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Is there an open source, command line based app for Windows to tag MP3 files by manually passing the artist, album etc as arguments?

The answers for Is there a Windows command-line tool to set ID3 tags on an MP3 file? are mostly closed source and the one which does offer the source code (Tag) doesn't list any licensing details anywhere.

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"Tag" is freeware, although source code is offered. See synthetic-soul.co.uk/files/tag.txt –  tricasse Aug 25 '13 at 20:15

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If you can't use any of the closed-source solutions you found before, I'm going to assume that you are a software developer and want to use the source code for your own project.

In this case, I would highly recommend the id3lib Tagging Library which is licensed under the LGPL. There are various projects listed on their website which use the library, some of which are fully implemented (and open source) MP3 taggers.

Two implementations I found on their website were Mp3 Tag Tools or EasyTAG. Both are open source, and have Windows binaries available. The only problem, however, is the lack of a command line interface (or at least I didn't see it listed on the project pages). Being an open source tool, it wouldn't be difficult to modify and recompile the application to perform whatever tasks you'd like from a command line.

However, if you're interested a strictly command line based tool, and you are comfortable compiling your own binaries, you might be interested in the id3v2 project. While it is officially released for Linux, I had a quick look at the source code, and you should be able to compile it on Windows with no changes.

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I like the idea of compiling id3v2 for windows. However, I am a C# / VB.Net dev and have not the first idea how to do that in C++! I am currently trying to install mingw in a Ubuntu VM to attempt cross compiling the source (again, not a clue what I am doing but learning lots!) –  Shevek Jan 8 '11 at 17:19
As long as you have the gcc binaries, you should be able to compile it in Windows using just the command line. MinGW contains these binaries, but is a program for Windows, not any other OS in a virtual environment. –  Breakthrough Jan 9 '11 at 7:36

The mutagen tag library for Python comes with a script named mid3v2. (Rename it to mid3v2.py and add the directory to your %PATH%.)

Possible downside: mutagen writes only ID3 v2.4 and automatically converts older ID3 versions, while Windows Explorer and Windows Media Player are only capable (AFAIK) of displaying ID3 v2.3.

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Thanks, but don't want to introduce any further dependencies (I assume one would need python installed to use this?) Also, the v2.4 issue is a blocker. –  Shevek Jan 6 '11 at 15:23

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