The Kid3 Handbook

Urs Fleisch

Software development 

3.7.0

Abstract

Kid3 is an application to edit the ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags in MP3 files in an efficient way. Also tags in Ogg/Vorbis, Opus, DSF, FLAC, MPC, APE, MP4/AAC, MP2, Speex, TrueAudio, WavPack, WMA, WAV, AIFF files and tracker modules (MOD, S3M, IT, XM) are supported. It is easy to set tags of multiple files to the same values (e.g. album, artist, year and genre in all files of the same album) and generate the tags from the file name or vice versa.


Table of Contents

Synopsis
Options
kid3
kid3-qt
kid3-cli
1. Introduction
2. Using Kid3
Kid3 features
Example Usage
3. Command Reference
The GUI Elements
File List
Edit Playlist
Directory List
File
Tag 1
Tag 2
Tag 3
Frame List
Synchronized Lyrics and Event Timing Codes
The File Menu
The Edit Menu
The Tools Menu
The Settings Menu
The Help Menu
4. kid3-cli
Commands
Help
Timeout
Quit application
Change directory
Print the current working directory
Directory list
Save the changed files
Select file
Select tag
Get tag frame
Set tag frame
Revert
Import from file or clipboard
Automatic import
Download album cover artwork
Export to file or clipboard
Create playlist
Apply filename format
Apply tag format
Apply text encoding
Rename directory
Number tracks
Filter
Convert ID3v2.3 to ID3v2.4
Convert ID3v2.4 to ID3v2.3
Filename from tag
Tag from filename
Tag to other tag
Copy
Paste
Remove
Play
Examples
5. Credits and License
A. Installation
How to obtain Kid3
Requirements
Compilation and Installation
Configuration
B. D-Bus Interface
D-Bus Examples
D-Bus API
Open file or directory
Unload the tags of all files which are not modified or selected
Save all modified files
Get a detailed error message provided by some methods
Revert changes in the selected files
Start an automatic batch import
Import tags from a file
Import tags from other tags
Download album cover art
Export tags to a file
Create a playlist
Get items of a playlist
Set items of a playlist
Quit the application
Select all files
Deselect all files
Set the first file as the current file
Set the previous file as the current file
Set the next file as the current file
Select the first file
Select the previous file
Select the next file
Select the current file
Expand or collapse the current file item if it is a directory
Apply the file name format
Apply the tag format
Apply text encoding
Set the directory name from the tags
Set subsequent track numbers in the selected files
Filter the files
Convert ID3v2.3 tags to ID3v2.4
Convert ID3v2.4 tags to ID3v2.3
Get path of directory
Get name of current file
Set name of selected file
Set format to use when setting the filename from the tags
Set the file names of the selected files from the tags
Get value of frame
Set value of frame
Get all frames of a tag
Get technical information about file
Set tag from file name
Set tag from other tag
Copy tag
Paste tag
Remove tag
Reparse the configuration
Plays the selected files
C. QML Interface
QML Examples
QML API
Kid3Script
Scripting Functions
Application Context
Configuration Objects

List of Tables

3.1. Mapping of Unified Frame Types to Various Formats
3.2. Entry in Rating Table

Synopsis

kid3 [ --help | --author | --version | --license | --desktopfile FILE ] [FILE...]

kid3-qt [--portable] [Qt-options] [FILE...]

kid3-cli [--portable] [--dbus] [ -h | --help ] [-c COMMAND1] [-c COMMAND2...] [FILE...]

Options

Table of Contents

kid3
kid3-qt
kid3-cli
--portable

Store configuration in file kid3.ini inside application directory.

FILE

If FILE is the path to a directory, it will be opened. If one or more file paths are given, their common directory is opened and the files are selected.

kid3

--help

Show help about options.

--author

Show author information.

--version

Show version information.

--license

Show license information.

--desktopfile FILE

The base file name of the desktop entry for this application.

kid3-qt

Qt-options

See qt5options(7).

kid3-cli

--dbus

Activate the D-Bus interface.

-c

Execute a command. Multiple -c options are possible, they are executed in sequence. See the section about kid3-cli for a description of the available commands.

-h|--help

Show help about options and commands.

Chapter 1. Introduction

Kid3 is an application to edit the ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags in MP3 files in an efficient way. These tags can be edited by most MP3 players, but not in a very comfortable and efficient way. Moreover the tags in Ogg/Vorbis, Opus, DSF, FLAC, MPC, APE, MP4/AAC, MP2, Speex, TrueAudio, WavPack, WMA, WAV, AIFF files and tracker modules (MOD, S3M, IT, XM) are supported too.

Kid3 does not grab nor encode MP3 files, but it is targeted to edit the ID3 tags of all files of an album in an efficient way, i.e. with as few mouse clicks and key strokes as possible. Where most other programs can edit either ID3v1 or ID3v2 tags, Kid3 has full control over both versions, can convert tags between the two formats and has access to all ID3v2 tags. Tags of multiple files can be set to the same value, e.g. the artist, album, year and genre of all files of an album typically have the same values and can be set together. If the information for the tags is contained in the file name, the tags can be automatically set from the file name. It is also possible to set the file name according to the tags found in the file in arbitrary formats.

The editing task is further supported by automatic replacement of characters or substrings, for instance to remove illegal characters from filenames. Automatic control of upper and lower case characters makes it easy to use a consistent naming scheme in all tags.

The tag information for full albums can be taken from gnudb.org, TrackType.org, MusicBrainz, Discogs, Amazon or other sources of track lists. The import format is freely configurable by regular expressions.

Please report any problems or feature requests to the author.

Chapter 2. Using Kid3

Kid3 features

  • Edit ID3v1.1 tags

  • Edit all ID3v2.3 and ID3v2.4 frames

  • Edit tags of multiple files

  • Convert between ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags

  • Edit MP3, Ogg/Vorbis, Opus, DSF, FLAC, MPC, APE, MP4/AAC, MP2, Speex, TrueAudio, WavPack, WMA, WAV and AIFF tags

  • Generate tags from filename

  • Generate tags from the contents of tag fields

  • Generate filename from tags

  • Generate and change directory names from tags

  • Generate playlist file

  • Automatic case conversion and string translation

  • Import from gnudb.org, TrackType.org, MusicBrainz, Discogs, Amazon and other data sources

  • Export as CSV, HTML, playlist, Kover XML and other formats. Exported CSV files can be imported again.

Example Usage

This section describes a typical session with Kid3. Let's assume we have a directory containing MP3 files with the tracks from the album "Let's Tag" from the band "One Hit Wonder". The directory is named in the "artist - album" format, in our case One Hit Wonder - Let's Tag. The directory contains the tracks in the "track title.mp3" format, which I think is useful because the filenames are short (important when using mobile MP3 players with small displays) and in the correct order when sorted alphabetically (important when using hardware MP3 players which play the tracks in alphabetical order or in the order in which they are burnt on CD and that order is alphabetical when using mkisofs). Besides this, the artist and album information is already in the directory name and