Finding the serial number of a CD

Question

When I used this CD cataloging program on Windows, it would identify each CD by a (mostly unique) four-byte serial number, like 376b-4554. The dir command of cmd.exe would show a serial number too.

Now I'm on Linux, and trying to hack my own small CD catalog script. Is there a way to read that serial number from an inserted CD? Or, if not possible, is there any other identifier that I could use for the same purpose? (Don't suggest volume label. I have five CDs labelled "NEW".)

Most programming languages would work, shell commands are okay too.

Answer 1

Have a look at freedb, there are a lot of programs available that use their DB and identifier to look up CD related information.