Replace/Regex edit before importing

[JOJ0]

This has been asked before: #4047

Update: Actually not the same question, I was wrong when I wrote that back then.

Sorry for repeating it but it's in a specific way I'm sure a lot of DJs and beatport users/customers in general will be aware of:

Downloaded tracks from Beatport tend to look like this often: "Trackname (Original Mix)" - This will get beets to apply penalties when searching for tracknames on MusicBrainz, Discogs or whatever source plugin is in use. (except the source plugin is the beatport plugion itself)

https://github.com/edgars-supe/beets-importreplace does the opposite, not what I need.

It would help to just kick out "(Original Mix)" before searching online. Is there any solution existing already? The fromfilename plugin does something like that but it's not configurable. Would a PR making it possible to add new regex replacements to fromfilename be welcomed?

[benpage2]

Edit: This comment was from a different thread.

Not that I know of. I'm currently using mp3tag to make a custom temp_title field, regex replacing in mp3tag, importing without move with beets, then using mp3tag to re apply the temp_title field before using beet move to put everything in my library as is.

Also a DJ and I'm really working hard to circumvent a lot of beets limitations because the lastgenre and whatlastgenre extensions are so good. If you have any workflows that work well for you please let me know lol

[arsaboo]

@JOJ0 I don't think there is one. We could extend the importreplace plugin to do some replacements before imports or incorporate that feature (regex replacement before and after imports) in beets. It is an important enough feature to be part of the core.

[benpage2]

Personally I don't see why not. It also seems like it would fit neatly into the modify command as well just for general use. Or maybe even its own replace command?

[JOJ0]

We have quite some plugins that replace something and have that in their names already. Let's carefully think about where to put that kind of functionality to not confuse the beets replacement jungle further 😅

[benpage2]

I only know of import-replace. Is there one that allows you to do regex replacements on your library without importing?

[JOJ0]

https://beets.readthedocs.io/en/latest/plugins

Ok replace not so much in the names, but similar terms like rewrite, substitute

Where would that functionality fit best you think? And how could the config entry look like?

[benpage2]

So I've been thinking about what exactly would be most helpful for the last little bit @JOJ0 @arsaboo.

For sure the best thing would be a simple find and replace command with the ability to use regex. The idea being that it would act very similarly to beet modify and act on the library and tags. It may compliment the import-replace plugin

beet replace [options] QUERY find:replace

Similar to QUERY find:replace runs a simple find and replace while find::replace runs a regex find and replace
Running beet replace [options] would run the replacements set under in the config (thinking that the config is similar to import-replace) but without having to do an import.

Options (same as beet modify):

• -M don't move
• -W don't write
• -w write (default)
• -a albums instead of items
• -y skip yes prompt

Additional options:

• -i case insensitive
• -e matches entire word (using -e because "whole word" would intuitively be -w)
• -f specify a field? I'm not sure if this could be part of the query functionality or should be it's own option

Config options:

• auto: yes/no (default yes) run config on import
• case_insensitive: yes/no (default no)
• entire_word: yes/no (default no)

Additionally the config options from import-replace would be included (quoting from the import-replace readme):

• item_fields is a set of fields to run replacements on for items
• album_fields is a set of fields to run replacements on for albums
• replace is a set of regex/replacement pairs

Overall the config may look like:

pluginname:
    auto: yes
    case_insensitive: no
    entire_word: no
    replacements:
        - item_fields: title
           replace:
               'The':'That' (alternatively `The::'that' would be regex)
        - item_fields: album
        - album_fields: album
            replace:
                'Foo':'Bar'

[arsaboo]

@benpage2 This looks great. We can finetune the options as we start working on it. Once @JOJ0 gives their blessing, we can get started with this.

[arsaboo]

@JOJ0 can we not include that feature in this framework? It still is a replacement...may be we add another config.

[benpage2]

@JOJ0 I just noticed you were specifically talking about adding regex to fromfilename.

I'm still new to github so sorry if this is an obvious question, but if I were to open a new thread, where would be the best place to put it?

Thanks for all the help guys!

[JOJ0]

fromfilename also acts before import, your feature proposal sounds like it's ment to run on already existing library items.

But actually I'd like to see any solution in beets to prep super broken metadata to get a chance of being detected. Furthermore the beatport (Original Mix) dilemma could be fixed with such a pre-import-fix.

Pls clarify if I'm mistaken.

I would obly like to keep issues in order as good as possible :-)

[JOJ0]

@JOJ0 I just noticed you were specifically talking about adding regex to fromfilename.

I'm still new to github so sorry if this is an obvious question, but if I were to open a new thread, where would be the best place to put it?

Simply open a new issue. I'm on mobile since travelling currently, not sure how to describe the clicks on Desktop. Youll figure it out. Cooy over your proposal into that new issue and let's refine it over there.

[JOJ0]

I'm still new to github so sorry if this is an obvious question, but if I were to open a new thread, where would be the best place to put it?

Simply open a new issue. I'm on mobile since travelling currently, not sure how to describe the clicks on Desktop. Youll figure it out. Copy over your proposal into that new issue and let's refine it over there.

[benpage2]

Yeah exactly, the idea is that you could do it on already imported items and potentially before import as well. Should the new issue go under ideas or feature requests? @JOJ0

Edit: I'll just throw it under ideas.