Random Musings

a.k.a. Miscellaneous, not pertaining to development or architecture

All Work and No Play…Mass Update Your MP3s with Cover Art

Scott S NelsonLeave a comment

Rather than buy a new car to get a dashboard computer, I just bought a tablet and mounted it on my ashtray. For the music, it is easier to see what is playing from cover art, but not all of my MP3s have it. So I went on a search..

I will save you the trials and errors of a half-dozen programs that will run on the latest patch of Windows but require adding the images one-by-one (I have 11,000 songs on the tablet). The only program I found that adds the images automagiclly is MP3 CoverTag. Well, it is supposed to because I read a dozen articles that said it did. Problem is, Microsoft has patched it to death and I could not run it.

I got around the patch issue by doing the following (extra steps added for those that didn’t already have the VMs handy):

  1. Download VirtualBox
  2. Download an old Microsoft-provided VM.
  3. Import the VM into VirtualBox. During the import or before starting it:
    1. Bump the RAM up to at least 2GB
    2. Add a shared folder that auto mounts where you will put your MP3s to update
  4. Start the VM and make sure Windows Update is set to Never Update
  5. Download MP3 CoverTag
  6. Log out and create a snapshot so you can always go back to it the state of an unpatched machine with MP3 CoverTag installed

Now you can run the unpatched VM and MP3 CoverTag will work.

Enjoy!

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Retirement Notice: My Work Chair

Scott S NelsonLeave a comment

thechair

The base of my home office chair bent beyond repair last week and I finally had to replace it today. It has supported my rear through the following:

Employers – netNumina (who gave it to me when they bought new furniture), FYW, Jupiter Media, Keane, Quin Street Publishing, BEA, Oracle, Primitive Logic

Locations – Charlestown, Cambridge, Manchest-by-the-Sea, Fort Mill, and Oceanside

Customers – CholesterolCare.com, Fidelity, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Jonesco, Sullivan Real Estate, O’Neil Machinery, Dunkin’ Donuts,  Iron Mountain, US Government, Bank of America, VMWare, Northern Trust, GNMA, Sempra

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Scared Skunk

Self-Examination before Exaggeration

Scott S NelsonLeave a comment

In nature, animals only puff themselves up when they feel threatened. This phenomenon is called Deception.

While there are valid situations to exaggerate to make a point, ask yourself who you feel threatened by before you do. If the answer is “no one”, stick to the facts, or you may end up needing to defend your claims.

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