Picard 0.12.1 is an important hotfix release. Due to a bug Picard 0.12 deletes all ID3 comment tags (COMM frames) when saving files. In addition this release restores the native file dialog when adding folders on Windows.
Picard 0.12.1 is available for download for Windows and Linux.
Sorry for the trouble.
We have released the next version of MusicBrainz Picard. Picard 0.12 includes a lot of bug fixes and new features, including:
A complete list of changes be found in NEWS.txt.
Picard 0.12 is available for download for Windows and Linux. The Mac OS X version will be released later, sorry for that. We are still in search for a long term maintainer of Picard on OS X.
Thanks to everybody who contributed to this release.
The WSJ just posted a well balanced review of TuneUp and Picard.
Thanks for the nice write up, Geoff!
Timothy Lee says:
After a month of trying universal builds through macports unsuccessfully, using a tool named ‘unify’ (h/t John) to lipo i386 and ppc arch bins together unsuccessfully, and bugging just about everyone I know to use their i386 tiger machine (I have an i386 leopard and a ppc tiger) unsuccessfully I’ve made the decision to halt my progress on trying to deliver a UB.
What I do have though is two builds. I have one PPC build that was built on a tiger machine and one i386 build that was built on a leopard machine. I have not had a chance to test my i386 leopard build on a tiger machine (read above failure to ‘borrow’ a tiger machine) but there is a chance it may work. If you feel like you have a better handle on the ‘lipo’ process, please, take my builds and smash them together and let me know! (It may be desirable NOT to deliver a UB as
each separate build of Picard is fairly large).
Timothy is looking for feedback on these builds. If you’ve been waiting for a complete version of Picard that includes working PUID generation, then please try these builds:
If you have problems running these please enter a bug report and use the component “Picard Tagger (Mac OS X Packaging)“. Thanks very much Tim and everyone else who has helped along this somewhat frustrating process.
If you have a PPC Mac that runs 10.4/10.5 and have been waiting for a DMG of Picard, please try download and install this version. Please let us know if it works in the comments.
Jon Hermansen and I have been working on building Picard with only MacPorts prerequisites — that is how this DMG has been built. If this install works then we can proceed to work on a Universal Binary that should work on 10.4/10.5. If we can reach that, we should be able to release Mac binaries at the same time as we release binaries for other platforms.
Thanks for all your hard work Jon!
UPDATE: We’ve found a problem with PUID generation and have fixed it — we hope. The above link now points to the updated dmg. May not work on Tiger yet — if you have a Tiger PPC box, please try it and let us know.
After many days of tinkering, the new search server has passed its tests and is nearly ready for deployment next week. After my last post on the search services, there were lots of questions, so I’ll give some more history on why I’m working on this now:
As of next week, MusicBrainz will have twice as much rack-space (20U’s of space!) and we can finally rack the two new servers that were donated a few months ago. Fortunately due to dropping bandwidth costs, this new space doesn’t really come at a greater expense to us — I expect our hosting costs to stay nearly the same as they are now. (about $1000/mo, btw)
This will allow us to have 3 times the search capacity we have now, which should keep the site working for a while longer. In fall I hope to start moving our web-service to Amazon’s EC2 service, which should allow us to get as much capacity as we need.
As soon as I get the new search services deployed I’m putting my head down and coding the next server update. So, keep your fingers crossed that this process goes smoothly.
Its clear that I won’t find the time to package up Picard for OS X anytime soon. I’ve put out one Intel based DMG, but haven’t found the time to create a Universal Binary package of Picard. 
If you have the following:
We would very much like to talk to you. The last item isn’t crucial — I suppose we can get people in the community to test your builds for platforms you have no access to. Please leave a comment if you’re interested in helping out.
If you have an intel Mac and would like to try out the first test of a PUID enabled Picard on OS X, please download this DMG and post a comment to let me know if it works.
This DMG:
If this DMG works for people then I will proceed to try to get 10.4/PPC/disc lookup support working.
Hi!
The first episode in my series of “Working with Picard” screencasts has now been recorded, and is available for public consumption 
A YouTube link to the video is available, and a higher resolution Ogg Theora file is also also available. You’ll probably find the Ogg Theora easier to read due to the higher resolution.
In this first screencast I go through the basics of Picard – how to load files, how the interface works, and basic usage with clusters.
If there’s something that’s unclear, or you have future ideas for screencasts – let me know! Other wise, enjoy the screencast – and show you’re friends and convince why MusicBrainz is so cool (if you haven’t already
Given the number of clueless/negative comments on the TRM announcement, I feel it necessary to clue people in to the fact that Picard QT’s interface has been revamped. The workflow has been greatly improved, the user interface is more stable and it does an amazing amount of work for you before you need to use acoustic fingerprinting.
If you feel the need to trash months of hard work that Lukas has done, please at least download it and try it before you make an idiot of yourself.