3 encoder (lame, gogo, bladeenc, l3enc, etc). Any MP3 encoder that
 174   takes two filenames on the command line, one for input, one for output,
 175   will work.
 176   You can get lame at: http://www.mp3dev.org/mp3/
 177   You can get gogo at: http://homepage1.nifty.com/herumi/gogo_e.html
 178   You can get BladeEnc at: http://bladeenc.mp3.no/
 179   You can get a trial version of mp3enc at:
 180     http://www.iis.fhg.de/amm/download/ or:
 181 * FLAC encoder (flac) or:
 182 * Ogg/Speex encoder (speexenc) or:
 183 * MPP/MP+(Musepack) encoder (mppenc)
 184 * normalize for volume normalization.
 185 * CD Paranoia, an audio CD reading utility,
 186 * Or cdda2wav, the audio CD reading utility cdparanoia was born from,
 187 * Or dagrab, another audio CD reading utility.
 188 * cd-discid, a CDDB DiscID reading program. Formerly bundled with abcde.
 189   It's available in Debian or http://www.hispalinux.es/~data/files/cd-discid/
 190 * An HTTP retrieval program: wget, fetch (FreeBSD) or curl (MacOSX)
 191 * id3, an id3 tagging program. Available at: http://lly.org/~rcw/id3/
 192 * id3v2, an id3 version 2.0 tagger. http://id3v2.sourceforge.net/
 193 * (optional) distmp3, a client/server for distributed mp3 encoding.
 194   You can get distmp3 at http://wlug.westbo.se/medlprog/medlprog.html
 195
 196 Potential problems:
 197
 198 Having trouble getting cdparanoia to read from your drive as a user?
 199 Add yourself to the cdrom group, change the permissions on your cdrom device
 200 to 660, and if you have a SCSI cdrom drive, check the permissions on
 201 /dev/sg* as well.
 202
 203 Running out of disk space for .wav files but don't want to use -l? Put them
 204 in a different location by adding WAVOUTPUTDIR=/some/other/path to your
 205 /etc/abcde.conf or ~/.abcde.conf.
 206
 207 If abcde seems to be ignoring your configuration options or not running
 208 commands such as the encoder, you may have misquoted something. Config
 209 options such as the following do not work:
 210
 211 LAMEOPTS=-h -k
 212
 213 Try this instead:
 214
 215 LAMEOPTS='-h -k'
 216
 217 Abcde's new mailing list is abcde@listas.hispalinux.es. So far has not
 218 been actively used.
 219 The posts from non-subscribers are moderated to prevent spam.
 220
 221 Archives of the old list are publically available at:
 222 http://lly.org/~rcw/abcde/list/current/threads.html
 223
 224 Abcde's current page is at http://www.hispalinux.es/~data/abcde.php
 225 Abcde's new homepage will be at http://abcde.hispalinux.es/.
 226 Abcde's old homepage is at http://lly.org/~rcw/abcde/page/.
 227 --
 228 Robert Woodcock <rcw@debian.org>
 229 Jesus Climent <jesus.climent@hispalinux.es>