iTunes 7.3

Library needs to update

After installing iTunes 7.3, your Library will be updated. Also, if you load a multiple library (or a library with iTunes Library Manager) that Library will be updated as well. The update process occurs only once for any iTunes library. MacFixIt notes that there have been several reports of libraries not being able to update.

Scripting changes, additions

As far as I have been able to tell, there are no AppleScript enhancements in iTunes 7.3 (although a couple of raw Apple event names have changed, see below). The iPhone, presumably, will display as a Source (like iPod) and (like iPod) audio files on the device will not be directly accessible with AppleScript. Since I have no plans to purchase an iPhone anytime soon, I'd be interested to know if AppleScripts such as Import iPod Audio Files work with iPhone. Then again, iPhone has its own OS, so file management may be completely different than with the iPod.

persistent ID

A couple of Correspondents have noted that the OSType associated with the persistent ID property has changed to 'pPIS', which returns the persistent ID as a string. The previous OSType 'pPID' now returns a 64-bit number as in iTunes 7.1.1 and earlier. If you use raw Apple events to get this data then you may have to make some changes. (Thanks Milo and Manfred.)

UPDATE: Apparently, recompiling a script that uses persistent ID is not going to work. If you have used the persistent ID property in any recent scripts, you may notice that the raw data «class pPID» will be displayed instead of persistent ID and the value will not be a string. Just change «class pPID» in the script to «class pPIS» and recompile; persistent ID will re-appear.

I had suggested in my overview of iTunes 7.2 that you can find the .itc artwork file for a set of album tracks by getting the persistent ID of (one of) the album tracks and the library. However, artwork files from the iTS for albums released after October 2006 are encrypted and thus discovering where they are located may be just a fun exercise and not practical for embedding the artwork into track files.

Column sort order

Sort columns no longer sort in strict ASCII order. Tags that begin with numbers will appear after tags that begin with alphabetical characters. (Thanks Kirk.) A presumption is that the new sorting method is to accomodate phone numbers in iPhone and particularly parenthetical area codes.

UI changes

As noted elsewhere, the highlighted selector's color in the Source column has changed from black to blue. ThinkMac Blog has thoughts on other subtle UI changes.

More as it develops...

Also see info on iTunes 7.3.1.