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@melcom-creations melcom-creations released this 13 Jun 02:09
4.1.0h
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This is the official public release of v4.1.0 (Hotfix) "Kontrollraum Edition"! 🖥

Built upon the foundations of the Läderlappen Edition, this release represents the largest feature expansion in the project's history. The Kontrollraum Edition transforms melcom's FFmpeg Audio Normalizer from a simple batch normalizer into a complete audio management and inspection environment, featuring advanced metadata editing, artwork management, dynamic theming, modular architecture, integrated playback enhancements, and extensive customization options.

The result is a faster, more flexible, and significantly more powerful workflow for audio normalization, loudness analysis, metadata management, and everyday audio file handling.

🛡 Hotfix Notice: Shortly after the initial v4.1.0 release, Windows Defender could incorrectly flag the executable as Program:Win32/Wacapew.A!ml. After investigation, the detection was traced to the executable compression method used during packaging and not to the application itself. The release package has been rebuilt without the affected compression stage and republished as v4.1.0 (Hotfix).

🚀 Key Highlights of v4.1.0

  • Audio Properties Inspector

    • Added a powerful multi-tab Audio Properties window with General, Details, Artwork, and Statistics pages.
    • Supports metadata viewing and editing, cover artwork management, loudness analysis, technical file inspection, and clipboard export.
    • Operates as a modeless live-sync window that automatically follows file selection changes.

  • Advanced Metadata & Artwork Management

    • Full metadata editing for supported formats including Song Name, Artist, Album, Album Artist, Composer, Genre, Track Numbers, BPM, Comments, and more.
    • Lossless metadata writing using FFmpeg stream copy (-c copy).
    • Embedded cover artwork can now be viewed, changed, removed, exported, and preserved for MP3, FLAC, and M4A files.

  • Integrated Audio Analysis Suite

    • Added detailed EBU R128 loudness analysis with Integrated Loudness, Loudness Range (LRA), Threshold, and True Peak measurements.
    • Additional signal analysis includes RMS Power, Crest Factor, DC Offset, Sample Peak, Min/Max Levels, and measured bit depth detection.

  • High-Precision Output Configuration

    • Output Sample Rate and Quality settings are now fully configurable.
    • Supports custom bit depths, floating-point WAV output, FLAC resolutions, MP3 CBR/VBR profiles, and dedicated M4A/OGG bitrate selections.
    • Real-time specification reconstruction instantly updates output format details as settings change.

  • Dynamic Theme & Language Ecosystem

    • Themes are now stored as external JSON files and detected automatically.
    • Language packs are now completely dynamic and loaded directly from the /lang/ directory.
    • Users can create and distribute custom themes and translations without modifying the source code.

  • Enhanced Audio Player

    • Added interactive timeline seeking directly from the playback progress bar.
    • Added true pause/resume functionality with system-level FFplay process suspension.
    • Improved timeline accuracy and instant playback position updates.
    • Added playback thread isolation to prevent overlapping playback sessions.

  • Totally Professional Graphic Equalizer™

    • Added a highly sophisticated equalizer.
    • It analyzes nothing.
    • It changes nothing.
    • It improves nothing.
    • But it looks impressive, blinks enthusiastically, and can be clicked.
    • Sometimes that's enough. 🙈

🛠 Improvements & Enhancements

  • Complete Modular Refactoring

    • Further decomposed the application into dedicated modules including player.py, dialogs.py, and utils.py.
    • Improved maintainability, readability, and long-term scalability.

  • Context Menu Integration

    • Added native Windows Explorer integration.
    • Open file location directly from the queue.
    • Access native Windows file properties via ShellExecuteExW.

  • Flexible Queue Management

    • Queue controls remain available during playback.
    • Intelligent playback recalibration handles file removal without disrupting the application state.

  • Optional Treeview Columns

    • Added asynchronous loading of Duration, Format, and Sample Rate columns.
    • Prevents GUI freezes during large queue operations.

  • Dynamic Status System

    • Reworked status bar behavior to accurately reflect playback, analysis, normalization, selection, cancellation, completion, and error states.

  • FFmpeg Diagnostic Engine

    • Converts cryptic FFmpeg messages into understandable, user-friendly diagnostic information.

  • Process Log Improvements

    • Added Copy and Select All context menu support.
    • Improved readability through cleaner FFmpeg output handling.

  • Unicode Compatibility

    • Improved support for non-ASCII filenames and international character sets.

  • Help System

    • Added localized HTML help integration.
    • Global F1 shortcut support is now available throughout the application.

🔧 Fixes

  • Resolved cover-art related normalization failures and container corruption scenarios.
  • Fixed metadata loss issues when processing files with embedded artwork.
  • Improved FFmpeg loudnorm JSON parsing reliability and robustness.
  • Fixed stale status messages and state synchronization issues.
  • Resolved Inspector theme synchronization problems during live theme switching.
  • Improved exception handling and diagnostics for malformed FFmpeg output.
  • Fixed several edge cases involving playback threading, analysis race conditions, and GUI synchronization.
  • Added proactive write-permission validation and Windows path-length safety checks.
  • Improved application stability when using missing, renamed, corrupted, or incomplete language and theme packs.
  • Resolved a Windows Defender false positive (Program:Win32/Wacapew.A!ml) affecting the initial v4.1.0 release package.
  • Rebuilt the release package without the executable compression method responsible for the detection.

🌍 Localization

  • Added fully dynamic language pack detection.
  • Improved English, German, Polish, and Swedish translations.
  • Completed localization coverage for Inspector dialogs, metadata editors, player controls, diagnostics, and FFmpeg warning messages.

🎨 Customization

  • External JSON-based theme engine.
  • Dynamic theme folder scanning.
  • Automatic theme template generation.
  • Smart luminance detection for custom themes.
  • Self-healing fallback logic for missing or invalid theme configurations.

🛡 Hotfix Information

  • Version 4.1.0 never contained a virus, trojan, spyware component, cryptocurrency miner, backdoor, or any other form of malicious software.
  • The Windows Defender detection was a false positive caused by the executable packaging method and not by the application's source code.
  • No source code changes were required for this Hotfix release.
  • Previous releases, including v4.0.3 and all earlier versions, were also clean and safe to use.
  • Users who downloaded the original v4.1.0 release should replace it with the updated Hotfix build.

Note: This version requires the FFmpeg suite (ffmpeg.exe, ffplay.exe, and ffprobe.exe) to be present in the configured path.

For a complete list of technical changes, improvements, and fixes, see the included CHANGELOG.md.

Thank you for using melcom's FFmpeg Audio Normalizer and enjoy the Kontrollraum Edition! 🖥🎧

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