Best way to manage Id3 tags?

[Francisco Borges]

» On Sun, Aug 20, 2006 at 02:07PM -0700, Danny Colligan wrote:

> I wanted to ask the list:  what is the best way to manage id3 tags?   I just
> switched to Rythmbox from XMMS because i wanted a nicer itunes-ish interface
> than what the winap-ish xmms provides.  However, unlike itunes (maybe this
> is why it is so much faster?) Rhythmbox doesn't allow you to edit the id3
> tags within the interface.
>
> I found this Python ID3 tag module: http://id3-py.sourceforge.net/ so I
> guess I could script it myself if I wanted to, but I wanted to know if
> there's an effective utility which already provides this functionality.

I use two programs easytag and id3v2.

easytag:
- has a GUI
- is slow,
- can do some database lookup's but may hang while doing that,
- changes only a limited number of fields,
- has a great interface to a RegExp like scanner to map the filename
  into tags
- has some other annoying glitches
- AFAIK may set a picture into the id3 tag.

id3v2:
- is a command line tool, and thus allows you do use it together with
  shell globbing and shell power in general
- *really* fast
- edits ALL Id3 fields
- except that does not set pictures into the tag.

-- 
Francisco