From 3b510a2ac84348fce1a066dfa5bf619e754d28ea Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: chuenchen309 <48723787+chuenchen309@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 2026 08:13:00 +0800
Subject: [PATCH 1/3] fix(autotag): "featuring" pattern in string_dist matches
 mid-word "ft"

SD_PATTERNS' featuring/feat/ft regex has no word boundary before the
alternation, so it matches "ft" embedded in ordinary words like
"draft", "left", "gift", "craft" and treats everything after it as a
low-weight suffix. "Draft Beer" vs. "Draft Whiskey" scores 0.05
(near-identical) instead of correctly registering as very different.
---
 beets/autotag/distance.py     |  2 +-
 docs/changelog.rst            |  4 ++++
 test/autotag/test_distance.py | 17 +++++++++++++++++
 3 files changed, 22 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/beets/autotag/distance.py b/beets/autotag/distance.py
index d5821f4733..6d57cfd60d 100644
--- a/beets/autotag/distance.py
+++ b/beets/autotag/distance.py
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@
 SD_PATTERNS = [
     (r"^the ", 0.1),
     (r"[\[\(]?(ep|single)[\]\)]?", 0.0),
-    (r"[\[\(]?(featuring|feat|ft)[\. :].+", 0.1),
+    (r"[\[\(]?\b(featuring|feat|ft)[\. :].+", 0.1),
     (r"\(.*?\)", 0.3),
     (r"\[.*?\]", 0.3),
     (r"(, )?(pt\.|part) .+", 0.2),
diff --git a/docs/changelog.rst b/docs/changelog.rst
index 096a35a6db..4a549dbd12 100644
--- a/docs/changelog.rst
+++ b/docs/changelog.rst
@@ -95,6 +95,10 @@ Bug fixes
   valid date/time string" error instead of crashing with an uncaught
   ``KeyError``. A ``|`` was being accepted as a relative-date unit due to a
   regular expression character-class typo.
+- Autotagging distance calculations no longer treat ordinary words containing
+  "ft" (such as "draft", "left", "gift", "craft") as a "featuring artist"
+  suffix, which was silently making genuinely different titles/artists score
+  as near-identical matches.
 
 ..
     For plugin developers
diff --git a/test/autotag/test_distance.py b/test/autotag/test_distance.py
index 15c4a7208f..03c2513c77 100644
--- a/test/autotag/test_distance.py
+++ b/test/autotag/test_distance.py
@@ -282,6 +282,23 @@ def test_matching_distance(self, string1, string2):
     def test_different_distance(self):
         assert string_dist("Some String", "Totally Different") != 0.0
 
+    @pytest.mark.parametrize(
+        "string1, string2",
+        [
+            ("Draft Beer", "Draft Whiskey"),
+            ("Left Field", "Left Symphony"),
+            ("Gift Ideas", "Gift Cards"),
+            ("Craft Beer", "Craft Wine"),
+        ],
+    )
+    def test_featuring_pattern_does_not_match_mid_word(self, string1, string2):
+        # The "featuring"/"feat"/"ft" pattern must not match "ft" embedded
+        # inside an ordinary word (draft, left, gift, craft, ...) -- doing so
+        # would treat everything after "ft" as a low-weight suffix and make
+        # genuinely different strings look almost identical instead of
+        # correctly registering as a large distance.
+        assert string_dist(string1, string2) > 0.3
+
     @pytest.mark.parametrize(
         "string1, string2, reference",
         [

From 9d7f9429b9d1ee588877342c8ae0ee48ba58b887 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: chuenchen309 <48723787+chuenchen309@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 2026 18:11:30 +0800
Subject: [PATCH 2/3] docs: reflow changelog entry to satisfy docstrfmt

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
---
 docs/changelog.rst | 4 ++--
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/docs/changelog.rst b/docs/changelog.rst
index 4a549dbd12..f4fadcdb78 100644
--- a/docs/changelog.rst
+++ b/docs/changelog.rst
@@ -97,8 +97,8 @@ Bug fixes
   regular expression character-class typo.
 - Autotagging distance calculations no longer treat ordinary words containing
   "ft" (such as "draft", "left", "gift", "craft") as a "featuring artist"
-  suffix, which was silently making genuinely different titles/artists score
-  as near-identical matches.
+  suffix, which was silently making genuinely different titles/artists score as
+  near-identical matches.
 
 ..
     For plugin developers

From f0bb4971f78a0010344932098ccfd34f2ba5cb0d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: chuenchen309 <48723787+chuenchen309@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 2026 18:42:15 +0800
Subject: [PATCH 3/3] fix(autotag): make featuring word boundary symmetric

Apply reviewer suggestion (@snejus): add a trailing \b after the
(featuring|feat|ft) alternation so the boundary is explicit on both
sides, matching the leading \b.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
---
 beets/autotag/distance.py | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/beets/autotag/distance.py b/beets/autotag/distance.py
index 6d57cfd60d..ba6d7939bf 100644
--- a/beets/autotag/distance.py
+++ b/beets/autotag/distance.py
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@
 SD_PATTERNS = [
     (r"^the ", 0.1),
     (r"[\[\(]?(ep|single)[\]\)]?", 0.0),
-    (r"[\[\(]?\b(featuring|feat|ft)[\. :].+", 0.1),
+    (r"[\[\(]?\b(featuring|feat|ft)\b[\. :].+", 0.1),
     (r"\(.*?\)", 0.3),
     (r"\[.*?\]", 0.3),
     (r"(, )?(pt\.|part) .+", 0.2),