| Ots Studio |
Software and file formats which allow the storage of release info are usually severely limited. Most allow a simple "year of release" to be specified only, such as "1996". Ots blows these limits away.
The release info chunk allows the date to be specified right down to the date level, if this info is known. Eg. 29 Dec 1973. Alternatively, it can be specified as a month and year only, such as Feb 1995. A year can be specified on its own if that is the only info you wish to store, such as 1984. And, going even more non-specific, a decade or century can be specified, if that is the only information you have. For example, you could specify the release info as 196*. This means "this song was released in the 1960s". Alternatively, you could specify 16**, which means "in the 1600s". As you can see, the format is capable of storing how much, or how little information you have and wish to enter. Then, when searching, you will benefit by whatever you have entered. If you want songs from the 1960s, then any release info chunks which flag a match will come up, even if you only entered "196*" for some of them.
This is only half of the story regarding the release info chunk. There's also the issue of multiple release dates. Although most songs only have a single release date (the date when the record label actually published the song), some have more. Take the Righteous Brothers Unchained Melody for example, which was released originally in the 60s, then the exact same version was re-released in 1990. For such a song, you would enter both release dates, and would subsequently benefit when searching your database. There's a whole generation of people who remember that song from the 1960s, but then there's a younger generation of people who remember it being on the charts in the earlier 90s. If you're a professional DJ, or a radio station, you want the benefit of both, and you want your searches and playlist generation to be reflective of reality.
Another example: Lois Armstrong's What A Wonderful World
Entering Copyright Information
Entering From Album: Information
Changing the Video Control Info (VCI) settings