iTunes No Longer Displays LongDesc

[GoogleCodeExporter]

What steps will reproduce the problem?
1. Generate a valid mp4 file
2. Give it it long description using mp4tags 
3. Import the file into iTunes
4. Click on (i) Icon in iTunes description

What is the expected output? What do you see instead?
This used to produce a popup window with the long description.  Now it just 
reproduces the short description, leaving no way in iTunes to show the long 
description.  This may be an iTunes bug or some new way that long descriptions 
need to be marked in mp4 files.

What version of the product are you using? On what operating system?
mp4v2 checked out within the last two weeks.  iTunes 10.2.1.1, both on Windows 
7 x64 versions.  This problem however appears to have existed for some time, so 
I'd be surprised if it was an incompatibility introduced by recent versions.

Please provide any additional information below.

Here is the mp4info for a file which exhibits this problem:
mp4info version 2.0-r335
Boardwalk Empire Se. 1 Ep. 01.mp4:
Track   Type    Info
1       video   H264 High@4, 4328.824 secs, 1893 kbps, 1916x1068 @ 23.976027 fps
2       audio   MPEG-4 AAC LC, 4328.576 secs, 113 kbps, 48000 Hz
 Name: Boardwalk Empire
 Release Date: 2010
 Genre: Crime
 Cover Art pieces: 1
 Media Type: TV Show
 TV Show: Boardwalk Empire
 Short Description: At the dawn of Prohibition in January 1920, Enoch "Nucky" Thompson, treasurer of Atlantic County, hatches a scheme to make himself and his associates very rich by bootlegging liquor, entering into business with Arnold Rothstein and Charlie "Lucky" Luciano
 Long Description: At the dawn of Prohibition in January 1920, Enoch "Nucky" Thompson, treasurer of Atlantic County, hatches a scheme to make himself and his associates very rich by bootlegging liquor, entering into business with Arnold Rothstein and Charlie "Lucky" Luciano. Nucky is approached by beautiful and pregnant Margaret Schroeder, who wants his help finding her abusive husband a job. Jimmy Darmody, Nucky's former protege, returns from fighting in World War I with ambitious ideas about his future and he forges an unlikely alliance that could have serious consequences for both him and Nucky.
 TV Episode: 1
 TV Season: 1

Pressing the (i) Icon in the iTunes description no longer displays the full 
long description, but only the short description ending at "... Luciano"  
Removing the short description entirely will leave the description empty, 
rather than using the long description.

Original issue reported on code.google.com by CarlEd...@gmail.com on 16 Apr 2011 at 12:48

[GoogleCodeExporter]

If you use an older version of mp4v2, like 1.9.1, do you still not see a long 
description tag?  It'd be good to isolate this issue to a problem in mp4v2 or 
an issue with itunes, if possible?

Original comment by kid...@gmail.com on 17 Apr 2011 at 6:39

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Using the current version of iTunes, I looked at some of my older files (which 
got their longdescs using mp4v2 1.9.1).  I am positive that these used to 
display properly.  Now clicking the (i) icon in iTunes just displays the 
truncated shortdesc.

I tried creating an mp4 using only a longdesc, thinking that maybe now iTunes 
ignores the longdesc when there is a shortdesc, but these files just showed up 
as without any desc at all.

In short, this appears to be changed behavior of iTunes, rather than a newly 
introduced bug in mp4v2.  Still, the longdesc availability was useful and it 
would be nice to figure out how to get it back; it seems unlikely that Apple 
just killed reading of longdescs completely.

So if somebody more familiar with iTunes could figure how to code usable 
longdescs again, it would be much appreciated.  I volunteer to write a python 
script to recapture the longdescs which are still in files and re-munge them so 
they display again, once somebody has figured out the mechanics.

Original comment by CarlEd...@gmail.com on 17 Apr 2011 at 4:07

[GoogleCodeExporter]

This link is almost certainly related to the issue: 
https://discussions.apple.com/message/13284390?messageID=13284390
Unfortunately, I do not have an Apple system to test the proposed workaround.

Original comment by CarlEd...@gmail.com on 22 Apr 2011 at 11:19

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Any progress on this?  I wish I had an Apple system to generate the new, 
"correct" longdescs or even a sample of a file with one, but I do not, so this 
very annoying bug remains without me being able to do much to suggest a fix, 
though there must be one.

Original comment by CarlEd...@gmail.com on 27 Jul 2011 at 12:03

[GoogleCodeExporter]

i believe the newest atv update displays desc.  they have coded some change in 
it to workaround the new itunes behavior i believe.

Original comment by santinof...@hotmail.com on 27 Jul 2011 at 3:53

[GoogleCodeExporter]

For what it is worth, I just installed iTunes 10.5, and it appears to display 
the full long description again on the same mp4v2 encoded files that iTunes 
10.4 truncated them on.

Original comment by CarlEd...@gmail.com on 16 Oct 2011 at 3:17

[GoogleCodeExporter]

sounds like an itunes issue.  going to close, please let me know if I need to 
reopen.  thanks.

Original comment by kid...@gmail.com on 19 Mar 2012 at 3:26

• Changed state: WontFix