New Version 2.0 (04 september/2010)

This application can extract the album art embedded in the music files in a iPod, and create the necessary files to display album art correctly in RockBox.

RockBox supports Album Art but with some limitations like described in his wiki page AlbumArt.
Between the limitations are that does not support Embedded album art, only external image files in BMP or JPG format.

This application is addressed to make easy the visualization of album art in Rockbox. It reads the iPod database to find music files then it does the folowing actions:

  1. Scan and extract album art from music files.
  2. Resize the albums extracted.
  3. Convert the format to bmp or jpg.
  4. Move the file converted to a folder in the iPod (or any other location).

The album art files are stored in iPod_Control\Music\ folder in the iPod by default.
The following characters will be replaced with an underscore (_) in the filename: \ / : < > ? * |. Double quotes will be replaced by singlequotes.

Now you can see album art displayed in RockBox, and use PictureFlow to visualize albums.

Download:

The iPod must be connected before executing the program, because the first thing it does, is to try to detect an iPod connected.
It needs .NET framework 2.0+ to run (can be downloaded from here: .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 (x86)).
This app uses SharePodLib and TagLib#.
Changelog:
2.0 - 04 september 2010

  • Update TagLib# version to 2.0.3.7.
  • When option Use .rockbox/albumart format is checked, it looks first for albumartist tag and if it doesn't exist, then uses artist tag.
  • Added option to use original album art size.
  • Include support for JPG output format, as well as BMP.
  • New layout.
  • Added option for overwrite Album Art file if already exists.
  • Doesn't need to generate temp files anymore, it saves directly the final Album Art in the location desired.
  • Enhanced example of filename output.
  • Include support for .m4a files.
1.3.1 - 22 october 2008

  • Bugfix: "include artist name in filename" was not working properly.
1.3 - 09 october 2008

  • Added a detailed log of errors found while processing files.
  • Added an option to include [artist] in filename.
  • Minor changes to layout and UI.
1.2 - 10 june 2008

  • Added an option to change the final location by user.
  • Added an option to include size in filename or not.
1.1 - 10 may 2008

  • Added an option to change the size of picture files generated (between 10 and 500 pixels).
  • Change the filenames of picture files to albumtitle.sizexsize.bmp, and final location to iPod_Control\Music\ to make it ready for PictureFlow.
  • Minor improvements to layout and interface.
1.0 - 8 march 2008

  • Initial release.

30 comments:

ZoT said...

Tremenda aplicación te felicito, me ha sido de gran ayuda ;)

Ray said...

Great software for rockbox!

2 Suggestions:

1. I'd like the option to use [artist]-[album].sizeXsize.bmp in /.rockbox/albumart

2. Detailed error log to file so I know which files I need to do manually.

Thanks!

Victor Cardenas said...

Ray:
I think your suggestions are very good ideas... I will implement it next week and release a new version.

Victor Cardenas said...

new version released! 1.3

Late Night Noise said...

Hey great program... but I think I am either using this wrong or its not working properly. When I check "include artist name in filename" the output doesn't have the artistname included? what could be going wrong here?

Victor Cardenas said...

Late Night Noise:

thanks for spotting the problem... i checked and it was a bug in the program. Version 1.3.1 just released fixes it.

Late Night Noise said...

Hero. thanks a lot!

Anonymous said...

Does his only work on MP3s? I am using iTunes and have converted all my CDs to AAC with correct coverart. Also, how does it know where the music is stored on my Rockbox-iPod, is it doing a recursive search on the whole iPod?

Anonymous said...

Sorry, I read now that it reads the iPod database. For us having iPods without an iPod database, is there an option?

I noticed the other app you have, but it doesn't have all the options as the iPod coverart app has, such as add Artist name to the filename.

Victor Cardenas said...

Hi Henrik... if you have an iPod without a database, then the other app is the appropiate (Album Art Extracter for Rockbox). I will be working on it tonight to release an upgrade for that app tomorrow, and it will have the same options that currently has the iPod Extractor.

Both apps can read a lot of music files formats, including AAC.. i will update the post to publish that info.

Unknown said...

Hi
the covers are extracted but the covers dont show on the wps...
help?

Victor Cardenas said...

@Tom: be sure you follow the guidelines in http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/AlbumArt

Anonymous said...

yeah its ok
thanks
the problem was the my ipod video didnt like the 100x100...

amazing program mate.

say - if I want to convert my whole library to normal names so that I could lose the itunes name system all together - is there a util for it?

thanks
T

Victor Cardenas said...

I'm glad you found the solution.

About the filenames, i have used Mp3tag that can rename files based on the tag information and it is freeware... but you must be aware that changing filenames implies the original firmware can't recognize the music, only rockbox will do, and can't use iTunes to administer your music.
Also this program won't work if you change the filenames, you will have to use the other i wrote Album Art Extracter for RockBoxregards

Unknown said...

I'm completely lost here... i'm a new adopter to unbuntu and I don't understand how to make this work at all... lol

Victor Cardenas said...

Hi Kyle... this app only works in windows, for ubuntu there is "Album Art Extracter for Rockbox" in this same blog. That works in windows and linux.

Read the info in that post, and let me know if you need some help to make it work, and i will gladly help you.

Anonymous said...

Hey Victor, it's not working for me anymore. I keep getting this error. What's going on?! =/

Victor Cardenas said...

which error?

Anonymous said...

cannot works for me

Victor Cardenas said...

can you provide some info about your issue?

Anonymous said...

Hi Victor,

As RockBox is now able to read Album Art in jpeg format, could you please update your tool to support jpeg format as well in addition to bmp format ?

Thanks in advance,

Bertrand

Victor Cardenas said...

@Bertrand
yes of course. I started to work on a new version some time ago (including jpg support), but get busy on other projects. Now I have some time to get back on this update. next week will be releasing a new version.
regards.

Anonymous said...

@Victor

Thanks a lot and take your time for upgrading your tools ;-)

Bertrand

Victor Cardenas said...

Version 2.0 released!

Anonymous said...

I get the following message when I launch the exe file: "iTunes has locked you database. Please wait for iTunes to finish synchronizing." The funny thing is that I don't have iTunes installed (I use sharepod, which runs fine). I get the same message with the previous version (1.3.1). That's odd, I remember using it without running into this issue. Any tip? I use Win7 x64 btw. Thanks.

Victor Cardenas said...

That message is because in your iPod is the file that locks the database (maybe another PC with iTunes or even SharePod may leave that file).
The solution is to remove this lock file: F:\iPod_Control\iTunes\iTunesLock.
iPod_Control is a hidden folder, so maybe you need enable to see hidden folders in your file explorer.
Deleting that file is perfectly safe for the info stored in your iPod.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the tip, it solved the issue. And thanks also for the handy software

Alberto Murillo Sakaguchi said...

Hola Victor, hablas Español no? porqué así sera más fácil explicar el problema que tengo... hace dos años tuve el mismo error y ahora que lo intente de nuevo me sale lo mismo, bueno el error consiste de lo siguiente según a mi parecer, me sale un mensaje de Microsoft .NET Framework diciendo "illegal characters in path" y según lo que me he dado cuenta es que al parecer no soporta caracteres unicode en el álbum de la canción, aunque no pasa lo mismo cuando es el campo de "artista" el que contiene caracteres de ese tipo. Lo malo es que mi colección de música esta compuesta un 95% de música Japonesa, así que ese problema me impide casi del todo poder visualizar el albumart en rockbox... claro esa es solo mi teoría por lo que no estoy muy seguro... pero espero poder ayudar para que puedas hacer tu software mucho mejor de lo que ya es! ¡Suerte!

Victor Cardenas said...

Hola Panda... gracias por informarme de ese problema, la verdad nunca se me ocurrió hacer pruebas con archivos que tengan información en idiomas con caracteres chinos o arabes o algo asi.
Me inclino a pensar que el problema se puede solucionar si encuentro una forma en que lea etiquetas con encoding unicode. Me ayudaría mucho si me puedes proporcionar un ejemplo de caracteres que te ocasionan problemas, o incluso si me puedes pasar una copia de un archivo que los tenga, ya que las etiquetas ID3 pueden estar almacenadas con distintos encondig y otras particularidades que pueden impactar el resultado de las pruebas.

Si es posible que me pases un archivo, montalo en algun servidor y me envias el enlace al correo por favor.

Muchas gracias y espero poder solucionar el problema que se te presenta con la aplicación.

Un saludo.

JD said...

I also have the same problem. The application stops processing when it encounters "illegal characters" in path. There are two options once this happens: continue or quit. Choosing either seems to freeze the app.