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  #106  
Old 2005-04-16, 09:10 PM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Wait a sec, track1-fixed is smaller (by 864) and track2-fixed is bigger (by 1140), looking like it just shifted and padded. I'm not convinced they've been re-encoded.

Quote:
kevin@dizzy:/data2/test$ shntool len *.flac
length expanded size cdr WAVE problems filename
6:12.52 65743148 --- -- ---xx track1-fixed.flac
6:12.52 65744012 -b- -- ---xx track1.flac
1:33.32 16480508 --- -- ---xx track2-fixed.flac
1:33.32 16479368 -b- -- ---xx track2.flac
15:32.18 164447036 B (totals for 4 files, 0.4918 overall compression ratio)

And I've had the "Pad last file..." checked and still no luck with fixing just the last track. I'll try again though, leaving only that track in the window. Would the Shift type make any difference? I use "round".
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Last edited by feralicious; 2005-04-16 at 09:18 PM.
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  #107  
Old 2005-04-16, 10:31 PM
jazzbo jazzbo is offline
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by feralicious
Wait a sec, track1-fixed is smaller (by 864) and track2-fixed is bigger (by 1140), looking like it just shifted and padded. I'm not convinced they've been re-encoded.
shntool's len mode shows the length of the uncompressed data. It shifted 864 from the first track into the second track and then padded 276 to end of it as it said. The len values should be the same for the original wav, a SHN, a flac, etc.

What is important is the size of the flac files themselves which I highlighted in red this time::

Quote:
Originally Posted by jazzbo
Code:
kevin@dizzy:/data2/test$ ls -l *.flac
-rw-r--r--  1 kevin kevin 32829902 2005-04-16 19:09 track1-fixed.flac
-rw-r--r--  1 kevin kevin 32738704 2005-04-16 19:05 track1.flac
-rw-r--r--  1 kevin kevin  7664871 2005-04-16 19:09 track2-fixed.flac
-rw-r--r--  1 kevin kevin  7648176 2005-04-16 19:05 track2.flac
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  #108  
Old 2005-04-16, 11:56 PM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Oh, yeah, I see. Oops.
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Last edited by feralicious; 2005-04-17 at 12:02 AM.
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  #109  
Old 2005-04-17, 04:53 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by jazzbo
I don't see how it's possible, as it is bytes in the uncompressed audio stream, not the compressed side that need to be moved so the data needs to be piped back through flac by shntool in order to make the correction.

I also tested it, and shntool clearly recompresses at level 5 when doing a SBE fix.

...
You're absolutely right: shntool does re-encode to compression level 5 when fixing flac files. I'm such an idiot (or am I just too old for this?) not to get the facts ... you can easily see what happened using the shntool info mode (same in Trader's Little Helper). The output for every file shows a row beginning with "compression ratio". Compare the values for an unfixed and a fixed flac file and you know whether or not the compression level has been changed.

And now the good news: In the next version of Trader's Little Helper there will be an option to set the compression level when fixing files.

PS: Just my two cents on the level of flac compression ... I'm not really a friend of a flac encoding levels higher than 6. Take a look at the filesizes below (sizes are in Byte):

Code:
...
2005-04-17  08:16       317,048,732 Track01.wav
2005-04-17  08:16       190,677,594 Track01_level5.flac
2005-04-17  08:16       190,182,642 Track01_level8.flac
2005-04-17  08:16        82,797,836 Track02.wav
2005-04-17  08:16        48,118,903 Track02_level5.flac
2005-04-17  08:16        47,874,321 Track02_level8.flac
...
The compressed versions of Track01 differ with about 483 kB or 0.0026%. For Track02 the size difference is about 239 kB or 0.0051%. On an old P3 550 Mhz machine of mine the time for encoding those two files with level 8 is about 4.5 times or 450% bigger than the time needed with level 5. IMO those size differences are not worth the significant bigger amount of time. But as i said before ... just a matter of opinion.
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  #110  
Old 2005-04-17, 06:46 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by roann
... The compressed versions of Track01 differ with about 483 kB or 0.0026%. For Track02 the size difference is about 239 kB or 0.0051%. ...
Well I think I'm really too old for modern science ... of course the correct values are 0.26% and 0.51% ...
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  #111  
Old 2005-04-17, 11:05 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by feralicious
And I've had the "Pad last file..." checked and still no luck with fixing just the last track. I'll try again though, leaving only that track in the window. Would the Shift type make any difference? I use "round".
I think this is a small bug with THL. When you load up a set and hit Fix, I believe it does a check to see if it can skip the first few files (if there are no SBEs on the first few tracks, nothing has to be done to them). However, when it sees that the only track that needs fixing is the final track, shntool doesn't allow it to fix because shntool doesn't like fixing just one track.

In theory, it should work fine if there are scattered SBEs throughout the set, as well as one on the last track, so shntool fix can do its thing, and shntool pad can do the last track.

This is just my theory, and I probably have no idea what I'm talking about, so it would be good if someone can confirm or deny this.
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  #112  
Old 2005-04-20, 02:35 PM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Right, I understand that it doesn't like fixing just one track, but roann said that if the option of "Pad last file with zero-bytes" was checked it would do it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by roann
...Trader's Little Helper can fix a single SBE on the last track of a FLAC/APE/SHN set. You need to enable the "Pad last file with zero-bytes" option for this.
But it doesn't for me.

I've tried with all files in the window and with just the file that had the SBE, no go.

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TLH v0.9.1 (build 48)
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Last edited by feralicious; 2005-04-20 at 02:40 PM.
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  #113  
Old 2005-04-20, 03:35 PM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by feralicious
Right, I understand that it doesn't like fixing just one track, but roann said that if the option of "Pad last file with zero-bytes" was checked it would do it.

But it doesn't for me. ...
I didn't say/mean that you can fix a single stand-alone file. What I said was "...Trader's Little Helper can fix a single SBE on the last track of a FLAC/APE/SHN set. ...". So, if you have a set of files (i.e. more than one) and the last file in this set is not sector aligned then Trader's Little Helper can fix this with the "Pad last file ..." option if you're having all files of the set in the file list window.

It's a common misunderstanding to try a fix only on the files with SBEs. Never do that (there are some exceptions but forget this for a moment)! Fix always the whole set of files. shntool is smart enough to see which files need to be fixed.
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  #114  
Old 2005-04-20, 06:19 PM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

I know what you're saying roann, but something about the way TLH is set up doesn't work with how shntool works. Here's an example.

I have this show that only has an SBE on the last track of the second disk:

Code:
    length     expanded size   cdr  WAVE problems filename
     5:03.13       53479820    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t01.shn
     5:15.74       55740092    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t02.shn
     4:52.67       51666428    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t03.shn
    14:14.71      150812636    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t04.shn
     5:41.54       60279452    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t05.shn
     5:58.37       63238056    -b-   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t06.shn
    41:07.16      435216484 B                     (totals for 6 files, 0.5403 overall compression ratio)
I hit Fix SBEs. I make sure Pad Last File is checked. I then hit fix:

Code:
shntool [fix]: warning: skipping first 5 files because they would not be changed
shntool [fix]: error: need two or more files to process

There were errors.
You can see from the error log that TLH skips the first 5 because nothing needs to be done. Fair enough, except that it is now only telling shntool to fix one track. Shntool can't do this, so it produces an error and never even gets to the padding part.

Now to the fun part. I load up the same show, except I put another track that has an SBE in front of it:

Code:
    length     expanded size   cdr  WAVE problems filename
     4:05.62       43364208    -b-   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d1t13.shn
     5:03.13       53479820    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t01.shn
     5:15.74       55740092    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t02.shn
     4:52.67       51666428    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t03.shn
    14:14.71      150812636    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t04.shn
     5:41.54       60279452    ---   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t05.shn
     5:58.37       63238056    -b-   --   ---xx   cj2001-11-07d2t06.shn
    45:13.03      478580692 B                     (totals for 7 files, 0.5284 overall compression ratio)
I hit fix, then preview and voila:

Code:
Preview of changes:
-------------------

Track breaks will be shifted backward when necessary.

cj2001-11-07d1t13.shn --> cj2001-11-07d1t13-fixed.shn
  - beginning of track will remain unchanged
  - data size will decrease by 340 bytes

<SNIP>

cj2001-11-07d2t06.shn --> cj2001-11-07d2t06-fixed.shn
  - beginning of track will be moved backward by 340 bytes
  - data size will increase by 340 bytes

The last file 'cj2001-11-07d2t06-fixed.shn' would be padded with 2224 zero-bytes.
Perfect, no errors.

TLH will not work when a show has only an SBE on the last track. Don't get me wrong, I love this program. I'm just trying to help you make it even better.

-Alex
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  #115  
Old 2005-04-20, 07:10 PM
feralicious's Avatar
feralicious feralicious is offline
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Quote:
Originally Posted by roann
I didn't say/mean that you can fix a single stand-alone file. What I said was "...Trader's Little Helper can fix a single SBE on the last track of a FLAC/APE/SHN set. ...".
I know, I quoted you. As I said in the post that you partially quoted, I tried both, with all the files in the window and with just the error file. Neither worked.

Quote:
Originally Posted by roann
So, if you have a set of files (i.e. more than one) and the last file in this set is not sector aligned then Trader's Little Helper can fix this with the "Pad last file ..." option if you're having all files of the set in the file list window.
Nope, I get the same error carrot posted above. It just doesn't work.

Quote:
Originally Posted by roann
It's a common misunderstanding to try a fix only on the files with SBEs. Never do that (there are some exceptions but forget this for a moment)! Fix always the whole set of files. shntool is smart enough to see which files need to be fixed.
Yeah, I've already learned that part. I only did it as an experiment to see if I could get TLH to work for fixing just the last track. No luck.
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  #116  
Old 2005-04-26, 05:14 AM
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roann roann is offline
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Showtime girls and boys! A new release (v0.9.2.55) of Trader's Little Helper. As usual you can download the setup file here.

Next are excerpts from the change log with some comments/explanations I added for you. Though this will take some time please read those notes carefully! There are some answers to reported problems and some help/hints how to use new functionality.

Added: Ability to verify shn files
flac.exe and mac.exe come with a build-in option to verify files (i.e. decoding w/o writing an output file), shorten.exe does not. I used a little workaround to implement the same functionality for shn files.

Added: Ability to pad files with zero bytes
Padding a file with zero bytes means adding silence at the beginning ("prepad") or at the end ("postpad") so the file becomes sector aligned. This is very useful if only the first or if only the last file in a file set has a SBE.
Important: Do not use pad mode for fixing single tracks that are part of a live file set (only exceptions noted above). Because it's silence that is added you will ruin the whole thing.
Note: The Fix tab had been reworked, so please take a deeper look to become familiar with this (for example "Preview" is now in the "Options" group).

Added: Re-encoding level can be set when fixing SBEs
As discussed early in this thread shntool re-encodes the files to be fixed. This will be done with a default re-encoding level of 5 on flac files and 2 on ape files. This default value can now be changed.
Note for those of you that are not familiar with ape encoding levels: Do not use the "insane" level. It will take a very very long time for encoding ...

Added: When fixing SBEs default setting "Skip the first N files that wouldn't be changed" can be disabled to process all files
The default was/is to skip the first N files that wouldn't be changed, i.e. shntool will check the file list from the beginning and skip all files with no SBE until the first file with a SBE comes up. That's the way all previous releases of Trader's Little Helper will handle a file set with SBEs.
And there we got a problem that was reported earlier in this thread: If you have a file set with a SBE only on the last track, all files except the last one will be skipped. Now there's only one file left to fix, and this cannot be handled by shntool ... error message.
With Trader's Little Helper there are now two ways to get this processed properly: a) Use pad mode (see above) to postpad silence to the last file. b) Stay in fix mode but disable the newly implemented option "Skip first N sector aligned files" so all files will be processed even if the first several of them wouldn't be altered.
Note: Please keep in mind that fixing SBEs the latter way in most cases needs alot of unnecessary time and disc space. Say you have a set of 10 files, each file 40 MB, and only the last file got a SBE. If you have disabled file skipping the first nine files without SBE will be copied to your drive though there are no fixes/changes (except the file names will be suffixed with "-fixed"). Because of copying this will work a lot longer and will waste your disc space with data that's already there (in this example 360 MB).
Note:Sorry for my previous incorrect postings on this but I tested your reports on the version I was working on and there skipping files was permanently disabled for debugging purposes - what I hadn't in mind at that time.

Added: Ability to fix SBEs on multiple file sets
If you double-click on a file name in the file list there will be a number left-handed to the file name. So this file is marked as first file of a new file set. Double-clicking on the file name again will remove the marker. When fixing SBEs Trader's Little Helper will detect those markers and step-by-step fix SBEs for every file set found.

Added: When fixing SBEs the file order can be changed with Move up / Move down buttons
There are now two buttons to change the order of the files. You can move all the files you've selected (BTW with the mouse you can move only one file at a time now). Moving files is only allowed within a file set (or in other words you can not move a file from one file set to another). So the best way is to set the file set markers after arranging the files.

Added: Buttons on some pages to expand the size of the log window
Those buttons will expand the size of the log window to the max so you can see a lot more messages at a time.

Added: Checksum files (.ffp, .md5, .st5) can be associated with Trader's Little Helper for verifying purposes
If you had selected "associate" during setup there a now two additional ways to verify checksum files: a) Double-click on a checksum file. b) Right-click on a checksum file and select the item "Verify with Trader's Little Helper" in the context menu. BTW there will be some (poor) icons installed for the checksum files. Would be great if you have better ones or can create better ones ... please let me know.
Note:Putting things to the registry is sometimes a bit frustrating because other entries may be a bit unusual. On one of my machines I had a minor "problem" with MD5Summer: MD5Summer stays as the default prog which will be executed when double-clicking a md5 file, Trader's Little Helper does not appear in the files context menu. If you want to set Trader's Little Helper as your default md5 checker you need to do this manually via the Explorers Tools --> Options menu.

Added: .ape, .flac and .shn files can be associated with Trader's Little Helper for decoding purposes
This is the same as described for checksum files above. Please keep in mind that with double-clicking you can only process one file. Processing multiple files will only work using the files context menu.

Added: .ape, .flac and .shn files can be decoded via drag & drop
As requested .ape, .flac and .shn files can be dragged from Windows Explorer and dropped on Trader's Little Helper to decode them.

Changed: Audio files that were located in different directories and/or have different file extensions can be processed at the same time to show file details
In previous releases Trader's Little Helper refuses to show details about audio files that have different file extensions or are located in different directories.

Changed: Default name for saving a checksum file is '<directory>.<type of checksum>'
Example: The files checksums were created for are located in C:\Music\abc2004-07-11.flac16 and it's a flac fingerprint. The default file name will be abc2004-07-11.flac16.ffp.

Changed: Default name for the file details log file is '<directory>.shntool.txt'
Example: Files are located in C:\Music\abc2004-07-11.flac16. The default file name for the log file will be abc2004-07-11.flac16.shntool.txt.

Changed: Almost all error messaging is done in the respective log window
In previous versions there are a lot of pop-up error message boxes. It's very annoying to click them away especially if there are alot of them during a task. Now the error messages will be displayed in the log windows.
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  #117  
Old 2005-04-26, 06:12 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Very, very, very, very cool Roann!
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  #118  
Old 2005-04-26, 10:13 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

I'm floored! Thanks a million!
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  #119  
Old 2005-04-26, 10:18 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Remarkable.
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  #120  
Old 2005-04-26, 11:19 AM
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Re: Trader's Little Helper

Very nice! Gonna go check it out now.
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