Export a CD catalogue¶

Build a readable album-and-track catalogue, then save a spreadsheet copy. This lesson takes about 15 minutes and uses only practice files. You will see how one template becomes a report before adding groups or multiple outputs.

OpenTag desktop app installed, with copied audio files loaded.
Pending edits saved or discarded, and the three practice files selected.
A separate practice folder available for reports.

Use these tags and select the files in the order shown:

Album artist / Artist	Album	Track	Title
Juniper Vale	Harbour Lights	2	Lanterns on the Water
Juniper Vale	Harbour Lights	1	Paper Boats
Mira Solberg	Low Tide	1	North Pier

1. Make a copy of the text configuration¶

Choose File → Export… (Ctrl+E, or Cmd+E on a Mac). Select Text, choose Duplicate, then Rename the copy to Practice catalogue. Keep Append data and Create one output file per off.

Set Export file name to practice-catalogue.txt in your separate report folder using Browse…. That location is the output; the configuration is the reusable set of instructions.

2. Repeat one simple line¶

Replace Export template with:

$filename(txt,utf-8)$loop(1)%artist% - %title%$char(10)$loopend()

Choose Export, then open the report in a text editor. It should contain:

Juniper Vale - Lanterns on the Water
Juniper Vale - Paper Boats
Mira Solberg - North Pier

$loop(1) preserves the selected file-list order. The line break belongs inside the loop so every track gets one. The original audio files are not changed by this report.

3. Group albums and sort their tracks¶

Reopen Export, select Practice catalogue, and replace the template with:

$filename(txt,utf-8)$loop(%album%)%album% — files: %_total_files%$char(10)$loop($num(%track%,3))  $num(%track%,2) %title%$char(10)$loopend()$loopend()

Export to the same practice report, keeping append off. The output becomes:

Harbour Lights — files: 2
  01 Paper Boats
  02 Lanterns on the Water
Low Tide — files: 1
  01 North Pier

The outer loop chooses an album and writes its heading once. The inner loop receives only that album's rows and sorts by padded track number. The two spaces before $num indent the lines. %_total_files% in an album heading counts that album, rather than the whole selection.

Albums with the same title would combine here. This practice set has distinct titles; for a mixed library, add an album-artist grouping level or choose a partition key that identifies each album edition.

4. Write a separate file for each practice album¶

Reopen Export and enable Create one output file per. Set Partition format to %album%, then set Export file name to %album%.txt in the same report folder. Keep the grouped template and append off.

Export and inspect Harbour Lights.txt and Low Tide.txt. Each report should contain only its album's heading and tracks. Partitioning divides the input into documents before the template renders. The album loop then sees one album within each document.

The name must vary between groups. If both used practice-catalogue.txt, OpenTag would reject the output collision rather than overwrite one album with the other. Empty or inconsistent album values need attention too.

5. Save a spreadsheet copy¶

Reopen Export, turn Create one output file per off, select CSV (spreadsheet) and choose practice-catalogue.csv in the report folder. Export, then use the spreadsheet's text/CSV import command. Select UTF-8, comma-separated fields and double quotes. Import track-like and identifier columns as Text if their exact spelling must survive.

Check that there are three data records plus a header. This is a separate configuration and output format. Editing the spreadsheet does not write tags back to the audio files.

What you learned¶

A configuration stores the template; an output file stores its result.
A loop repeats a row, and an inner loop can repeat tracks under one heading.
A sort key controls ordering independently of printed track formatting.
A partition creates separate reports and needs a distinct name for each.
CSV import settings determine how a spreadsheet interprets text values.