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Article: Introducing Tonal: A Minimalist Music App for Collectors and Audiophiles


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24 minutes ago, mneveux said:

Hello Baoshan,

 

Very interesting program you have created. I have had some difficulty getting it to work for me. I uploaded a couple of CD's and even though they show, they will not play. When I click the play, I just get a spinning icon. The second issue is one of the CD's I uploaded was a 3 disc set. 2 of the discs were identified properly but one of then was not. The album is Frank Zappa Halloween 77 3 CD set. Discs 1 and 3 have proper metadata and disc 2 shows as a separate album with no art work. Is there a way to edit the metadata?

 

Regards,

 

Marc

 

3

 

Thank you for your reply, Marc! I’m sorry for the trouble Tonal brought.

 

I hope the metadata issue has gone. Please confirm. I’ve made some magic to the metadata.

https://github.com/ICMD/Tonal-Metadata/commit/6deb02e7488633e14a2c213be03f309942c330c2

 

On the playback issue, may I know if it plays fine on your internal speaker? If it plays fine on your internal speaker, we can focus on your specific selected device (Biforst gen 5).

 

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2 minutes ago, Joebah said:

Have added 4 hires (24/96) flac files from external hard drives. Different genres (rock, jazz, classical) and metadata all handled very nicely. 

 

Sounds very nice.

 

Question: Where are the music files I have added being stored? It appears somewhere in the cloud? Is there a limit on the amount of storage? Could I add a terabyte (or more) of data if I wanted to? (That would take a bit of time - seems to take several minutes to process each music folder.) Is there a chance my data might just disappear in a puff of smoke some day?

 

It will take some getting used to not having any way to adjust preferences...

 

Thanks for the opportunity to try this out!

2

 

Hi Joebah,

 

Thank you very much for giving it a try.

 

Where are the music files I have added being stored? It appears somewhere in the cloud?

The audio (in a proprietary format, without any metadata or personal information) is secured in a content-addressable cloud storage (Amazon S3). The key to access above audio and link above audio to according metadata is registered in your private iCloud storage. Only you have the read/write access. Since we only store the key in your iCloud storage, the extra storage required for iCloud drive is quite small (usually in kilo-bytes). We don’t know our users’ name, email, iCloud account, etc.

 

Is there a limit on the amount of storage? Could I add a terabyte (or more) of data if I wanted to?

There is no limit, as long as my credit card backing my AWS account is not maxed out.

 

Is there a chance my data might just disappear in a puff of smoke some day?

In the current architecture, I need to keep my AWS account active for users of Tonal to access their data. I’m open to decentralized storage solutions, which could totally eliminate any 3rd party in the chain.

 

On the adjustable preferences topic, I think there’ll be a day we need to introduce a preference panel. But must audiophile related parameter is optimized automatically.

 

Thank you again, Joebah.

 

 

 

 

 

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21 minutes ago, Joebah said:

Follow-up: The fifth file I tried to add has failed. Flac 24/96. It seems to process, and I get the "success - you have added the disc" message, but it is nowhere to be found. I have also tried searching by name - no results. Tried this 3 times now with same folder - same results - nothing added. Hmmm. Any thoughts?

 

Thank you for letting me know this issue.

 

I guess your file is ripped from vinyl, with no compact disc counterpart. Our underlying metadata sources has no record for the disc, so I had to manually catalog it:

 

https://github.com/ICMD/Tonal-Metadata/commit/04775358529e809922ad64b7fce20d2d981704cc

 

Can you see the album in your collection now? Please let me know.

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3 minutes ago, Joebah said:

 

 

 

Does your metadata source work with HDTracks?

Yes. Most albums from HDTracks have their compact disc counterparts.

 

On the iTunes / Audirvana topic:

Tonal has a playback engine designed for predictable audiophile performance. I believe there’ll be some community members interested in the playback engine design. Plus, if you enjoy the metadata Tonal renders, I truly wish you could give Tonal another try.

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29 minutes ago, Daverz said:

I'm in based on the pictures.  What's the Github link?

 

Hi Daverz,

 

The GitHub links reveal how the metadata engine of Tonal works. Please ignore them if you’re not interested in the internals.

 

Thanks!

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17 minutes ago, ted_b said:

Interesting concept.  What is the likelihood your development includes native DSD?  Windows as a platform?  I ask cuz your "future of" article mentions them.  Thx

 

Dear ted_b,

 

DSD is certainly among the top wanted features and is technically quite feasible. Then Windows (PC) support.

 

 

The 1st item on my to-do list is finding financial support for the project, covering at least the next 6 – 12 months’ design and development. I believe the project is promising and deserves a dedicated team.

 

Please forgive me for not willing to add DSD support today.^_^

 

Thanks again!

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1 hour ago, mneveux said:

Hi Baoshan,

 

Metadata has been fixed for the Zappa album. Plays fine through the internal speakers but does not play when Bifrost 4490 is selected.

 

Marc

 

 

Hi Marc, It’s very interesting. Could you confirm no other application is hogging the Bifrost (do you mind restarting your Mac)? Do you have another DAC in your hand? Does any other DAC work? If the problem still exists, I’ll dig into the issue.

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15 minutes ago, Joebah said:

Just a few additional observations that may be unique to the situation where the source of the music being added is a digital flac file from a needle-drop....

 

The cover art does not match the actual lp cover (even when the actual cover art is included in the file folder) - Tonal must just try to make as close a match that it can based on other information. A minor nit, I guess, but I am would prefer the actual cover art.

 

Like the cover art, Tonal is making an educated guess at the name of the LP - though close, the guesses are sometimes off, different from what is possibly  a more accurate name. Again, a minor thing, but it is a little disorienting to see the titles changed to something different than what I have provided.

 

At this stage in its development, at least, Tonal is probably better suited to CD information rather than needle drops. I also noted it would not accept an ISO file.

 

I am going to experiment a bit with some of the files of CDs that I have ripped from my collection currently located in my iTunes library.

 

I haven't yet done any A/B listening comparisons (listening to the same music on Tonal as compared with Audirvana or HQPlayer), but Tonal does sound good.

 

Hi Joebah,

 

Thank you for sharing your discovering! The metadata (cover art, album title, etc.) you see is generated by a sophisticated algorithm. But the metadata does not end there: you can edit it by yourself, or you can PM me (the only contributor for now).

 

Once the cover art (and/or the title, etc.) is updated, your collection will be reflected in real time.

 

But you’re correct: Tonal is designed with ripped or downloaded lossless music in mind. Issues related to needle drops need to be re-considered more thoroughly.

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8 hours ago, Unblessed Be said:

Will your app support multi-DAC chips for headphones in certain flagship smartphones such as the LG V30's Quad DAC? Would be awesome if it did.

 

Hi Unblessed Be,

 

Thank you for your suggestion. Windows and Android platforms will be scheduled after iOS. The macOS/iOS combination needs to form a reference experience first.

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1 hour ago, jhwalker said:

I've tried it for a while, but a couple of recurring issues keep it from being more than a curiosity for now:

 

1) At least half of my downloads or rips apparently contain a track that is considered a "Broken audio file", though the same files process just fine with any other player, including Roon which does error checking.

2) Of the remaining half, at least 50% generate an error message "Disc is too long to be a valid audio disc” - this can happen with digital downloads that are the equivalent of a single disc or several discs (e.g., new recording of the recent NBC TV broadcast of Jesus Christ Superstar, the recent release of the complete Brahms Symphonies by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra with Ticciati).  Either way, processing stops at that point.

3) Some discs generate an error, "Disc could not be verified" (e.g., Original Studio Recording of Jesus Christ Superstar)

 

So right now, only about 20-25% of my collection can be imported.  Until these issues are corrected, it's will not be able to continue testing.

 

PS - I very much like the interface and would certainly consider giving it another try in the future.

 

 

Hi jhwalker,

 

Thank you for your feedback!

 

On “Broken audio file”

Could you PM one of the broken audio file Tonal reported?

 

On “Disc is too long to be a valid audio disc”

Currently, if you help Tonal by separate the files into folders of discs (e.g. Disc1, Disc2, etc.), Tonal may be able to process the album. That’s far from ideal, I believe there’re better ways.

 

On “Disc could not be verified”

I may be asking too much: could you use a standalone AccurateRip / CUETools verifier to verify if the album is verifiable? Redbook discs failed to pass AccurateRip / CUETools verification will be rejected by Tonal.

 

Thanks,

Baoshan

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4 minutes ago, hopkins said:

Hello, do you plan on publishing a Windows version ?

EDIT: just saw you already answered that question earlier.

 

Hi hopkins,

 

Thank you for your suggestion!

 

After the majority of macOS/iOS users are satisfied with the reference Tonal experience, a Windows clone will be scheduled.

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2 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

You want me to upload my music to your amazon server?

 

ah, no.

 

Hi AudioDoctor,

 

Thank you for your feedback!

 

From an end user’s point of view, Tonal functions as a specialized version of Dropbox (listed on NASDAQ last month IIRC) or iCloud Drive, focusing on lossless audio, with AccurateRip and CUETools built-in  (besides the hosted metadata solution and the audiophile playback engine).

 

In the mean time, as technology permits, Tonal is willing to evaluate decentralized storage solutions to completely eliminate any 3rd party in the storage-access chain.

 

My 1st hand survey reveals many audiophiles already use cloud services to store their music collection. Tonal is designed to push their experience to the next level.

 

 

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1 hour ago, R1200CL said:

What does this SW add, that I can’t have in Roon ?

 

Hi R1200CL,

 

Thank you for your wonderful question!

 

Room is a great software, I am sure there’re more CA community members who are more qualified than me to compare Roon with Tonal. I’m just sharing my $0.02 here:

 

Tonal has a secure CD ripper built-in. You can directly collect physical discs into your collection.

 

Tonal collection is cloud based. You do not need to maintain local storage solutions. Your music is ready to be streamed anytime, anywhere.

 

Tonal has AccurateRip and CUETools built-in. All Redbook format you streamed is guaranteed to be accurate.

 

Tonal has a micro kernel of less than 50 disassembly instructions to talk with the HAL layer. This, together with other important decisions, gives Tonal a more predictable audiophile performance. Read more on medium.

 

Tonal incorporates a new metadata engine. Please see the screenshots I put in the article and see the difference. If you prefer, I can provide some same albums rendered in both Tonal and Roon for your reference.

 

I suggest you take 20 minutes to read 3 more articles on Tonal internals. You can find more different decisions Tonal made, in compared with Roon or Audirvana. I believe your 20 minutes will be rewarded.

 

https://medium.com/tonal-app

 

Thanks,

Baoshan

 

 

 

 

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18 minutes ago, mneveux said:

Tonal looks very promising and initial reports are that the audio sounds very good. Hopefully I will be able to experience it myself soon but it currently does not work with my Schiit Bifrost 4490.

 

Hi mneveux, I’m sure your 4490 could work fine. With the device in hand I think it will take me less than half a day to identify and solve the issue. But please understand as I’m exploring possibilities to find financial support to bring a dedicated team in to boost the Tonal experience to a new level, the Bifrost 4490 issue may still be there for a while. I’m really, really sorry.

 

 

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19 minutes ago, R1200CL said:

 

Can I choose which cloud service I like to use in order to store my rips ?

 

 

 

The files Tonal secured in the cloud are of proprietary format (for best streaming performance) which means no other applications can read the file(s) Tonal produced.

 

Tonal uses low level cloud storage, not end-user friendly cloud drive. As technology evolves, Tonal will continuously improving the architecture of her infrastructure.

 

Currently I can not see why one service is preferable over another. One exception is for users living in China, where oversea bandwidth is throttled.

 

Please correct me if I missed something. Thanks!

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1 hour ago, ted_b said:

Right now? about $500 in your pocket.

 

Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

Hi ted_b,

 

Thank you very much for mentioning the pricing difference!

 

I want to clarify one thing: Tonal MAY NOT always be free for unlimited collection size.

 

Tonal is 1% finished. I’m not saying there’ll be 100 times more features. I’m saying an experience which is 100 times leaner, more intuitive and fluid, more stable and performant, plus, a new ecosystem involving labels, audio equipment brands, and most importantly, the community.

 

To support such a vision of the future, Tonal may introduce tiered pricing policy. But, due to the complete end-to-end ecosystem, I’ll first try to explore innovative ways to keep Tonal free to end-users while still be profiting to support a dedicated team.

 

Thanks,

Baoshan

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10 minutes ago, DavidL said:

Congratulations on having the courage to tackle this from a fresh perspective.

I can see one problem with your approach as applied to the metadata for classical music. Your fundamental basis is transferring CD albums to cloud storage while retaining the enclosed album structure. For me the fundamental element in classical music is the 'work'. A particular work is likely to appear in different combinations with other works on other classical CD albums. How do you cope with the situation where a listener wishes to see all performances of a particular work in his library in order to choose one for replay? I guess you would need to use a powerful search engine to achieve this with a system of metadata based on CD albums? If however you used classical 'works' as your fundamental element such a search would be trivial. Any thoughts?

David

 

 

Hi DavidL,

 

Thank you for your comment.

 

I’m waiting for some classical guys for the last 48+ hours. It’s my honor to discuss related topics with you!

 

I’ve studied classical music metadata for 10+ years. My research is quoted by university professors in Europe and China. Believe me or not, I understand your concern. :P

 

You mentioned the concept of “work”. Actually, if you check the Sokolov picture in my article, you can see the work is modeled accurately. I’ve attached more pictures for you to inspect the modeling of classical works in Tonal.

 

All the pictures I provided is under the context of an “album”, which confuses you to start worrying about Tonal not being able to provide interaction approaches to show all recordings of Mahler’s “Titan”, or all Goldberg recordings by G. Gould. But please blame me for not implemented that feature yet, the Tonal metadata model is far beyond supporting such capabilities.

 

Have you read the metadata article on Medium?

 

Please let me know if you have further questions.

 

Regards,

Baoshan

 

 

 

 

 

Screen Shot 2018-03-16 at 12.06.54 AM.png

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10 hours ago, ednaz said:

Interesting set of ideas. I worked on similar ideas around corporate knowledge assets and knowledge management.  In a big corporation, any given presentation may be stored thousands if not hundreds of thousands of times. Some of those versions deviate from the original - some minor and harmless, some totally unauthorized and inappropriate. Using asset discovery applications, we found that way over half of corporate storage footprints (can't share actual numbers... project is ongoing) were consumed by those replicated assets. We found that with a "customization veneer" - which stores my personal speaker's notes for some presentation, and that when it's served to me it should have certain pages removed, since I deleted them in my version - we could get even more efficient in storage footprints. So, I get what you're doing on the back end with single stored asset, key based access. A couple requirements from me based on having had to think this through in another context.

 

We weren't just trying to shrink centralized storage footprints (since storage is so cheap... but corporations are so cost cutting focused.) A bigger goal was to shrink edge devices - why should I need a 1tb hard drive on my laptop? Why a laptop? That was part of an even bigger goal, which was the ability to use a wide range of endpoint devices. Why should I carry anything other than my mobile phone? Or, I may LOVE having two phones, two laptops, and a tablet. (Yes, we found several people who liked living that way.) So, think about a variety of endpoints. I should be able to get my music to and from any device.

 

I share this part of the goals because it's turned out to be a hard one for us, in today's world. Network quality is not evenly distributed, nor are networks ubiquitous enough. Closer to your project, I listen to Radio Paradise on my mobile by caching, since I can't count on being able to stream while I'm in my car, on an airplane, in the subway. My concern with the model of Tonal is that an awful lot of my listening is done in offline mode not by choice. Key requirement for me. Stream AND store.

 

As to the customization veneer - I've got experience with Roon now, and one of the things I dislike is metadata standardization that doesn't match my mental model for organizing music. "World music" is a meaninglessly vague high level category to me, and assigning an artist to pop, rock, alternative rock, R&B, blues, etc. in a standard way sounds nice, but there are New Orleans artists who could be put in every one of those... but in my mental model aren't any of them - they're in one of four or five categories of New Orleans music. I divide "classical" into six categories. My metadata categorization when I use JRiver is very personal (maybe even quirky) but it allows me to quickly find what I want to listen to, and quickly assemble playlists. So, I want to be able to selectively over-ride, or add my own layer, to metadata.

 

A thought about back end security and data integrity, which people (rightfully) brought up. The approach we landed on was secure slice object storage. Extremely efficient (no replicant copies required), and insanely resilient, because it stores object slices across an array of clouds, internal or external or both. The minimum number of disks/servers is quite high for your current work, but at scale I think you'd be in a "mid size" environment.

 

Unfortunately my two Mac laptops are both in repair for the second time each... but once I get one of them back, I'll give Tonal a try.

 

Hi ednaz,

 

It’s wonderful to read your thoughts, on storage management, security, and metadata.

 

  1. Files of proprietary format are stored in a content addressable cloud storage. The keys to access these files are stored in your personal iCloud space. This combination (currently) ensures the security. I am open to decentralized storage solutions such as Sia, Maidsafe, etc. in the future.
  2. Local caching of selected albums is on the todo list. This feature is more important on iOS (mobile) devices.
  3. For metadata customization, Tonal will introduce a tagging system on top of the standardized metadata engine. The tagging system enables you to set predefined color codes, sub-genres, or possibly anything you can imagine. You can assign albums to tags just as the Finder app of macOS does.

 

I encourage you to give Tonal a try and share your feeling when you have a working Mac with you.

 

Thanks again,

Baoshan

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4 hours ago, DaQi said:

Love this concept and will read more about it in the referenced papers. I wish I could try it and provide feedback but as a Windows person that is not possible right now. I will watch this with interested. I want to second two concerns that have been brought up but which I think are crucial for success in this. 

 

  1. Metadata can be very personal and challenging as one of the previous commenters said different people may have a different level of categorization that is meaningful to them. I was intrigued years ago with what Pandora was doing with their categorization which seemed to get at some of the basest of categories that would be useful. Not sure what you are using for metadata but is there a chance for some very low level granular type of categories that would be more universally useful. 
  2. Offline listening. A reason why I have not jumped on the streaming bandwagon and still buy my music is that I listen to a lot of music offline and maintaining that option is critical to me. Are you planning any capability for that in the future where part of a library or even a copy of a library could be maintained offline?

 

Watching with interest how this develops. 

 

Dear DaQi,

 

I am still obsessed with the idea of a high-quality, simple, standardized, community-driven metadata source which could satisfy more than 90% of users.

 

Tonal will introduce a tagging system on top of the standardized metadata database. The tagging system enables you to set predefined color codes, sub-genres, or possibly anything you can imagine. You can assign albums to tags just as the Finder app of macOS does.

 

Local caching of selected albums is on the todo list. This feature is more important on iOS (mobile) devices.

 

Thanks,

Baoshan

 

 


 

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1 hour ago, Umetaro said:

Great concept and I love the sound!

I noticed a few issues.

1. App changes the volume of the amp.  I use Devialet AIR function of Devialet 800 and Tonal somehow changes the volume (very loud) when starting music.

2. It takes about 30 min to rip one CD.  I ripped 7 discs and one of them failed.

3. My music data is stored in AIFF.  AIFF support would be great.

 

 

1

 

Hi Umetaro,

 

Thank you very for your feedback!

 

Re: Volume issue on Devialet AIR

Please try this new build and see if the issue is resolved.

https://binaries.ton.al/app/Tonal-20180409.zip

 

Re: Ripping speed

How fast is it when ripping via XLD? Can the failed disc be ripped by XLD and pass AccurateRip verification?

 

Re: AIFF support

AIFF is already supported. Try to collect some of your lossless discs in AIFF format and let me know if something goes wrong.

 

Thanks again.

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35 minutes ago, bobfa said:

I am sort of confused.  I run your software you then "process it" and upload it to your AWS account.  I have no control.  

 

If you disappear how will I get my data back?  

 

By uploading the music to your account I am most likely in violation of the license I have for the music.    

 

What prevents you or some other user from "absconding" with the music I put into your service?  

 

Where are the Terms of Service for your system?

 

I will not  even get into the problems with ISP data caps, or privacy, or safety?

 

 

Hi bobfa,

 

Thank you very much for your wonderful question! I’ll do my best to make everything clear and you’ll be the one who makes the decision.

 

Suppose you have some private pictures taken during your winter holidays, you want to secure them safely and browse them later to have great memories. Dropbox or iCloud drive is a perfect choice (Dropbox uses AWS to some extent).

 

If we omit the benefits that the pre-processing stage brings, the new metadata engine, and the playback engine designed for audiophile, Tonal functions exactly like “Dropbox for lossless music”.

 

When I use Dropbox 10 years ago, I’m also concerned about the exact question you mentioned. Basically, every service you used (LinkedIn, GitHub) faces the exact same issue. Dropbox is listed in NASDAQ last month. If it goes bankrupt, I may have some time to get my photos back (finger crossed).

 

Here’s the technical detail on storage:

 

  1. Your music is optimized/transcoded/sliced into a proprietary format, on your own mac.
  2. These files are uploaded and stored in a content addressable cloud storage (Amazon S3).
  3. The keys (very small) to access your files are stored in your personal iCloud space.

 

Above approach ensures the security for:

 

  1. Nobody else has the key to your audio file on the cloud storage (guaranteed by iCloud).
  2. The file stored is in a proprietary format, only Tonal can read it.

 

For privacy, Tonal is even better: we do not know your name, your email account, your password. This layer of privacy is offered by iCloud.

 

When technology evolves, I’m open to decentralized storage solution which totally eliminates any 3rd party between you and your content. But for now, I wish I could focus on something more important.

 

I honor the opportunity to present my thoughts to the community, I’ll NOT do anything stupid. I just want to mention 2 things:
 

  1. Any local music player can upload your music to somewhere else (in the background) if she is evil.
  2. Ripping your disc and saving it to Dropbox does not violate your license in most countries.

 

Please correct me if I’m missing something. I know trust is hard to build, but I’m in the industry for 10 years, I’ll not ruin it stupidly.

 

Have a nice day,

Baoshan

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11 minutes ago, Sounds2Good said:

This sounds like a terrific approach for storing lossless audio files. As a blind audiophile and computer user I am always concerned about the accessibility of the software packages I use. I use Mac and IOS products because the screen reading technology, Voice Over, is included with the operating systems on these devices. Your presentation of the files in graphical formats in your description of Tonal and in replies to posts here suggests that your software may not be accessible to Voice Over. If it is VO accessible, I'll be happy to download the software and attempt to evaluate it. If the Tonal software is not accessible with VO, then I'd like you to consider making it accessible before development has progressed to the point where that might be too costly for you.

 

Thank you very much for considering this request.

2

 

Hi Sounds2Good,

 

Thank you for your comment.

 

Sorry for Tonal is not VoiceOver compatible yet. Thank you for pointing out the issue in such an early stage. I believe a well designed and architectured application should incorporate VO technology easily. I promise you to support VO and message you the progress once Tonal is ready to move forward.

 

Regards,

Baoshan

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3 hours ago, earsandeyes said:

Intriguing concept.

Few questions:

-When I switch from one OSX device to another on the same iCloud account, will the(my) database com along automaticly?

 

-Within my house I do schare my server based music with other family members. We have individual iCloud accounts, not a family account. How should we operate to make that work EASY?

 

Thanks,

 

Regards

Michiel

 

 

3

 

Hi Michiel,

 

Great questions!

 

-When I switch from one OSX device to another on the same iCloud account, will the(my) database com along automaticly?

 

Yes. Your iCloud account (and only your iCloud account) owns the albums you collected.

 

-Within my house I do schare my server based music with other family members. We have individual iCloud accounts, not a family account. How should we operate to make that work EASY?

 

I’m afraid Tonal cannot do that before hiring a very smart attorney and put a lot of money into the issue. Any attempt Tonal introduced to make that work EASY may bring lots of legal troubles. Sorry.

 

The best thing I can think is your family members use their iOS device (under any iCloud account) to control a macOS app via local LAN. But I also need to consult a lawyer first.

 

Thank you again,

Baoshan

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