beet write continuously writes albumtype on every invocation

[intelfx]

$ beet version
beets version 1.6.1
Python version 3.10.9
plugins: alternatives, chroma, convert, discogs, edit, embedart, fetchart, fromfilename, inline, lastimport, lyrics, missing, replaygain, scrub, unimported, zero

My config.yaml: http://ix.io/4lS3

---

I've got a pretty old beets library comprised of mostly flac and some m4a files that was last touched somewhere around 2018. After accessing it with uptodate beets, every beet write goes through all tracks updating the albumtype property, with the original value being empty string and the new value being seemingly correct:

$ beet write  
Access to Arasaka - void(); - *strtok()
  albumtype:  -> album
Access to Arasaka - void(); - kill_recorder=$c1
  albumtype:  -> album
<...>

On the next invocation exactly same thing happens (probably meaning that albumtype is never actually written).

What do I do with this? Is this a sign of bad configuration, or a broken database, or am I unknowingly using an unsupported combination of features, or is it a bug?

[JOJ0]

You've hit an ugly issue that is, if I'm not mistaken, already being worked on in #4582
HTH

[JOJ0]

This fix is merged. Please unmark this answer if the problem persists @intelfx. Thank you. HTH.

[JOJ0]

@intelfx I recently merged that fix. Is the problem gone now? Thanks!

[gamoeri]

Didn't want to start another thread so posting here - I assume I'll need to use a updated version of beets and then fix the tags (By reimporting all the affected files) ? If so, how do I update my beets? I can't find it in the docs. I downloaded beets by doing a pip install beets.

[JOJ0]

I'd like to return that! Thanks for the detailed feedback! For 1. I could try to improve that regex to catch e; p as well

[gamoeri]

Sorry to blow this thread up but actually, reimporting all my tags and it doesn't fix the issue. I manually zeroed all the files that had the symbols in the 'albumtypes' field, then reimported all the affected files, and the semi colons appear again. I took a look at albumtype and that's fine, but the albumtypes field still populates with the symbol-y string. My most recent reimport matched with bandcamp and created the e;p albumtypes field.

[JOJ0]

U using beetcamp latest version from snejus?

[gamoeri]

I used python3 -m pip uninstall beets -y && python3 -m pip install git+https://github.com/beetbox/beets.git@master to reinstall

[JOJ0]

You wrote

My most recent reimport matched with bandcamp and created the e;p albumtypes field.

That's why I'm assuming you have a bandcamp plugin installed. Which one? The IMHO currently best choice is https://github.com/snejus/beetcamp, it's a well maintained fork. Dont use the original version of the plugin, it's abandoned.

I just want to make sure we are using the latest components everywhere before moving on with analysis. To be honest, I think we should wait if things get better with the currently pending PR'S #4743 #4751 It could be totally unrelated though...not sure...

I'm currently not really working on beets things, other things in life going on. I think it would help us if you would merge in those PR branches and help testing.

[snejus]

This has been fixed in #5540 ultimately