Sift prepares a DJ library.

It spots fake lossless files, finds duplicates, files every track in the right format and the right place, then sends the library to Rekordbox and onto a USB drive.

One rule governs everything else: moving a track means converting it and filing it in the same gesture. Sift deletes nothing unless you ask for it, and it never modifies a folder it watches.

This manual follows the order of a working session: install, learn three words, then walk the left rail from top to bottom.

Install

One file to download, depending on your machine. Everything else on the release page serves the automatic updater and does not install: .app.tar.gz, .msi, the .sig files, latest.json. The .app.tar.gz is the classic trap: it weighs more than the .dmg, so it looks like the right one.

Every version is on the releases page. The installers are not signed, for want of an Apple or Microsoft certificate: your system shows a warning on first launch, once.

On Windows

SmartScreen announces “Windows protected your PC”. Click More info, then Run anyway.

On Mac

Open the .dmg, drag Sift into Applications, then depending on the message:

• “unidentified developer”: open System Settings › Privacy & Security, scroll down to the message about Sift and click Open Anyway;
• “Sift is damaged and can't be opened”: this message offers no button. Open Terminal and type the command below. The -r is required — a Mac application is a folder.

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/Sift.app

If the message persists: codesign --force --deep --sign - /Applications/Sift.app

Later versions install themselves, from inside the application.

Three words to know

Fake lossless. A FLAC, WAV or AIFF file built from an MP3, an AAC or an Opus. The label says lossless, but the sound has already been compressed, and that quality is not coming back. These files are sold, they circulate, and the difference is not always audible. This is what Sift looks for.

Verdict. What Sift concludes about a file, in one word:

Écarter — set aside. Taking a file out of the flow without deleting it. Two destinations: À re-sourcer, to re-source, for a fake or a truncated file to buy again elsewhere, and Corbeille, the trash, for a duplicate or a mistake. Nothing is erased until you empty the trash yourself.

The English words kept as they are

LOSSLESS, DUPLICATE, MATCH, XML, kbps, kHz, MP3, AIFF, WAV stay in English in the filters, the labels and the badges, because that is the form they take everywhere else: in Rekordbox, in the stores, on the forums. The verdict, on the other hand, is in French.

The rail, top to bottom

The left column has two parts. At the top, your sources: the folders Sift watches, each with its color, its number of pending files and its state. Clicking a source narrows the list on the Review screen (Revue) to its files. A folder with no recognized audio file is marked “0 audio”.

Below, eight screens, in the order of a working session. Ctrl+1 through Ctrl+8 go straight to them (⌘ on Mac), and Ctrl+B collapses the column.

Review (Revue)

The main screen: one track at a time, you listen, then you decide. The file list is on the left, the open track in the center, the diagnostics on the right. The list filters by category (Lossless, MP3, Faux — the fakes, Doublons — the duplicates…) and by search, Ctrl+F goes straight there.

For each track you get the player, the verdict, a metadata sheet you can edit in place, Discogs identification and the full audio diagnostics. Sound comes before the verdict: you listen, then you call it.

• Convertir — convert. The file leaves for its destination, converted to MP3, WAV or AIFF as you choose, with a filename built from the tags. The Destination menu offers the tree of your library and your other folders.
• Écarter — set aside. To À re-sourcer if the verdict is FAUX or if the file is truncated, to Corbeille otherwise. A duplicate is flagged as such, with the original track.
• Identifier — identify. Sift queries Discogs, offers matches and writes the tags you keep into the file: artist, title, label, year, genres, cover art.

Batch mode (mode Lot)

Tick tracks in the list: the center area sums up the selection (verdicts, formats, total length) and a single button files all of it. The Sélection menu takes everything, takes nothing, takes one category only, or everything but the fakes; Ctrl+A and Ctrl+Shift+A do the same. Past a certain number of files, Sift recaps before it starts, then shows progress and a report.

Log (Journal)

The full history of what Sift has done, grouped by session and by day: conversions, files set aside, identifications, syncs. Every line undoes in one click. A bulk filing that went to the wrong place comes back from here, even after restarting the application.

Filed (Rangés)

Your library as it sits on disk, in a Finder-style table: columns you customize and that are remembered, sorting, search, multiple selection with a summary panel. The cover art doubles as a play button. Right-click opens the file's location, re-runs the analysis, moves or sets aside. A bar shows the space each format takes.

To re-source (À re-sourcer)

The fake or truncated files, each with its reason. Treat this list as a shopping list: these tracks are waiting to be bought again or found elsewhere. The Restaurer button — restore — puts a track back into the Review list (Revue) if the verdict strikes you as too cautious.

Trash (Corbeille)

The duplicates and the mistakes. Nothing is erased from the disk until you empty the trash, and Sift asks for confirmation before doing it. A track is restored the same way as from À re-sourcer.

Rekordbox

A single action syncs everything: Synchroniser la sélection, sync the selection, or Tout synchroniser, sync everything. Sift compares your filed library with the Rekordbox one, groups what it proposes by type (new tracks, metadata, cover art, linked files to repair) and names each item “Artist, Title”. Two ways to write: an XML file you import into Rekordbox, or writing straight into its database.

USB drive (Clé USB)

The left column lists the removable drives. For the drive you pick, you see the space taken by each format, its characteristics (mount point, format, capacity, free space, file count, model, health) and three actions: Formater… to format, Éjecter to eject, Relire le disque to re-read the drive.

Formatting writes FAT32, the format the players read, even past the 32 GB Windows refuses. It proceeds in blocks and shows the megabytes written.

Settings (Réglages)

The categories on the left, the panel on the right. Every setting applies immediately, there is no Enregistrer (Save) button.

• Général, general: the root folder of your library. It defines the filing tree, not the conversion.
• Nommage, naming: the filename template, built from the tags, with a live preview.
• Identification, identification: your Discogs token.
• Apparence, appearance: the theme — automatic, light or dark.

Ctrl+, opens Settings (Réglages) from any screen.

The keyboard

On Mac, ⌘ replaces Ctrl.

What Sift will never do without you

• Delete a file. Setting a track aside — Écarter — moves it. Only emptying the Trash (Corbeille) erases, and it asks for confirmation.
• Modify your download folders. Sift reads them, it never writes them back.
• Write into Rekordbox without having first backed up and verified its database.
• Make an action final. Everything Sift does can be undone from the Log (Journal). On a large batch, the confirmation arms for a few moments so a double click cannot go through it.

What the detection does not see

No detector is perfect. Sift measures three things in the signal: the frequency where the spectrum stops, the density of the highs, and the grid the encoder leaves in the samples, replayed for MP3 and for AAC. On its test set (8 verified purchases, 150 transcodes built from those purchases), it accused no authentic file: that is the rule that comes first, better to let a fake through than to make you buy a good file again. Since v0.1.2, every MP3 in the test set is caught, whatever its bitrate, 320 and V0 included, and almost every AAC. What still gets through: some of the Opus, Vorbis and WMA transcodes, rated À VÉRIFIER at best, and a few AAC 128.

In plain terms: a FAUX verdict — fake — is reliable. A VRAI verdict — genuine — means that nothing measurable contradicts the file, not that it is guaranteed authentic.

What's new

v0.1.2 — the detection no longer lets bitrate fool it:

• MP3s disguised as lossless are recognized whatever their bitrate, 320 and V0 included: the probe replays the MP3 encoder and finds its grid in the samples. A lossless that cuts off between 20,000 and 20,750 Hz, the signature of a 320 MP3, turns À VÉRIFIER instead of VRAI.
• AACs too, including at 128 kbps: the probe looks at the long blocks with the window the encoder uses, and on the right bands.
• A track longer than 9 minutes is probed on its first 9 minutes instead of being skipped.

The v0.1.2 release notes.

v0.1.1 — first version published since 0.0.3. The essentials:

• An interface redone screen by screen, read against Finder, Music, Mail, Photos, Disk Utility and System Settings, then adapted to Windows habits. One bar, a sectioned rail carrying the sources (the Home screen, Accueil, is gone), a one-word verdict, batch mode and the Sélection menu, Rangés Finder-style, Journal as a table, Rekordbox in a single sync, Clé USB and Réglages redrawn.
• More reliable detection: two more signals (density of the highs, the codec's trace in the samples), the verdict replayed at startup when the engine changes, without a new analysis.
• Clé USB: FAT32 written in blocks, progress shown in megabytes, external SSDs ejected.
• Speed: analysis reports twenty times smaller, incremental deduplication.
• Intel Mac: an installer, alongside Apple silicon and Windows.

The detail is in the release notes.

If something goes wrong

Errors appear in the application with their cause. If a file refuses to analyze, its message stays visible on its row. An available update offers itself at startup.

To report a problem: github.com/c0remusic/sift/issues. Give the version, your machine, and what you expected.