README
1CD-DISCID
2=========
3cd-discid is a backend utility to get CDDB discid information from a CD-ROM
4disc. It was originally designed for cdgrab (now abcde), but can be used for
5any purpose requiring CDDB data.
6
7Using cd-discid is very simple. It accepts one command line parameter, the
8device name of the CD-ROM drive to look up. For example:
9
10$ cd-discid /dev/cdrom
117c0b8b0b 11 150 23115 42165 60015 79512 101560 118757 136605 159492 176067 198875 2957
12
13The information returned is, in order:
14
15* 32-bit hex CDDB disc-id. The first byte of this is the track checksum, the
16 next two are the length of the CD in seconds, and the last is the number
17 of tracks
18* Number of tracks
19* Frame offset of each track
20* Second offset for the leadout track (length of the CD in seconds)
21
22The (lack of) inspiration behind this output format was the CDDB database
23server. It accepts requests like so:
24
25http://freedb.freedb.org/~cddb/cddb.cgi?cmd=cddb+query+7c0b8b0b+11+150+23115+
2642165+60015+79512+101560+118757+136605+159492+176067+198875+2957&hello=user+
27hostname+program+version&proto=3
28
29cd-discid was developed with attention to the CDDB specifications, available
30at http://www.freedb.org/sections.php?name=Sections?sop=viewarticle&artid=28,
31using portions of their sample code.
32
33TODO: output ID3v2 MCDI (Music CD Identifier) frames. Since these are binary in
34nature it is unclear what the best method of outputting these should be. If
35someone knows of software that can read conforming MCDI frames, please let
36me know.
37--
38Robert Woodcock <rcw@debian.org>
39