Zero duration for FLAC without header

Suppose I generate a raw FLAC file, but in a streaming way where the STREAMINFO block isn’t updated after encoding:

ffmpeg -f lavfi -i "sine=1000:d=5" -f flac - > test-unknown-duration.flac

In the output file, the total sample count is zero, which is a special value for “total samples unknown”.

When loading metadata with music-metadata-browser, meadata.format.duration is zero 0.

I see that there is an option to set, {duration: true}, to force reading of the whole file to determine a duration. Even when that’s set to true, the duration ends up being zero 0.

It would be helpful in this case if the file were read to get its real duration. In the event this isn’t possible, I think it would be good if this module returned undefined or null instead.

A sample file is attached. Thanks!

test-unknown-duration.zip

[Borewit]

@bradisbell, if it no to much extra weight, will consider it for sure.

[bradisbell]

It’s about the added complexity of parsing the FLAC audio, and change code size for a very specific use case.

@Borewit Thanks for the reply, I can appreciate that concern. I’ve seen though that FLAC without header data is quite common, and I’m guessing more common than some of the other audio types that are supported. In any case, if a pull request were submitted to properly fix this issue, would you consider accepting it? Or is it purely the case that you’re trying to prevent adding any additional weight to the project?