# Zeroing COMMENT field?

**URL:** <https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075>\
**Category:** Help\
**Created:** [April 20, 2022, 7:59pm UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075 "2022-04-20T19:59:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![senorsmartypants](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.beets.io/senorsmartypants/32/589_2.png) [@senorsmartypants](https://discourse.beets.io/u/senorsmartypants)\
**Post date:** [April 20, 2022, 7:59pm UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075/1 "2022-04-20T19:59:34Z")

</div>

I have some FLAC files that beets converted to MP3s for me. The original FLAC files had a comment field with info like this.  
`EAC V1.0 beta 2, Secure Mode, Test & Copy, AccurateRip, FLAC -8`

This was saved into a ID3 field that ffprobe reports as:  
`COMMENT : EAC V1.0 beta 2, Secure Mode, Test & Copy, AccurateRip, FLAC -8`

I’m trying to get the Zero plugin to remove these. I added this to my config

```auto
zero:
    fields: comments
    comments: [EAC, Exact Audio Copy, LAME, 'ripped by', http, LameXP]
    update_database: true

```

This is not zeroing the field in question. I tried adding COMMENT to the field list

```auto
zero:
    fields: comments COMMENT
    comments: [EAC, Exact Audio Copy, LAME, 'ripped by', http, LameXP]
    COMMENT: [EAC, Exact Audio Copy, LAME, 'ripped by', http, LameXP]
    update_database: true

```

Now Zero reports that COMMENT is not a field. Which it isn’t in the beets field list.

So what am I doing wrong? How can zero these comments?

Is there a way to do a dry run with scrub? I’m curious what other fields I would lose if I scrub the files instead.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![adrian](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.beets.io/adrian/32/4_2.png) [@adrian](https://discourse.beets.io/u/adrian)\
**Post date:** [April 21, 2022, 6:37pm UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075/2 "2022-04-21T18:37:59Z")

</div>

Hi! You shouldn’t need to add `COMMENT`; only beets field names are relevant here. I’m not really sure what’s going wrong… maybe a good way to start debugging would be to remove the conditions for the `comments` field and just unconditionally zero it and see if that works? Verbose mode might help too.

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**Author:** ![djkc1072](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/77aa72/32.png) [@djkc1072](https://discourse.beets.io/u/djkc1072)\
**Post date:** [July 13, 2023, 7:56am UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075/3 "2023-07-13T07:56:34Z")

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Hi guys. I am having the same issue with removing comments. I have hundreds of random comments on tracks that I want to delete. Do I need to list all of these comments to delete them? Thanks in advance.

zero:  
fields: comments  
comments:  
update\_database: true

This 👆does not unconditionally zero

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![djkc1072](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/77aa72/32.png) [@djkc1072](https://discourse.beets.io/u/djkc1072)\
**Post date:** [July 13, 2023, 8:09am UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075/4 "2023-07-13T08:09:14Z")

</div>

zero:  
fields: comments  
comments: [EAC, Exact Audio Copy, LAME, ‘ripped by’, http, LameXP, Purchased at [Beatport.com](http://Beatport.com)]  
update\_database: true

A lot of my tracks have ‘Purchased at [Beatport.com](http://Beatport.com)’ even though I add this it still doesn’t remove from the comment on the track.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![adrian](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.beets.io/adrian/32/4_2.png) [@adrian](https://discourse.beets.io/u/adrian)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2023, 9:28pm UTC](https://discourse.beets.io/t/zeroing-comment-field/2075/5 "2023-07-14T21:28:42Z")

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Hello! Can you please put your config listings into Markdown code blocks? Otherwise, they don’t preserve indentation and other formatting.

You could also try just doing `beet modify comments=` as a one-off solution.